A Vision Assisted Robotic Cell for Scale Model Decoration

Summary

A vision based robotic assembly cell has been set up to examine the problems and possibilities associated with the decoration of scale models of cars. The cell consists of a pallet conveyor belt controlled by a PLC, a carmercial vision system for identification and inspection of the models, a Puma 560 robot and a tamping machine for the application of the decoration, an RTX robot for unloading the models and a commercial expert system shell. In addition, there is a facility for off-line proyLamming via a CAD workstation. The operational efficiency of the cell is dependent upon various novel robotic tools and lighting devices, these are described in detail. The paper compares the overall process of the existing factory based system with that of the robotic cell and provides some ideas for extension to further areas of the overall model production process such as automated assembly and test.