Robotics

Target Design Conciliation & Application Review

Target's engineering and sales team worked closely with the OEM's engineering, marketing, and management staff to help define the current and future needs of the product as well as selecting hardware and software to achieve these goals.

3 to N axes of high performance servo motion

N axes of normal or low performance servo motion

Potential need for some stepper motor axes

All axes are on industrial network

Ancillary axes added depending on application

Ancillary workcells added to network based upon post processing needs

Minimize wiring and assembly time

Multi-headed robot with need for collision avoidance

PC based motion control

Touch screen user interface

Linux based OS

Product Technology Selected

Based on the need for networked high performance servos and the need for flexibility, Motion Engineering's SynqNet was chosen as the industrial network and control. This provided tight integration of the motion

axes with the host PC control. It also allows axes and workcells to be added and removed from the system as needed. SynqNet also offered the high performance control loops required to meet the very high speed motion and acceleration needs. Danaher's Servostar CD-SynqNet drives were chosen for the primary axes with later migration to the Danaher S1800 series drives when they became available. robotarm

Design Implementation

The OEM implemented a user friendly drag-n-drop icon based programming language that integrated nicely with the capabilities of SynqNet's API. The networked based drives allowed quick assembly of the control panel by means of connecting power and a few cables to each drive. This reduced the build and debug time significantly as well as reducing the wiring errors.

Overall Success

The chosen system met all of the OEM's expectations and requirements. It even allowed them to patent a technique of adapting the robot's performance based upon the payload. Also, they were able to integrate an Ethernet based vision system.