CASE STUDY

Stamped parts are picked up from the press and grinding machine, placed in the correct position in the tool carrier by a scara robot and then forwarded to the pass-through washer. The cycle time is less than 2 seconds per part. 

Stamped parts run through a number of processing stages as unfinished parts before ultimately leaving the production process as finished products. In the case in question, the parts are stamped at the first processing station. Some then undergo a cleaning process to get rid of any chips.

At a further processing station the unfinished products are grinded, meaning they have to be subsequently cleaned of any emulsions and chips in a pass-through washer.

However, in both cases the cleaning processes are significantly faster than the following processing stages, which frequently results in waiting times and bottlenecks at the end of the pass-through washer.

In order to even out the process and reduce the level of personnel required to implement the procedures, future loading and unloading on the various production machines was to be automated.

Our automation solution picks the stamped parts from the fine blanking press and transports them along a conveyor belt. A sensor identifies the contaminated unfinished parts and positions them ready to be picked up for cleaning.

The contaminated unfinished parts are picked up by a pneumatic vacuum gripper attached to a scara robot, which lays the parts in the right position in a tool carrier and conveys them to the pass-through washer. Because 5 parts are simultaneously put through the pass-through washer on the tool carrier, the throughput of parts is increased significantly.

After the unfinished parts have passed through the washer, the robot sweeps over the tool carrier with its pneumatic vacuum gripper. Its light sensor recognises the precise position of the unfinished parts so that it is able to smoothly and fully automatically remove the cleaned parts and accurately place them in a magazine.

Integration of a robot to unload the pass-through washer enables a cycle time of less than 2 seconds per part to be achieved, while the use of a rotating magazine ensures that no downtime results from unloading the magazine.

The unloading unit is connected to the pass-through washer via an input and output so that signals that run along the entire production line can be processed and, where necessary, emitted.

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