Now That’s “Collaborative”!
Pick-and-place product handling … simple assembly tasks … sure, or why not serving a cold beer?
Pick-and-place product handling … simple assembly tasks … sure, or why not serving a cold beer?
So-called “collaborative” robots, or “cobots,” are gaining interest and adherents among plastics molders, who welcome the idea of robots working safely side by side with humans, unrestricted by “hard” guarding.
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They also entertained and refreshed visitors to October’s K 2016 show in Dusseldorf. Among several examples at the show, Universal Robots USA, Inc. (E. Setauket, N.Y.) put one of its six-axis cobots to work at the Boy Machines Inc. exhibit, handing out freshly molded drink cups digitally printed with the recipient’s name and, on request, filled with beer. Direct transfer of the cup from the robot’s gripper to a visitor’s hand was a vivid illustration of safe collaboration.