EFTEC Engineering (Markdorf, Germany; www.eftec.com) has developed an automation solution for Volkswagen, Skoda Auto, and Tata Motors that streamlines the robotic application of seam sealant to join the body and roof of automobiles. To do so, they called on Sensor Control (Västerås, Sweden; www.sensorcontrol.com) for help in developing the vision alignment needed for the various robots used on the lines.
Each workstation has two OptiMaster 3-D vision systems from Sensor Control—one for each side of the car body. Each system is based on one Sony (Park Ridge, NJ, USA; www.sony.com/videocameras) HR70 camera and three StockerYale (Montreal, QC, Canada; www.stockeryale.com) red line lasers. This camera/laser assembly was mounted on the end of each robot’s arm, along with the dispensing head for the sealant. The OptiMaster software is developed using Windows Visual Studio, Visual Basic, C/C++, and Matrox Imaging Library (MIL) version 8.
Robert Hogarth, sales manager for Sensor Control, says, “The combination of integral robotic controls and enhanced vision system achieves a positioning accuracy of 0.2 mm or better, in all three dimensions. End users have told EFTEC that they have seen results as great as zero rework due to quality issues with substantial higher productivity in their auto-seam sealing process.”
