Industrial painting and coating technology are constantly evolving. As a result, innovative companies are always coming up with new ways to make the most of their time, energy, and resources.
Contractors, manufacturers are increasingly using these mechanical wonders to help them do what they do best – make things better!
Industrial Robots are especially appealing for large-scale painting and coating projects because they deliver precision and consistency that humans can't match. It's hard work to hand-paint or coat an entire plant, but a robot does it without breaking a sweat!
Industrial paint and coating robots are a great way to automate your painting and coating process. They allow you to produce higher quality products, reduce labor costs, increase production rates, improve accuracy and ensure consistency.
The key is understanding how painting and coating robots work so that you can get the most out of them for your company.
In this blog post, we'll be discussing what robot painters do for a living, as well as the benefits of using one in your company's manufacturing process
Why Use Industrial Robots for Painting and Coating?
Today's robot technology has led to a myriad of improvements in the workspace.
With slimmer models that can reach farther and dual-armed robots with anti-collision software for working together closely without incident, these bots are taking up less space while still performing all sorts of tasks from installing paintings like artistry on walls or shelves to ground level painting the floor tiles!
These new technologies offer some profound benefits, especially regarding safety, efficiency, and speed.
In the past, manufacturers kept robots in cages in industrial settings due to their proximity with humans and other automated machines around them.
Read more: Maintenance and Repair of Industrial Robots: What You Should Know
However, today, there are no longer complicated safety procedures for these types of robotics.
Programming determines specific space restrictions that enhance workplace protection while requiring employees to follow standard protocol on how close they get or what tasks they perform near robots.
The use of painting robots is a great way to minimize the risk for human workers.
The chemical compounds found within paints can cause adverse health effects among those who work with them occasionally
Such problems become less likely through these industrial alternatives- simply due to not being around whenever toxic chemicals might leak out into open air while performing various tasks like spraying walls and ceilings near windows where fumes could easily drift back inside.
The industrial manufacturing and aircraft finishing industry is challenging as workers retire or leave for other opportunities. Although an increasingly smaller workforce is trying to keep up with demand by doing more with less these days, some companies can't seem to get enough hands on deck!
Industrial painting robots are sophisticated machines with the capacity to paint faster and more efficiently than human hands.
By integrating these automated finishing tools into your operation, you can free up floor space for other uses while increasing productivity by eliminating repetitive tasks that would otherwise need doing on an almost daily basis.
Integrating a robot finisher into an existing business could have many benefits, including increased worker efficiency (reducing human resources requirements) and freeing up valuable workstations.
Not to mention fewer insurance costs since accidents don't happen frequently enough when using such bots around any day/night cycle due to their ability to work 24/7.
Why Should you Care about Painting and Coating your Equipment?
Equipment that looks tired and broken will not only hurt your company's image, but also the appearance of paint-covered equipment sends out an unprofessional message. In addition, keeping all metal surfaces painted in one color scheme makes for much more visually appealing facilities, leading to higher customer satisfaction rates!
The improved look removes both interior business aspects: it helps establish confidence within clients while bringing them back into regular contact due to their enhanced perception when coming across any building or machines belonging to you run!!!
However, it would help if you kept an eye out for wear-and-tear fatigue when it comes time to get new parts installed.
Read more: Using Computer Vision to Improve Health and Workplace Safety
Then, it will make things run smoothly without any pesky problems popping up between inspections from other companies.
You should also ensure that prospective clients are impressed with what you have going on at your facility.
Thermal Protection of Equipment:
Industrial equipment is sensitive to elevated temperatures, and paint manufacturers have developed various coatings that provide adequate thermal protection.
Painting and coating protect high-temperature service and also acts as insulation corrosion in varying environments. And Paints can also withstand extreme conditions like fire retardants or UV inhibitors.
Extended equipment service life:
The world of industrial equipment is an unforgiving one. Most machines take a long time to break down, so if you want your investment in painting or coating techniques, ensure that every part gets attention and care!
Please don't get caught with a used machine that's past its prime!
Extending your industrial equipment service life is a significant investment and will maximize returns.
For example, painting machinery can be restored to its original finish, which usually breaks
down within two or three years--by following basic coatings techniques.
Rust and corrosion prevention:
Corrosion and rust are two of the biggest enemies for machines, and they will eventually lead to a more significant component or even total machine failure. This prolonged downtime can be expensive if you don't take preventative measures now!
The best way to keep your machines running is by protecting them from rust and corrosion. Unfortunately, once you have an impacted component, it will be harder for the device in question; this results in prolonged downtime and extra costs!
Protecting your machines from the ravages of rust and corrosion is a surefire way to keep them running smoothly. However, this will result in prolonged downtime, extra costs for parts if it's an entire machine that fails due to this condition - not just components like before--and may even lead right back into problems with new equipment coming online later down the line!
It is essential to take care of your industrial equipment and protect it from harsh elements. In addition, the regular painting will help keep the paint job looking fresh, year after year!
Weather resistance:
The best protection for your machinery is a durable, UV-resistant coating system. These coatings can prevent oxidative damage from moisture exposure and harsh conditions like salt air corrosion or acid rain.
They also protect against fading in sunlight due to sun rays hitting an object's surface.
The yellowing happens as they absorb color over time ( paint cracking) when exposed continuously day after day without any breaks between applications, plus peeling away at raw material because of accumulated salts on its exterior.
Enhanced productivity:
With a proper maintenance schedule, your industrial equipment will last far longer than if you let it fall into disrepair. Not only that but the frequency of unplanned downtime is reduced by over half when adequately maintained!
We are talking about benefits down the road, too- with all these repairs done more effectively and less often, fewer costly breakdowns mean more enormous profits for everyone involved in any business process whatsoever!
Conclusion:
Industrial robot companies are revolutionizing their painting and coating systems. Industrial robots are now capable of spraying paints on surfaces with incredible precision, making a big difference in quality control.
These robots are faster than human painters, they can paint more surfaces at once, and they don't get tired or distracted like humans do (which means perfect consistency).
With robotic painting technology becoming more common in factories worldwide, industrial managers need to understand what this type of automation entails.
Industrial robot painting and coating technology are evolving rapidly. Industries now use robots to paint cars, boats, trains, airplanes, and even space shuttles.
The most significant advantage of using an industrial robot for painting purposes is that you can program it in advance with specific tasks for any given day or week.
Hence, there is no downtime while the machine waits around between jobs. The disadvantage? Robots require programming knowledge which means you have to hire someone who knows how to do it if you don't already have these skills on staff.
Do you know anything about robot painting and coating technology? If not, it's time to learn.
Maintenance and Repair of Industrial Robots is an important issue that many companies may overlook sometimes.
Industrial robots are a great asset to any manufacturing plant, but they require maintenance and repair. You can save time and money by knowing the basics of how to handle issues that may arise with your industrial robot. Today, we'll go over some of the most common problems you might experience with your industrial robot, as well as what you should do when these problems occur.
You'll also learn about some best practices for improving the lifespan of your industrial robot to get more from it before having to replace or repurpose it.
Robots are fantastic tools to make your company more efficient. But like any other tool, they need regular care and maintenance to stay in good working order. So to ensure that your robots are running smoothly, you should establish a plan for regular maintenance.
Multiple problems can arise with robots, other than the complete failure of the equipment.
These include- electrical malfunctions, including damaged cords or cables and wires which could lead to an electrical fire. Dangerous behavior toward staff members due to unpredictable robot actions or malfunctioning behaviors can also occur.
Position deviation in robots is another common problem where a robot is no longer staying within its intended perimeters causing issues for your business processes. Repeatability in robots is a problem where the repetitive motions performed by a machine are not occurring consistently anymore resulting in data loss or software breakdown leading to significant disruptions.
Preventative maintenance is essential to ensure that your industrial robots will function correctly and without errors. Like any other machine, robots require routine checks for them to continue running efficiently and smoothly.
The Benefits of Preventative Maintenance for Industrial Robots:
Smooth Working Conditions:
A robot that's well-maintained will work better and more efficiently. Even if a machine looks like it's working fine without preventative maintenance, you may be spending extra money on operating costs because of this lack of care. We should make sure robots are running as smoothly as possible with minimal energy use. Upkeep is necessary!
Cost-saving:
By taking care of your industrial robots, you can save money and avoid costly repairs or replacements. Preventative maintenance tasks are generally less expensive than emergency ones in the case that a breakdown happens. You'll also be able to keep everything running smoothly by avoiding unplanned downtime altogether!
Prevents Malfunctions:
By taking preventative measures, you can prolong the life of robots. Even if nothing is wrong with a robot that isn't well-cared for, it could still be putting additional stress on its parts, leading to them breaking down earlier than expected. It will not have an immediate effect, but over time, these stresses could cause severe damage and shorten the lifetime of your machine before its due date arrives.
Early Detection:
Preventative maintenance is more cost-effective than repairing issues that arise after they happen. When you do a preventive repair of an industrial robot, it saves your business time and money.
What is the Upfront Cost of an Industrial Robot?
Manufacturers need to consider several aspects when calculating the upfront cost of an industrial robot.
Firstly, while robots require someone with a hefty price tag (approximately $250k) to maintain them, they can help companies save money in other ways, such as increased productivity and reduced labor cost.
Secondly, humans incur many additional expenses that their robotic counterparts don't need to worry about; these include healthcare benefits ($10000 annually) training/recruitment fees ($2-$47 per hour depending on the country).
Human employees also require breaks now and then, which isn't necessary when utilizing advanced robotics technology! However, they also have operations and maintenance costs at around $10,000 annually compared to factory employee hourly wages that range from 2-47 dollars per hour, depending on the country.
Read more: Robot Painting & Coating Technology: Here's What You Need to Know About This Tech Revolution
Initially, the overall cost of an industrial robot (including systems engineering costs) is approximately $250,000. Furthermore, robots will also have operations and maintenance costs which we calculate at approximately $10,000 annually.
Typically, in the first 3-4 years the cost of industrial robot maintenance will be around $500 per year regarding preventive maintenance like lubrication and upgrading batteries. In the 5th year, the preventative maintenance will cost around $5,000 primarily for replacing wear items like internal wire harnesses.
In the next 6-8 years, there would be another 500 dollars spent on preventative maintenance. Still, this time it's mostly to do with greasing any moving parts and replacing the lithium-ion batteries, which should last up to about 8 or 10 years, depending on usage.
At first glance, it may seem like investing in a robotic workforce is very costly. If you consider all the expenses related to workers, such as recruiting expenditures, payroll hours loss due to accident hospitalization, etc.; they quickly add up over time.
The best robotic preventative maintenance intervals are not the same for all robots. Different mechanical companies will give you additional time frames for when your company should do maintenance on its machines, ranging from every 5,000 hours to 1 year or 3,850 operating hours. By enhancing operations, industrial robots can deliver an excellent return on investment (ROI). They include accuracy, efficiency, safety, and profitability.
Regular Maintenance Schedule for Robots:
Here are some everyday tasks that can be part of a maintenance schedule for robots, depending on the model and its usage:
Inspection:
If you notice any suspicious noise or vibration, don't assume it's nothing. Don't hesitate to talk with the manufacturer about what could be causing that weird sound. They may already know and can help prevent a more significant problem down the road before anything serious happens!
Data Backup:
Data backup is essential if your business experiences equipment failure. You can back up data individually or use software to handle all robots on the same network.
However, when it comes down to data, you should always have a plan in place for when something goes wrong. In this case, having proper backups of robot's information will be helpful if there were ever an issue with their performance and function within the workplace.
Electrical Maintenance & Battery Replacement:
Minor and major electrical work is an expected part of industrial robot maintenance. This task should be left to the professionals, as it can become hazardous if not done correctly. Also, replace the batteries in your robot arm and controller if they are not working correctly.
Read more: How Oil and Gas Industry Operators Benefit from Digital Twin Technology | Digital Twin
Maintenance needs vary depending on how often the plant operates the machine, what materials have passed through the machinery, etc. Still, your company should consider hiring experienced technicians for these tasks at least twice per year to ensure safety when using their equipment.
Cleaning:
To keep your equipment working correctly, you should investigate and clean the vents and filters weekly. Ensure that these areas are free of dust or other particles to avoid clogging. You'll also want to check for signs of wear, such as burned-out lights in light curtains. It indicates that the machine may have wiring issues.
Repairing robots can be difficult and costly, so it's essential to prepare for any eventuality. Industrial robot maintenance is a dynamic process that requires constant attention and understanding of the technology to keep your business running smoothly.
For more information or expert advice contact us anytime!
Simulation in the digital twin can help the aerospace, manufacturing, and robotics industries in many ways.
How many times have you bought a new product only to find out it's defective? It is a huge problem that has affected many people in the manufacturing industry, and with simulation, we can help! A digital twin can be used for testing products before they are released. Let me show you how this works.
Imagine we have an airplane manufactured by company ABC Corp, and they want to make sure that their new plane design will work well without any defects. To know if their plane is safe enough, they need a simulator that displays the different flight conditions to test for safety. If the makers detect any problems during this simulation, they can fix them before production begins, so no one gets hurt.
This blog post explores the importance of simulation in digital twin technology for aerospace, manufacturing, and robotics. We will discuss why simulation is essential to these industries and how we can use it to improve efficiency.
Let's get started!
Simulation in digital twin for Aerospace:
Aerospace companies have become more competent. They are using digital twins to eliminate unplanned downtime for engines and other systems. Today, airlines can keep their aircraft in service longer due to digital twins' warnings.
A digital twin is the computer model of how an asset behaves in the aviation world. It accounts for variables like weather and performance to predict outcomes. The virtual model also provides actionable advice on what to do if things go wrong based on simulated scenarios. This strategy has been so effective at airlines that aircraft are flying more hours than ever before!
Digital twins are capable of recommending mission adjustments that will decrease wear on equipment, thus increasing longevity and success rate for a given operation.
Data analytics are a vital component of digital twins and can predict when an asset will fail. The sensors receive the data in real-time on specific failure points.
The models make predictions and help determine how long the running equipment has left before needing replacement or repair. It saves companies both money and valuable resources like human labor that would otherwise go towards maintenance efforts if they were done manually instead of digitally predicted.
Read more: How Are Industries Creating New Opportunities By Combining Simulations and AI
Creating a digital twin is challenging without the necessary data. However, data about calibration details, the geometry of components, and mechanical assemblies could be enough for creating an effective model that will help improve quality assurance testing.
According to Aviation Today, "Boeing has been able to achieve up to a 40% improvement in quality of parts and systems it uses to manufacture its planes with the "digital twin." Essentially this means that before any aircraft component enters production, they are analyzed digitally using high-powered computers.
Imagine if you could test out how your new car will perform in any weather. Well, with digital twin replication that's possible! This virtual 3D model can go through a range of simulated environments like being underwater or enduring freezing temperatures - all before it ever leaves the assembly line.
Alongside these simulations are data fusion techniques that help gather information on an asset by combining different datasets such as images from sensors embedded into machines. Data fusion evolves alongside technological advances, keeping up-to-date with the piled-up data in volume, velocity, and variety. It can be crucial for businesses who want their products ready for anything life throws at them!
Data is the driving force in our industry. We produce an unimaginable amount of data every day, and it has to be processed by machines so that we can make sense out of it.
The flow from raw data to high-level understanding requires a complex fusion process at different levels: sensor-to-sensor, sensor-to model, and model--model fusion.
Designing a digital twin for one or more critical systems like airframe, propulsion & energy storage, life support, avionics, and thermal protection is recommended for success.
Digital Twin Simulation for Robotics:
For example, let's say you're building a machine that picks up parts from its bin. You want it to know where the function is and how big it is so your robot can grab them correctly without any mistakes or hiccups in production.
We need an algorithm trained by images of the items on top of our bins - which would then tell us what size each item was. We will also need a video feed captured by cameras positioned overtop these bins, giving us that cameras above images
Read more: How Digital Twins Can Help In Saving The Environment
A great example is bin-picking; people must manually place parts in many different configurations for a machine-learning algorithm to learn how it should pick up a part automatically.
This method is an example of supervised learning. When training a supervised learning algorithm, the training data will consist of inputted images paired with their correct outputs like bounding rectangles and labels describing what objects are in each image (e.g., "box," "can," etc.).
There's a lot to consider when you're teaching robots how to complete tasks. In addition to training them on what the job looks like, it also takes repetition before being trusted with delicate and potentially dangerous materials.
The robot must have had multiple rounds of practice for every task for its skill sets not only get better but continue improving overtime without any hiccups or errors that could lead to injury accidents down the line
A robust automation solution can take weeks and even months to converge, depending on the task. For example, a complex system will require more time than one which has few components. Additionally, some of your parts might be unavailable or still in production already - this could limit you from accessing them for training purposes.
"Digital Twin" is making significant leaps forward in industrial robotics, assisting manufacturers by not only setting up systems but also validating them for robust reliability using machine learning and integrated vision techniques. As a result, it can shorten the time taken significantly from months or years down to days.
In a virtual environment, the avatar replaces the real robot. So instead of spending all day in front of video screens and keyboards, it's now easy to do everything from your couch: launch a simulation on your computer and let the machine work for you!
In addition, the costs go down by about 90% because there are no lab fees or equipment setup charges.
Next, you bring your robotics into the physical world from the virtual.
The machine learning algorithm helps to learn what everyday objects and scenes look like when viewed by this device so that its actions are more in line with our expectations for how we would behave if given these inputs.
You can teach an old robot new tricks using AI-based facial recognition software!
Digital Twin: The Future of Manufacturing:
Digital twins are the future of manufacturing. With a digital twin, you can test and simulate before any mistakes happen with physical prototypes—saving time and money from costly errors that could have occurred through experimentation on materials or manufacturing processes.
In addition, manufacturers will never again risk releasing a defective product to market because they know what works beforehand thanks to their virtual representation by way of a "digital twin."
It is getting to market faster than their competitors is a challenge for companies. However, it can be possible with a digital twin as it cuts long steps shorter and reduces changes in production.
The product life cycle happens in the virtual environment where we can make all improvements much easier and quicker- perfecting efficiency and development time.
Imagine you have created this beautiful virtual prototype that has all the potential features. But, instead of wasting time test
One of the best features of digital twin technology is that it can help you predict problems before they happen. So, for example, every time one broke down, its virtual copy would start to analyze data from sensors to pinpoint any potential troubles.
It can solve many potential issues without any intervention from an operator by using predictive maintenance software that collects various sources of data through sensor readings to identify likely future complications with machinery. As a result, if you replace worn-out parts sooner rather than later, your manufacturing process will run more smoothly!
Conclusion:
Simulation in the digital twin is reducing costs for industries.
For example, ASME reported, a 2020 study says that up to 89% of all IoT platforms will have a digital twin in 2025, while nearly 36% of executives across industries understand the benefits, with half planning for implementation within just five years from now.
If you're not already familiar with the concept of digital twins, then it's time to get up-to-date. A digital twin is a virtual representation that mirrors an existing physical system in real-time.
In other words, if your company has a manufacturing plant and wants to find ways to be more productive by reducing costs or improving product quality, implementing a digital twin may help!
