axcontrol, Author at AX Control, Inc.

Machine Vision is Improving Manufacturing Robotics

Machine vision can create a faster, more flexible throughput on your factory floor.

Why consider Insight 2000 Cognex or the Insight 8000 Cognex camera?

As sophisticated technologies are introduced into the manufacturing landscape, those who want to include robotics as part of their production line are looking for ways to increase the machine’s functionality, flexibility, and efficiency. This often means manufacturers are adding machine vision capability to their robotics to meet these goals. Cognex cameras are ideally designed for use as vision sensors.

Insight Cognex 2000 is ideal for use as a vision sensor. — The InSight Cognex 2000 camera

How machine vision works

For most of their existence, robotics have used sensors, PLCs, and coding to create their movements. But despite what we may have inferred from pop culture references in movies like Terminator or from cartoons, older robots have difficulty picking up and moving small parts, especially parts lacking similarities on all sides, like a screw with a tapering shank connected to a rounded head….or Princess Twilight Sparkle parts.

Is Maintenance Enough to Protect Equipment from Heat Damage?

Well-maintained equipment will pay dividends for years. But is maintenance enough?

Electrical equipment has the same need for air and cooling as human beings. Without a proper air supply, machines will flounder and fail. You have to protect equipment from heat damage, or they’ll die. But these expensive casualties don’t have to occur.

Pull out the manual for any equipment in your plant, and you’ll probably see a bolded notation stating its proper operating temperature range. Keeping equipment operating within this range makes sure those machines remain an efficient and reliable part of your operation, and avoids the cost associated with failures like unexpected shutdown, deteriorated performance, and shortened equipment life, not to mention the need to replace damaged equipment.

Sustaining proper operating temperature is especially important in CNC machines where machine precision can be affected by thermal errors. Machines running outside their proper operating range have significantly more errors than those running within range.

Is basic maintenance enough?

Basic maintenance is a good first step for protecting equipment. The primary source for damaging heat comes from within the equipment’s own enclosure. As temperatures increase, lifespan decreases: a 10C change can cut a machine’s lifespan in half. While new, clean equipment can easily maintain proper operating temperature, internal temperatures will increase as particulate matter like dust, debris, pollutants, or dispersed oil sit on the surface like a thermal blanket and create a topical barrier.

Top OSHA Violations–and How to Avoid Them in 2021

Top OSHA violations don’t change much from year to year. But you can take steps now to keep your employees safe.

When I was in my mid-twenties, I ran an in-store optical lab for one of the big national “in an hour” eyeglass chains. It was a fun but demanding job. Sometimes the lab was understaffed, and meeting those hour deadlines got tight.

One day, as I was trying to cut a few seconds off the time grinding a lens, I reached into the curve generator to move the lens to the next machine while the diamond cutting blade was still spinning–something I knew we weren’t supposed to do–and heard and felt a sudden ppzzt! as the spinning blade made contact.

Luckily for me (maybe), the blade had hit my diamond engagement ring instead of my hand, ruining the stone.

I never reached into the moving machine again. I also stopped wearing jewelry to work.

M Kenney–tech writer, AX Control

Provide Safety for Your Employees

No matter what industry your manufacturing plant is part of, providing for the safety of your employees has to be a top priority. Compliance with safety regulations prevents your workforce from accident or injury. It also keeps you from dealing with costly OSHA violations and with their ramifications, which often mean expensive shutdowns.

Proper training and implementation will help you avoid violations. It’s that simple.

But violations are also simple for compliance officers to spot. In fact, most of the top 2020 violations have been leading OSHA violations for years, some for over a decade.