Effective Robotic GriNDing of Surface Areas through HORSE framework
ENDORSE
PROJECT TITLE

Effective Robotic GriNDing of Surface Areas through HORSE framework – ENDORSE

PROJECT KOORDINATOR

Innovation centre Nikola Tesla

PROJECT DURATION

9 months (01. 10. 2018 – 30. 06. 2019)

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

To address the persistent shortage of skilled labor and demand for high-quality products, Enikon Aerospace has begun automating the sanding process, which is vital for surface preparation before a quality final paint application. Automating this process has several advantages: i) consistent quality of the final product, ii) no human errors, iii) loss of materials is reduced to a minimum and c) reduction of employee exposure in an empty atmosphere.

Although the current robotic grinding workstation can machine up to 75% of the object’s surface, the time the robot spends grinding the object is only 8% of the total processing time. The other 92% of the time, the object is handled and processed by human workers. Since grinding produces very fine dust, the most important goal of this project is to shorten the time a human worker has to spend in such dangerous conditions. For this purpose, another robot will be added to the processing process. The use of more agile and human-acceptable robotic manipulators in this process will result in an increase in the percentage of areas of objects processed by the robot, as human workers will be able to teach the robot how to grind more complex parts. In order to shorten the time in which the human worker processes the object, an automated quality control system will be developed using the above-mentioned agile robot equipped with lasers.

 

PROJECT PARTNERS