FANUC Develops Automated Vehicle Floor-Plug System for GM; No More Bending and Twisting for Workers
FANUC and GM have maintained a long partnership in the production of automobiles. In the latest example, FANUC helped GM by providing an automated system to insert floor plugs.
FANUC worked with General Motors to automate the insertion of floor plugs to help relieve workers from having to bend and twist to do this process manually.
Now, vision-guided robots locate and insert plugs, providing several benefits that have led to higher productivity, including ergonomic improvements and better quality control of the error-proofing process.
"Traditionally, floor plug installation is done manually by team members. The plugs are located in various positions on the floor pan. Sometimes the operator has to twist and bend to get to a hard-to-reach location," says David Trudell, Staff Engineer at GM.
But now, the automation relieves that ergonomic strain, provides quality control, and improves production time.
The first step of the automation process was to validate that the robot could stack and dispense the plugs, followed by the plug feeding. Eventually, the entire system was tested and approved.
"FANUC set up the plug feeding system and ran several million cycles to validate that the system was reliable enough to go into production," says Matt Sikowski, Director of Engineering at FANUC.
FANUC uses the iRVision to check the orientation and position of the plugs. If the robot detects an error, it alerts the operator who can check the plug manually to make sure the plug was properly installed.
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