Posts by Mike789

Can someone provide the correct/surefire way of making the ownership set correctly between Safety EIP on the robot and CompactLogix?

I've done about 10 FANUC thus far (i30plus), and every time it is just a few hours of frustration until enough button pushes and restarts seem to work...

IP address is always correct, correct byte length as we rarely change them. Never an issue pinging between units. Never have an issue if just run non-safe EIP. It seems purely to do with the ownership setting for safety.

With Safety EIP the robot or the PLC always gets in a state of the ownership not getting set on the robot; or the ownership can't be reset and redone to match the PLC. i.e Can't get the robot to change the FFFF-FFFF etc to that of the PLC, or you get a key AHGB_HYTG etc, but can't then update it as you change the PLC.

The solution we have is really enough swearing and random combination of enabling and disabling coms on both ends, robot restarts, plc in and out of programming mode. What normally happens is it magically just sets itself out of the blue, but unfortunately in such a frustration you've already created a new signature in the PLC.....

Normally have grey-out options in the PLC for ownership reset or refresh etc; Sometimes will appear and then just get a warning module not responding etc...

Hi

We're looking at Palletiser much simpler than normal and run all control from the robot. Does the PMC option have the ability to talk with external IO devices rather than internal hardware IO?

i.e if we have EIP master, can I control and read to VSD and IO blocks from PMC?

I believe it will with the correct IO configuration, but it's not that concrete in the manual?

Robot controllers should be installed inline with their SCCR rating; those ratings are on the low end of the spectrum for ArcFlash harzard. (The ratings will be in the specification of the control manuals)

I don't think I've ever seen a robot installed with a feed greater than 16kA; everything I do is the standard 10kA and that is more than enough to run a robot.

Assuming you're overall electrical feed complies; the only time you should need full arcflash PPE is if you have a panel mount controller that is feed with a much higher SCCR rating. And in that case, I'd question if the panel mount controller should be installed in such a enclosure.... I haven't looked for a long time, the ratings would exceed 10kA; but certainty won't be in the range of +50kA....

Is there anybody out there who has pushed multiple brands of laser seam tracking products to their limits? and if there is any significant difference in software intelligence once you push the application to the limit?

I do have plenty of robot vision experience with both smart devices, and PC based architectures across all sorts of applications. I have used dedicated welding seam trackers in the past, but nothing hard and never had to take to the edge of potential. I do want to keep with natively ABB supported options of Servo-Robot, Meta-Vision or Scansonic; some others I’m interested later, but not for this project.

I've done all the product research and evaluation I can, but I need to make a call on a unit;

The servo-robot unit looks the most elegant, but I’m leaning towards Scansonic THD6 because 6D tracking should be more beneficial for pre-scanning on some complex joints; and they’re the only supplier with “local” support. (I might also be able to use it for part alignment over another dedicated wide area 3D scanner; straight 3D systems won't really do it).

What I can’t tell is the performance advantage from each manufacturers internal software.

Bit old so you've probably already made your decision.

Either would be good robot once complete; but I avoid Kuka like the plague unless have a good reason. This is coming from someone who not only does robots, but machine vision, machine learning automation; programming and fault finding skill is not an issue...

The equipment is good; but Kuka really only seems to care about marketing and sales. Their post sales engineering tools and quality of documentation makes them nightmare of a manufacturer. That is what you'll actually care about once the robot turns up.

If your background is ABB then you're probably taking the engineering tools and documentation for granted; no other brand compares at all (why I actual prefer ABB); Kuka is the complete opposite end of the spectrum.

FANUC tools are functional but like using windows 95... Most of the others are workable, but I wouldn't pay for them... I'd use robotDK instead.

Certainly, anything "hard" I'd want to use ABB or Kuka since programming is much more powerful; (Kawasaki, Yasakawa, FANUC are like something from the 1970s....) But if there is an ABB option I'd take it every time over Kuka.

And Kuka's level of documentation; well the first time I asked for the KRL programming manual I went back to Kuka asking for the full version believing I'd been sent the "quick start." A good chunk of it was found wrong; or non existent details... You love it when it "details" a function; but doesn't give any information on the parameter you pass; or rarely any have example code to show a working example.

KRL also has some really annoying and awkward work arounds on par with FANUC TP.

FANUC, Kawasaki documentation can be hard to follow since poor translation to English; but at least highly detailed and complete. For all its 1970s I do like the FANUC as #2; I'll happily take all the clunky elements over Kuka's mess.

btw;

If you're a beginner; nothing you'll do will require ABB or Kuka over FANUC/Kawasaki/Yasakawa.

For that payload, I'd look at FANUC or Kawasaki options in addition to ABB.