Engineers Demonstrate Key Step in Robotic Disassembly
September 2, 2019 | University of BirminghamEstimated reading time: 1 minute
Engineers at the University of Birmingham have successfully designed a robotic system that can perform a key task in disassembling component parts.
The research is an important advance for manufacturers looking for more efficient ways to build products from a combination of reused, repaired and new parts.
Known as remanufacturing, this process is becoming increasingly commonplace in manufacturing and is attractive because it can use as little as 10% of the energy and raw materials required to build the product from scratch. It can also reduce CO2 emissions by more than 80%.
A key part of the process is the ability to disassemble the ‘core’, the returned product. It’s a challenge because of the huge variety within these products, with lots of unknowns in the size, shape and condition of components.
The new study, published in Royal Society Open Science, demonstrates a process for removing pins from holes – components like these are extremely common in a wide variety of machines, such as internal combustion engines. The research is the first to investigate this operation in depth and identify the key parameters required to automate the process.
Yongquan Zhang, of the Autonomous Remanufacturing Laboratory, in the Department of Mechanical Engineeringat the University of Birmingham is lead author on the paper. “Processes currently used for automating disassembly are fairly ad hoc,” he explained. “We need to be able to design robust systems that can handle the uncertainties that are inherent in disassembly processes – and to do that, we need a better fundamental understanding of disassembly.”
“The results of this study demonstrate how that fundamental understanding can be used to design robotic systems for reliably performing one common disassembly operation.”
Suggested Items
Synopsys, Samsung Electronics Collaborate to Achieve First Production Tapeout of Flagship Mobile CPU
05/03/2024 | PRNewswireSynopsys, Inc. announced that Samsung Electronics has achieved successful production tapeout for its high-performance mobile SoC design, including flagship CPUs and GPUs, with 300MHz higher performance using Synopsys.ai™ full stack AI-driven EDA suite and a broad portfolio of Synopsys IP on Samsung Foundry's latest Gate-All-Around (GAA) process technologies.
Altair Acquires Research in Flight, Forging a New Path for Aerodynamic Analysis
05/03/2024 | AltairAltair a global leader in computational intelligence, announced it has acquired Research in Flight, maker of FlightStream®, which provides computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software with a large footprint in the aerospace and defense sector and a growing presence in marine, energy, turbomachinery, and automotive applications.
Real Time with… IPC APEX EXPO 2024: Software Solutions for Circuit Board Challenges
05/03/2024 | Real Time with...IPC APEX EXPONolan Johnson speaks with Will Webb from Aster Technologies about their software solutions for design teams, manufacturing, test engineers, and process engineers. Aster's software addresses the increasing complexities of circuit boards and the need for alternative testing methods.
Real Time with… IPC APEX EXPO 2024: My Role as a Technology Solutions Director
05/02/2024 | Real Time with...IPC APEX EXPOPeter Tranitz, senior director of technology solutions at IPC, shares insights into his role as the design initiative lead. He details his advocacy work, industry support, and the responsibilities of the design initiative committee. The conversation also covers the revamping of standards, the IPC Design Competition, and the implementation of design rules in software tools.
Real Time with… IPC APEX EXPO 2024: Ventec Discusses New Pro-bond Family of Advanced Products
05/01/2024 | Real Time with...IPC APEX EXPOChris Hanson, Ventec's Global Head of IMS Technology, outlines the launch of four pro-bond formulas that deliver an outstanding combination of low dissipation factor (Df) with a dielectric constant (Dk) range to maximize the design window for critical PCB parameters. As Chris points out, Pro-bond is designed for low-loss, high-speed applications, while thermal-bond dissipates heat from a component through the board to a heat sink.