PROJECTS
IK4-TEKNIKER is participating in the European CustomPacker project, provided with 3.8 million euros' worth of funding, for the development of an automatic packaging station for consumer electronics products.
The consumer electronics products sector is characterised by extremely high competitiveness. That is why cutting costs in production and packaging are one of the key aspects which manufacturers have turned their attention to. Today, makers of dishwashers, televisions, toasters or microwave ovens package most of their products manually. Only the production lines that process large consignments of a single product have introduced automated packaging.
The CustomPacker project has been started in order to come up with technologies designed to increase automation in the packaging of electronic goods on the European market. It is being funded through the EU’s 7th Framework Programme and aims to develop and integrate a robotised assistant that will automate the packaging of heavy, medium-sized and large goods, in co-ordination with the workers.
The project, in which IK4-TEKNIKER is participating, consists of the development of a flexible packaging station for different products which is capable of optimizing coordination between workers and robots. This co-existence between machines and workers will open up a new dimension in collaboration between workers and industrial robots.
The results of the project, which will be introduced at the plant of the company Loewe in Kronach (Germany) for testing purposes, has an application potential that goes beyond the limits of the consumer electronics sector. The people running CustomPacker anticipate that the prototypes being developed can be used in other industrial sectors in the future.
Right now, the packaging station prototype is being got ready at the facilities of the Technical University of Munich and will be shown at Automatica, the Trade Fair for Automation and Mechatronics, being hosted by Munich in May.
Organisations that have accumulated vast experience in the technologies needed to develop the packaging station form part of the consortium involved in the project. CustomPacker comprises universities, R+D centres and companies in Germany, Austria, Finland and Spain, including Loewe, the German manufacturer of electronic products, and the Finnish Institute of Technology, the VTT Research Centre. The Basque R+D centre IK4-TEKNIKER has the task of developing a mechanical gripper to handle fragile consumer goods (like televisions), which will be incorporated into the packaging station.
Human adaptability and robotic precision
The project, which was started in 2010 with a 3.8 million euro budget, of which nearly half a million euros corresponds to IK4-TEKNIKER, will end in the summer of 2013. The main aim is to cut the production cycle time, and consequently costs for the company through the automation of packaging in the mixed production lines. This system will allow several production lines to be combined into a smaller number of flexible packaging stations. Furthermore, the project sets out to maintain and enhance safety standards.
To meet this objective, the project plans to integrate the highly adaptable skills of a worker with the precision and capacity of robots for the transport of heavy goods, which will result in a highly flexible, efficient and effective packaging station. The organizations participating in the project will be using hardware devices and software modules to detect the worker and recognize his/her movements; these applications will reduce production cycle times and compensate for the introduction of this technology and the investment. .
Experience spanning 30 years
With experience spanning 30 years in research into applied technology and its transfer to companies, IK4-TEKNIKER has achieved a high degree of specialisation in four major areas (Precision Engineering and Mechatronics, Surface Engineering, Production and Automation Engineering, and Manufacturing Technologies), which enables it to put its state-of-the-art technology at the service of any kind of task.
