Industrial Robot Wrist Adaptor for Visual Sensor Integration
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Solution Overview
Problem
Industrial robots equipped with visual sensors for detecting working tools and positions often interfere with workpieces and robot bodies due to their size, limiting operational paths and requiring cumbersome workarounds like detachable tools or sensors, which complicate teaching and correction processes.
Innovation Solution
A rotatable wrist flange with an end-effector supporting mechanism that accommodates the visual sensor within its structure, allowing the sensor's center of gravity to be positioned between attachment sections, minimizing interference and enabling the working tool to be in the sensor's visual field, with mechanisms for easy attachment and detachment, such as radio-communication or electromagnetic means.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If the imaging device is mounted in the vicinity of the working tool, then the working position can be detected accurately, but the imaging device interferes with the workpiece or robot body
Solution Approach 1:
The imaging device is nested within the end-effector supporting mechanism (adaptor), which is attached to the wrist flange. This nesting arrangement allows the imaging device to be positioned close to the working tool for accurate detection while being structurally integrated to avoid interference with the workpiece and robot body.
Solution Approach 2:
The imaging device is positioned in a different spatial dimension (within the adaptor structure on the wrist flange) rather than directly adjacent to the working tool, achieving both detection accuracy and interference avoidance through three-dimensional spatial arrangement.
2Measurement precision
If the imaging device is mounted on the robot arm, then the working position can be detected, but the robot arm structure becomes complex
Solution Approach 1:
The imaging device is merged with the end-effector supporting mechanism (adaptor) by attaching it to the adaptor structure. This combining approach integrates the imaging function into the existing support structure, avoiding the need for separate mounting mechanisms and reducing overall system complexity.
3Object-affected harmful factors
If the working tool is detached to mount the imaging device, then interference is eliminated, but teaching correction becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The imaging device is nested within the adaptor structure that remains attached to the wrist flange during both teaching and production phases. This eliminates the need to detach the working tool for mounting the imaging device, allowing teaching correction to proceed normally while still avoiding interference during operation.
Data Source
AI summary
An industrial robot, having an end-effector supporting mechanism for holding an end-effector and accommodating an imaging device of a visual sensor, which is free from the interference with the periphery and capable of taking an image of the working position. A container-shaped adaptor of the end-effector supporting mechanism is attached to a distal end of a wrist flange provided in a robot wrist supported by a robot arm. The adaptor has a first attachment section provided with a first attachment surface to be attached to the wrist flange, and a second attachment section provided with a second attachment surface disposed generally parallel to a wrist flange surface at a position apart from the first attachment section by a predetermined distance along a rotary center axis of the wrist flange. On the second attachment surface, a tool holding member of the end-effector supporting mechanism for holding the working tool is attached.