THE National Manufacturing Institute Scotland (NMIS) is an industry-led international centre of manufacturing expertise, operated by the University of Strathclyde and part of the UK High Value Manufacturing Catapult network. A key part of its role to the manufacturing sector is to showcase groundbreaking technology to demonstrate what is possible, as well as inspiring a new generation of engineers and technologists to work in the industry.
NMIS had put out a tender for machinery that would showcase an end-to-end Industry 4.0 demonstrator in a manufacturing environment. Having been awarded the project through a competitively tendered bid process, Beckhoff UK provided a maglev transport system working alongside a cobot.
“They wanted something eye-catching in the building, so had a preference for magnetic transportation systems,” said Jamie Withers, application engineer at Beckhoff. “It was also specified that the equipment should generate lots of data, which could be accessed and used by anyone. The demonstration needed to be relevant to industry, but also accessible to student visitors too and the general public too.”
Beckhoff proposed a magnetic levitation (maglev) transport system that would work in conjunction with a collaborative robot from Universal Robots. Visitors could interact with it via a human machine interface (HMI) where they would pick from a selection of coloured and coded resin cubes, a process designed to loosely replicate selecting a product.
After selection, the cobot would move the cubes onto the ‘movers’, small pucks that levitate above the magnetic tiles, where they would be transported across the tiles and fed past a vision system that would process data about each of the cubes. Users could see data about their cubes in real-time. The entire system would operate using a single control system, utilising Beckhoff’s TwinCAT software suite.
The idea behind a maglev transportation system is similar to maglev trains. A maglev transport system like Beckhoff’s XPlanar uses magnetic levitation and advanced control systems to enable ‘contactless, precise, and highly flexible’ movement of ‘movers’ on a planar surface. The contactless element reduces maintenance and cleaning requirements as there is no friction between the moving parts.
Unlike traditional maglev systems, which are typically linear, XPlanar operates on a two-dimensional plane and offers six degrees of freedom, said to provide greater versatility in industrial applications. It is described as a transformative technology for flexible and high-precision automation tasks. Demonstrating how this would work in conjunction with a cobot was also important.
The demonstration was designed by Beckhoff’s engineers to strike a balance between allowing users to interact with the machine and have fun, while also demonstrating how it could be used in industrial sectors like pharmaceuticals and food and beverage.
“Many companies still operating in Industry 3.0 are unaware that this technology is even feasible, so showing how it can work was important,” Jamie added.
Machine vision is increasingly important in industry, so Beckhoff wanted to demonstrate how XPlanar could work alongside a vision system and provide object character recognition (OCR) and traceability. Each cube that passed through the system had a unique QR code, allowing it to be correctly identified and data gathered and shared with the user in real-time.
Another growing demand from is the ability to carry out batch-of-one manufacturing. An order can have unique requirements and this can go directly to a factory’s manufacturing execution system (MES), so long as the capability for batch of one manufacturing exists. The demonstrator was designed to simulate scenarios like this, with users or ‘customers’ able to select different colour blocks with different icons on them. The vision system would help identify each block with OCR, relaying data to the user through the HMI.
The controller running the maglev system was the same controller processing all of the image information.
“That’s quite a unique place to be,” commented Adam Carless, business development manager and Beckhoff’s leading vision specialist in the UK. The feat was achieved by splitting the high-speed processing with the comparatively slower image processing, using the real-time platform provided by TwinCAT.
“It’s quite easy to get fixated on what the machine does, but the programming of it and the software piece around it is part of why it was such a good demonstrator,” Adam added. “TwinCAT 3 allows multiple programmers from different disciplines to work together on a project without source control conflicts and passing tag information between PLC, motion, HMI and vision is seamless.”
Another challenge for the demonstration was showing how this technology could improve efficiency.
Gathering data on how much power the machine was using was a key aspect. There was a three-phased connection going into the machine, which was continuously monitored to see how efficiently power was being used. This monitoring was also a first for the maglev system, which was found to have lower power consumption than expected when it was running.
To make the machine as eco-friendly as possible, the team developed an eco-saving mode, where the machine would be put into sleep mode and consume less power automatically if it was inactive for a period of time.
“A lot of the companies we work with are still in Industry 3.0,” said John Reilly, connectivity theme lead at NMIS. “We wanted something that touched all areas of Industry 4.0 with a design that was interchangeable for different sectors, to show them what is possible.”
As well as demonstrating the possibilities of this technology, helping inspire the next generation of technologists is also a key rationale for NMIS. “The facility is open to the public and we regularly host tours of school children,” John explained. “People who can program and understand data often end up working for tech companies, but we want to inspire them to pursue careers in manufacturing too.”
You can visit the XPlanar demonstration in person at the NMIS. To find out how to get started with XPlanar you can read more here.
