ELVIS takes you to learn about the characteristics and development history of truss manipulators
Features of truss robotic arm products:
1. Efficient - Its axes run in a straight line at extremely high speeds, and can be quickly responded to by servo motors;
2. Stable - minimal repeatability error, up to 0.05mm;
3. High intensity -7x24 hours of work, no need to eat, sleep, smoke, etc;
4. High precision - positioning accuracy can reach 0.02mm (due to production cost reasons, positioning accuracy can be appropriately enlarged according to usage conditions);
5. High cost-effectiveness - Compared to articulated robots, they have a larger load weight and lower production costs, making them suitable for the basic national conditions of "China's intelligent manufacturing";
6. Easy to operate - based on the Cartesian coordinate system, its motion parameters are relatively simple.
Development history of truss manipulators:
Mechanical arms were first developed in the United States and have been widely used abroad.
In 1958, the United States Joint Control Company developed the first robotic arm.
Its structure is: a rotating long arm is installed on the body, and a workpiece gripping and releasing mechanism with an electromagnetic block is installed on the top. The control system is in a teaching shape.
In 1962, United Control Company of the United States developed a CNC teaching and reproducing robotic arm based on the above plan. The business name is Unimate (i.e. Universal Automatic). The motion system is modeled after a tank turret, with arms that can rotate, pitch, retract, and be hydraulically driven; The control system uses magnetic drums as storage devices. Many spherical coordinate universal robotic arms have developed on this basis. In the same year, the American mechanical manufacturing company also successfully experimented with a robotic arm called Vewrsatran. The central pillar of this robotic arm can rotate and lift using a hydraulic drive control system, which is also a demonstration and reproduction type. These two types of robotic arms that emerged in the early 1960s laid the foundation for the development of industrial robotic arms abroad.
In 1978, Unimate and Stanford University, along with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, jointly developed a Unimate Vicart industrial robotic arm equipped with a small electronic computer for control during assembly operations, with a positioning error of less than ± 1 millimeter. KnKa, a German company, also produces a spot welding robot arm with a joint structure and program control.