micropsi industries and DEPRAG jointly offer an automated screwdriving solution that can handle variance in manufacturing workstations. It overcomes complexities in screwdriving assembly processes that are extremely hard for most automation systems, quite expensive too. The solution is applicable to the assembly of whitegoods, electronics, automotive parts, agricultural machinery, and more.
The Challenges of Automated Screwdriving
Screwdriving assembly processes are common in all manufacturing industries. In essence, the aim of these processes is to realize a secure connection between two or more parts by means of a screw or multiple screws. While this may seem straightforward, automating a screwdriving assembly process is exceedingly difficult. This is due to several types of variance that arise in production workstations that involve screwdriving:
- Variance in the position of parts in the workstation. This makes the precise location of screw holes unpredictable. Position variance is particularly troublesome when parts cannot be fixed in a workpiece carrier. Even when parts are placed in a workpiece carrier, they can still vary in their position by up to a few millimeters.
- Variance in the part itself, a result of production tolerance, which can make the screw-hole location on a workpiece uncertain.
- Variance of the angle at which to insert a screw, owing to an unpredictable location of a screw hole or to unaligned screw holes when there are two or more parts that must be connected.
Getting around this complexity is nearly insurmountable for traditional automation systems, which require uniform conditions. As a result, many screwdriving assembly tasks must be done with human hands. The same applies to nuts, studs, and flow-form screws.
