MOTOMAN NEWS

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YASKAWA intends to revolutionise bonding and sealing applications
using a newly developed process
YASKAWA presents pioneering
adhesive bonding technology
A highly dynamic joining process ensures that gap variations are automatically compensated for whilst maintaining
a constant robot travel speed. The overall system features high-tech robotics components, dispensing technology and
sensor systems, and delivers unprecedented performance.
The six-axis MOTOMAN MH50 robot delivers supreme continuous path performance.
For decades, robotic welding has been
one of the central core competencies of
MOTOMAN. Following the merger with
its parent company, MOTOMAN now trades
as YASKAWA Europe. “Those with
high levels of welding expertise also
have an advantage when it comes to
related processes, such as bonding and
sealing,” affirms Ralf Raimann, bonding
specialist at YASKAWA. “Particularly with
regard to path following performance, the
demands on the robot are very similar.
Welding processes are often combined
with, or replaced by, adhesive bonding
processes. We are therefore working in
familiar territory.”
Market analysis forecasts significant
growth potential in the areas of bonding
and sealing. The number of applications
is steadily increasing in a wide range of
industries, from automotive and subsupplier
industries to aerospace and even
the defence and pharmaceutical sectors.
There is also potential for growth in areas
such as white goods, the construction
industry, solar power systems and the
processing of high-tech materials. It is for
applications such as these that the newly
developed process, for which a patent application
has been filed, is set to become
a state-of-the-art technology.
Pioneering bonding system
YASKAWA is using a pilot system, which
is soon to be used in practice, to demonstrate
next-generation bonding.
“We developed our pilot system in response
to a specific customer enquiry,”
explains Raimann. “Its task is the automated
joining of workpieces for the con-
struction industry with single-component
material. The advantage is that it is not
necessary for the workpiece to be manufactured
with great precision as our technology
enables the sealing of different
gap widths, from two to seven millimetres,
whilst maintaining a consistently high
process velocity.”
The innovative bonding system developed
by YASKAWA consists of three core
components: a six-axis MOTOMAN MH50
robot, a highly dynamic dispensing system
and the sensor system, which plays a key
role in establishing the gap width. Exact
in-line measurement of the gap width
with a 2D laser sensor is the basis for
controlling the complex process.
Various parameters – primarily the travel
speed of the robot and the dispensing
quantity – have to be controlled in real
time and coordinated with each other.
Control of the process is based on a
number of interlinking control loops.
With the innovative DX100 robot controller,
YASKAWA has achieved outstanding
process reliability and can process a wide
range of medium and high viscosity singlecomponent
materials in the system.
Highly dynamic dispensing system
In the opinion of suppliers, the Modis
dispensing system (Modular Dynamic
Dispense System) from Hilger & Kern, is
the dispensing technology of the future.