Japanese automotive parts manufacturer doubles productivity with cobots

Yoshiyasu Ogawa, Manager of the Maintenance and Die Casting Engineering Office, was involved in the development of the robot system. "Before, I was working in food industry, managing a restaurant, so I had no knowledge of robots. With the help of a distributor, Sangen Corporation, I was able to achieve what I wanted to get the cobot in operation.”

The first application deployed was the air blowing process for the workpieces after cleaning. To completely dry the complex shaped workpieces, it is necessary to blow into the holes. By attaching air nozzles to the cobot arm, it is now possible to dry even the narrow holes that are difficult to do manually.

Other UR cobots are in charge of machine tending for a series of processes involving ur machines: picking a workpiece from the conveyor, performing two leak tests, cleaning, and placing the workpiece on the finished product conveyor after air blowing. The robot hand is self-made to handle multiple processes at once.

Over the past three years, Aido Industry has installed 40 UR cobots and doubled its productivity, but this is not the only benefit of introducing cobots. "The robots cannot detect problems on their own, but when the factory employees and workers find something unsuitable in the cobot's movements, they change the robot program to make improvements,” explains Watanabe. “By incorporating human wisdom into the cobot, we can increase productivity further. I think this is a true collaboration," said Watanabe.