How SHL is Expanding the Surface Treatment Market with Wandelbots NOVA
SHL has partnered with Wandelbots to develop a custom surface treatment application running on Wandelbots NOVA. By offering an application with an easy-to-use interface and fully automated path generation, SHL is making robotic surface treatment more accessible for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that focus on high-mix, low-volume manufacturing.
Project Highlights
About SHL
SHL AG, in Böttingen, is a leading systems integrator of advanced automated surface processing solutions, specializing in robotic systems for grinding, polishing, and deburring.
Objective
Create a solution to enable surface treatment process specialists to easily program KUKA, ABB, and FANUC robots.
Solution
An easy-to-use application was developed on Wandelbots NOVA to allow process specialists to automate robotic surface treatment across various workpiece materials and surface types.
Impact
SHL can now provide a self-service solution for robotic surface treatment, enabling customers with high-mix, low-volume production to benefit from industrial robots.
Challenges & Process
SHL has seen a growing demand for robotic automation among SMEs. These companies typically handle smaller batch sizes and frequently encounter new workpieces, variations, or changes in shape with each batch. The high-mix, low-volume nature of these applications require robotic solutions that involve significant reprogramming for product changeover and fine-tuning. This can create challenges for SMEs lacking in-house robotic programming experience, which may prevent them from initiating their robotic automation journey.
To address this issue, SHL aimed to create a solution to enable their customers' surface treatment experts to work alongside industrial robots for teaching and reprogramming without needing to understand the complexities of robotic programming.
Together with Wandelbots, SHL developed an intuitive end-user application on Wandelbots NOVA that empowers SMEs, even those without robotics expertise, to easily teach robots new workpieces. The application features a user-friendly interface and incorporates fully automated path generation for sanding and weld grinding processes, simplifying robot programming and enhancing operational efficiency.
This application integrates a Zivid 3D camera to scan each workpiece and generate its point cloud data. The application visualizes the data alongside an automatically generated path using path planners created in NOVA. When an external positioner is unnecessary, NOVA's conventional path planner can be utilized. This planner, designed for industrial robots, is based on inverse kinematics and intended for 6-axis movements, including linear, point-to-point (P2P), and circular motions. When an external rotating positioner is required, NOVA's Multi-Axis GPU Accelerated Motion Algorithm (MAGMA) is deployed. MAGMA is an advanced trajectory optimization tool for planning robotic motions across multiple axes. It can synchronize movements between a 6-axis robot and a 2-axis positioner, making it exceptionally useful for complex surface treatment applications. In SHL's application, MAGMA allows the robot arm to synchronize with the workpiece positioner, enabling the robot to process all of the required surfaces efficiently.
The result of these developments within Wandelbots NOVA is an easy-to-use application that empowers SHL's customers to easily scan in a new workpiece, select the desired process, and allow the robot to complete the task.
Nova helps us remove the fear of robots from SMEs by enabling process owners to program the robot themselves using easy-to-use apps. Thanks to these new programming possibilities, grinding, polishing and deburring work can be kept in Germany.
Daniel Welte
Head of Project Management
SHL AG
Impact & Results
Wandelbots NOVA allows SHL to collaborate with previously inaccessible small and medium-sized enterprises. This innovative application, built on NOVA, automates the programming of robotic surface treatment projects. By creating a user-friendly application that anyone can operate, regardless of their experience with robotics, SHL empowers its customers to take advantage of the benefits that industrial robotics has to offer.
As a result, SHL is saving their customers money on reprogramming costs while enhancing the efficiency of their own programmers. This improvement provides SHL’s programmers with additional time to manage ongoing projects alongside new ones, allowing them to easily adapt to changing customer requirements in the future.