Robotic Roll Former Tending Cell

MWES provided our customer with a robot cell that would take flat steel cone blanks that weigh as much as 300 lbs. and are as big as 80in x 68in, and run them through a roll forming machine. The robot would be equipped with a vacuum gripper end effector and a re-grip table to square up the parts. 

The process would begin as the system operator loads a pallet of steel blanks into the infeed station with a forklift. The robot would then pick a blank off of the pallet and move it to the squaring table. Once the blank has been squared and settled the robot will then regrip the part and would use edge detection sensors to find the exact plane of the leading edge of the part. The robot then communicates with and inserts the blank into the roll forming machine.

Once the roll former has completed its forming operation on the blank, the robot then picks the part from the outfeed side of the roll former. Lastly, the robot will move the completed rolled blank to a rack in the outfeed station where the operator can safely remove the rack once it is full.