This has been changing in recent years with a growing number of mechatronic programs at major universities and wildly popular programs like the First Robotics Competition.  Interest in mechatronics has spawned a wave of contests sponsored by manufacturers to educate young people about the technology and make future customers in the process.  The greater benefit is the number of creative individuals being exposed to the technology in grade school and high school.  Undoubtedly, we will all be the beneficiaries of some new inventions that will be coming in the future.

But there are still some interesting subtleties that arise in motion control.  A common problem is defining coordinated motion.  This is because the precise behavior has to be described BOTH as mechanical objectives and correctly modeled in the control system hardware.

There can be many axes of motion in a particular machine.  But they are rarely coordinated in the absolute sense.  And this is an important distinction to keep in mind during design of the control system.  Most of the axes, maybe 80% of them, will require a start signal to coordinate their operation while the equipment is operating.  Rarely do the axes require time synchronous control.

Want to know the secret?  Simple. Think of a machine that does “Tic Tac Toe” versus one that “Draws a Circle”. Tic Tac Toe can be done with simple Cartesian linear axes with no coordination, other than a start bit and a done bit.  You can have a busy signal if you want to get fancy.

Ever try to draw a circle with an Etch a Sketch?  It is harder than it looks.  Because every tiny point must be coordinated between the two separate sources of motion.

And when you draw a circle, what happens as the time constraint is decreased?  As you go faster the acceleration and inflection points of motion become much more critical.  Generally, this produces increasing error in the actual trajectory.

Which leads to the “Stump the Band” question for would-be mechatronics engineers.  What is the one variable that connects all aspects of mechanical motion and electrical control together?  Time

And there is no end of importance in this fact.

When you try to Draw A Circle, time is absolutely essential.  The incremental change in time, delta-t, will impact how precise the circle is.  And the control system programming and execution will not be of much help in regulating this.  Neither will servo tuning.

For those of you planning a multi-axis system, let me share one further time-oriented thought.  When you have two truly coordinated axes, and they can be anything, a servo following an ac frequency drive (don’t laugh, I did this once and it worked great) make sure that if you are using a PLC that the coordinated axes are on the same control module.

Most PLC’s use a separate processor to run up to 4 axes of motion at a time.  The slave axes have to all have to be on the same module or the backplane update will limit the performance of the motion.  You will see perfect performance up to some speed and then synchronism will be lost because the new position update is going through the backplane and the servo is being commanded to follow old position information.

More on this next time.

The oil industry has known for many years that oil can be extracted from shale rock by heating it.  But in the past, when oil was cheap, this process was too expensive, oil would have to be around $50/barrel to make it profitable.

Well, we hit that and more.  Recent crude pricing has been hanging out at $75 a barrel.  So it’s not surprising that shale oil has been developing in the background.  Shell Oil had fully operational pilot plants, spent the money, applied for the permits.  Shell also announced that the industry would create 10,000 jobs nationwide and capacity to directly reduce a fraction of our oil imports from foreign sources.

The Canadians were sitting on similar resources.  I guess the geology of the Rocky Mountains is the same from Colorado to Canada.  And the Canadians spent the money on pilot plants, applied for the permits and started building plants.

This is pretty big stuff.  Getting tons of rocks crushed, transported, cooked until they release their oil, distilling the oil into a usable form.  Big machinery, lots of equipment.  Lots of work.

The only difference with these two stories is that Canada has completed its first two plants and is planning on a pipeline to the US through which they are going to sell and deliver the crude to US refiners.  US Interior Secretary Salazar denied the permits to Shell Oil, at the last minute, saying that the land use was not consistent with our national goals for the use of the land.

As a former resident of Colorado, I have to say, the land in question is some of the most remote and unusable land anywhere to be found.

So what’s the deal?  Before an election it was all about the jobs coming back to the auto workers.  After the election it was jobs that are never coming back to automotive sector.

State governments have fallen victim to a similar myth in the green economy.  Alternative energy is reportedly going to bring tens of thousands of new jobs to the economy.  And government officials at the state level are trying to parlay renewable energy projects into increased employment in their states.  And that’s fair.  They should be looking for all the help they can.

But many renewable energy jobs are temporary.   A wind farm project may only employ a few hundred people and after the project is done they have to find a new project.  A new wind turbine manufacturing facility in a state is not like an automotive plant.  The plants are usually manufacturing a sub assembly or part for the wind turbine.  The actual number of people required to build a certain part may be 80-100.  Much of wind turbine machinery content is offshore.

The other “new math” of the job conversation is jobs that are “created or saved” by government intervention.  Well, that’s a tough one to prove.  I surveyed several industries using the Department of Commerce industrial output data.  For many industries the relationship is $220,000-300,000 of sales per employee.  Obviously this number can vary quite a bit.  But to “save or create” 30,000 new jobs takes sales of $7.8 Bil of new products or services.

Somebody has to spend a lot of money.  Which means that somebody also has to earn a lot of money. Government cannot spend to offset a recession.  They can only dig the hole deeper.  New products come from entrepreneurs.  And people who are working buy new products.

We need government to help create new jobs, not destroy them.

The embedded PC, which features a DDR3 memory and an Intel Core2 processor, is free of wear from moving parts, such as hard disks and fans. This compact motion control system provides maximum flexibility and accommodates centralized or decentralized machine concepts for PC-based applications or for applications that require a compact size.

It is designed for many different motion control applications with its multiple onboard interfaces. They support communication over Profinet, the open industrial Ethernet standard, as well as Ethernet interfaces that run at 10 / 100 / 1000 megabit speeds. Four USB interfaces make it simple to connect a keyboard, USB stick, printer or other devices. A DVI port rounds out the links so users can attach a display or monitor. The Simotion P320-3 can also be used in a “headless” configuration without a display, monitor or front panel.

LEDs on the front indicate the operating states, making self-diagnosis easy. The integrated power supply bridges temporary power failures. In the buffered SRAM memory, the process data is saved securely even in the event of a sudden voltage drop. Monitoring functions for the batteries, temperature and program execution are also included. The Windows Embedded Standard 2009 operating system, which increases the reliability of the system, is pre-installed. Additionally, the Simotion runtime system comes installed on the Simotion P320-3.

www.sea.siemens.com

WITTENSTEIN Aerospace & Simulation has been the control loading leader in the flight simulation market for more than a decade. The Company has taken its expertise and applied it to telerobotics, where a user controls an axis or entire vehicle remotely. WITTENSTEIN’s products provide the user with feedback of the remote axis through electrical linking and force control technology.

The main features of the sidestick systems for telerobotics are superior efficiency, compact design, and electric linking with force feedback. These result in smooth operator feel, no need for additional mechanical linkages or hydraulics, and a standard off-the-shelf system solution that utilizes standard wall-outlet power. The robust nature of the WITTENSTEIN systems allow for up to 10 axes per control module.

Sample areas of application for this technology include remote product testing for reasons due to environmental or equipment restrictions.

www.wittenstein-us.com

One aspect of artificial intelligence gave rise to expert systems.  Complex systems like diesel locomotives are very difficult to repair because of the large number of parts operating together.  Human experience accumulated after years of working with diesel locomotives needed to be captured in order to prevent each generation from having to apprentice workers over long periods of time in order to learn how to troubleshoot these systems. So programmers in the early days of AI were employed to learn and program the diagnostic procedures developed by skilled workmen over many years.

These programs were very successful.  But in no way do they replace human intelligence and insight.  This is simply an example of subtlety in programming a specific area of human experience.  Speech recognition continues to be a challenge after decades of effort, limited to transcription applications and simple material handling instructions.

Another area that came up was large scale logistical mapping, another Expert System.  What is the most economical way to use airplanes to transport people around the US?  When you think of a large air carrier and the number of airplanes, flights, destinations and how they might be mapped together to get the best use out of the airplanes, it is a problem that is too large and complex for a single human to work with.  Enter the expert system programmer.

But in none of these cases can a computer program exceed the boundaries of it’s programming.  Can the autonomous Jeep get from it’s starting point to it’s destination?  Yes.  With many man-years of programming and a vast array of computing power, proper deployment of sensors and actuators, and a lot of stored energy.

Can the autonomous Jeep perform any other task?  No.  Regardless of the sophistication, the machine cannot exceed the boundaries of it’s programming.

Can we teach machines to learn?  So far, only in the most crude and rudimentary way.  But the course of the learning is again bounded by the programming.

And again, I will defer discussion of true intelligence or consciousness.

But what robotics can do to expand it’s usefulness is to mimic simple human tasking where it is cost effective and where the robot can “outproduce” or exceed the precision of a human.  Robotic welding, for example, has reached the point where a basic robot welding cell is less than $50,000.  So the cost of entry, the learning curve and complexity of implementing a welding robot cell in a small production facility is very reasonable.

Will robots be used in “human service” applications?  Sure.  ”Robot, vacuum my living room”  No sweat.  We can already do that with a Roomba only it doesn’t have voice recognition yet.  We have robots that can mow the grass in the front yard and avoid shrubs and trees.  Very cool.

Will we have robot servants like C3PO in Star Wars?  Hopefully more intelligent, C3PO was kind of dumb.  Simple tasks like serving a drink at a bar? Yes, that’s been done too, although it doesn’t have philosophical conversations with customers.

Will robots be able to provide basic care in hospitals and for the elderly?  Anything is possible. It will come down to how far we can push the envelope of programming, safety and return on cost.  Certainly we get robots to get a cold beer from the fridge.  But if the fridge is empty can it run out to the store and get us a six pack?

Not anytime soon.

The US Department of Defense (DoD) has been seeking a way to reduce the cost of producing cast spare parts. The Advanced Technology Institute (ATI) currently leads several national collaborations that are developing advanced robotics capabilities and implementing both new and existing robotics technologies in response to the DoD’s need.

One collaboration is with the American Metalcasting Consortium (AMC). The ATI-managed AMC partner companies, like Clinkenbeard, are using robotics technologies to support legacy weapon systems; which could help meet the Defense Logistic Agency’s goal of dramatically shorter lead times for the production of legacy weapon systems parts. The patented Clinkenbeard® Toolingless Process proved that it could reduce lead times for military cast spare parts from six to twelve months to six to twelve days.

The results, according to ATI, also demonstrated that the Toolingless Process can reduce capital investment by as much as 35%, reduce individual parts cost by up to 20%, and improve cycle time by 25%.

Lead times often exceed a year because technical data may require reworking, including the development of a solid model of the part. But, even when a solid model is generated first, the Clinkenbeard process can supply a cast part in less than a month. The secret is computer-generated molds with no tooling.

The Toolingless Process consists of machining sand cores and molds, and is accurate. According to the company, this process can reduce the lead-time to obtain development castings by up to 90%. With this process, you can:

• eliminate the need for prototype tooling, depending on project requirements.

• make and test multiple design iterations during product development, from the simple to complex parts.

• reduce the cost of production tooling for one-of and small quantities.

• obtain accurate, prototype parts while large quantity tooling is made.

• eliminate tooling inventory.

• match exact production core materials and chemical levels so that prototype castings emulate production.

• incorporate engineering changes into high-volume production sand cores.

Clinkenbeard developed the sand machining process using CNC machining centers. By using robots with sand machining, company technicians can use the process on much larger molds and cores. Robotic technology will reduce the cost dramatically compared to the same expenditure for CNC machining centers.

Clinkenbeard
www.clinkenbeard.com

American Metal Consortium

http://amc.aticorp.org/

Defense Logistic Agency
www.dla.mil

Advanced Technology Institute (ATI)
www.aticorp.org

Researchers at Tehran University, in Iran, unveiled last month an adult-sized humanoid robot called Surena 2.

The initial press reports in Iran’s official news media didn’t include many details, saying only it could “walk like a human being but at a slower pace” and perform some other tasks, and there were questions about the robot’s real capabilities.

IEEE Spectrum obtained more information about Surena, as well as images and videos showing that the robot can indeed walk — and even stand on one leg.

Aghil Yousefi-Koma, a professor of engineering at the University of Tehran who lead the Surena project, tells me that the goal is to explore “both theoretical and experimental aspects of bipedal locomotion.”

The humanoid relies on gyroscopes and accelerometers to remain in balance and move its legs, still very slowly, but Yousefi-Koma says his team is developing a “feedback control system that provides dynamic balance, yielding a much more human-like motion.”

Surena 2, which weighs in at 45 kilograms and is 1.45 meter high, has a total of 22 degrees of freedom: each leg has 6 DOF, each arm 4 DOF, and the head 2 DOF. An operator uses a remote control to make the robot walk and move its arms and head. The robot can also bow. Watch:

Surena doesn’t have the agile arms of Hubo, the powerful legs of Petman, or the charisma of Asimo — but hey, this is only the robot’s second-generation, built by a team of 20 engineers and students in less than two years. A first version of the robot, much simpler, with only 8 DOF, was demonstrated in late 2008.

Yousefi-Koma, who is director of both the Center for Advanced Vehicles (CAV) and the Advanced Dynamic and Control Systems Laboratory (ADCSL) at the University of Tehran, says another goal of the project is to “to demonstrate to students and to the public the excitement of a career in engineering.”

Next the researchers plan to develop speech and vision capabilities and improve the robot’s mobility and dexterity. They also plan to give Surena “a higher level of machine intelligence,” he says, “suitable for various industrial, medical, and household applications.”

The robot was unveiled by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on July 3rd in Tehran as part of the country’s celebration of “Industry and Mine Day.” The robot is a joint project between the Center for Advanced Vehicles and the R&D Society of Iranian Industries and Mines.

Part of the problem may have to do with our use of the word “intelligence”.  We talk about the increasing “intelligence” of processors and particularly about the cost of “intelligent” control dropping to the point where it is suddenly economical to put a microcontroller together with a motor in order to achieve new levels of performance in either energy management or some other critical parameter.  Which opens new performance capability in robot design.

Increasingly, industrial robotics involve the use of vision systems to acquire information about the location and orientation of parts so that the robot system can interface smoothly to the “real world”.  If any of you have been to an industrial trade show and witnessed the Delta Robots making cookies, it is a very impressive sight to behold.  Incredible throughput and accuracy.  And that’s what it’s all about in industry. Higher productivity, improved product quality.

But where is the line between remote control and automatic control?  A remote manipulator for working in the nuclear industry, which was the big application that drove early robots, is a remote servo loop operating a series of servo motors and controls and powering mechanical systems, in order to do work that is dangerous to humans from a safe distance.  The DaVinci medical robot is a phenomenally improved version of the same thing.  A remote controlled robot, guided by direct haptic inputs from a surgeon, and with very sophistical tactile feedbacks, whose end effectors operate a variety of surgical instruments and actually increase the precision and speed with which doctors may perform certain procedures.

Is this a robot? Sure!

When we watch welding and painting robots making cars, we are watching decades of technology development in action.  There has been significant effort to improve the actuator hardware, and probably many man-years of software development to improve our description of the task and its safety and performance constraints in order to create not only reliable, but increasingly efficient machines to do the tasks that humans cannot compete with for productivity.  These are very sophisticated automatic applications, but certainly not autonomous.  The boundaries of the application and the programming for it are very finite.  Again, its about repetition, speed and accuracy.

And, yes, we call these robots, too.

But increasingly, there is discussion about the next frontier of robotics.  Where are the next big apps coming from?  Most of the big robotic companies in Japan and Europe are talking about personal service robots.  You can let your imagination run wild here.  Anything is possible. Certainly the service robot for NASA is interesting because it, again, follows the concept of doing tasks where it is difficult for humans to operate.

Is a Jeep that can be programmed to find a path and drive from one place to another autonomously a robot?  Yes, but we may be pushing the boundaries here just a bit.  These applications fall into the realm of Artificial Intelligence.  The programming and software languages for which were just being described for the first time about 30 years ago.  And at this point we are forced into the debate about what is intelligence.  In addition, are these systems which are capable of “learning” and what is learning exactly?  And more importantly, as all good science fiction movie watchers will ask, can a machine exceed it’s programming?  (See?  I didn’t even start on consciousness yet)

These are all serious considerations for the Future of Robotics which I will pick up further next week.

The new sizes 300 and 500 meet the highest requirements concerning torque, compactness and dynamics. Features include high rigidity, extreme precision and excellent performance, making the TPM+ 300/500 actuators a fundamental contribution to increase the productivity of any machine.

Technical specifications at a glance:

- Torque up to 10,000 Nm

- Compact design coupling the alpha TP+ 300/500 gearbox and 220 series motors

- Optional strengthened output bearing (special gear housing)

www.wittenstein-us.com