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Estonian Journal of Engineering

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Open Access Journal

Implementation of robot welding cells using modular approach; pp. 317–327

PDF | doi: 10.3176/eng.2010.4.07

Authors

Martinš Sarkans, Lembit Roosimölder

Abstract

During recent years the automation of production processes in small and medium enterprises (SME-s) has been a subject of growing interest. The economy of scale and increased volume of production can be achieved by selecting the right strategy for the automation. The automation systems are as a rule complex and their implementation is resource consuming for SME-s. In the present paper we study implementation of robot welding cells in several enterprises. It is shown that introducing robot welding cells in SME-s is a difficult task because of the limited resources and lack of the needed competence in SME-s. For successful realization of automation projects the complex systems must be divided into smaller and simpler parts using modular approach. The success of the project can be achieved through suitable definition of the modules. This makes it possible to implement the project steps in parallel by involving the needed resources.

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