CHICAGO—Yushin America Inc. was running a molding work cell with several of its new robots at NPE 1997. Yushin also showed a new, easy-to-use controller and what the company claims is the world's fastest robot for injection molding.
Yushin's DRD robot can remove parts from injection presses in less than 0.15 seconds. DRD was designed for molding compact discs. It can be used in any high-speed application for removing small parts, on presses with clamping forces to 100 tons. Designed for removing parts from the rear of the press, the DRD is a side-entry, swing-arm type robot.
Another new, fast-paced robot, the SX-150NII, removes parts in 0.35 seconds. Yushin said most robots have just one axis, but this robot has a second, ``kick'' axis, so it can be adapted easily to a variety of molds.
Another new product, the Airliner AB Series of traversing robots, have air drives on all three axes. They are designed to remove parts from presses with clamping forces of 50-300 tons.
A hand-held controller allows an operator to call up any of 99 setups stored in memory.
Yushin said its new E-Touch Controller is available on its Netliner VN-II. The portable controller features a computer screen, measuring 11 inches by 11 inches, that displays information in intuitive graphics and uses simple language.
The controller shows the robot in three dimensions. ``You can literally touch the picture and make the robot move. It's that easy,'' said John Mallon, president of Yushin America in Cranston, R.I.
``Molding robots are often underutilized because they are too complex for shop floor personnel,'' Mallon said. ``This controller allows operators to program and run robots with a minimum of training.''
Yushin also showed a cell with a side-entry robot removing parts from one press and loading them to a hot stamper for decorating. A pick-and-place robot moved the inserts from the stamper and put them onto a conveyor to go to a second station, where a top-entry robot placed them into a second press for overmolding.
Finished parts are removed by a robot, then decorated, serialized and placed in trays, which then are stacked. An automated guide vehicle picked up the parts.
NPE was held June 16-20 in Chicago.