Robots: Food for thought

By Bob Struijk

Contrary to popular belief, the main driver to use robots isn’t cutting labour costs. Robots improve the productivity of expensive production lines by ensuring that manufacturing operations move at a constant pace with minimal machine idle time. A robot is a mere component of any production line, albeit a highly flexible and reliable one. Hard automation might fulfil a dedicated function, but comes at a high price: the grouping of various valves, cylinders, sensors, motors and controls come not even close to the reliability of a robot, with up-times of 99.99 percent. Robots allow faster and easier set-up when change-over occurs at the line. And it is not only the big automakers that use robots. Robots have been in factories since 1962 and are a mature technology. Companies with

Second reason why robots can help your business is higher quality and lower scrap. Robots provide higher quality and yield because of more controllable, predictable and repeatable process consistencies. Imagine for your production process if you would only have half of the current rework/scrap costs. Or likewise, what is your current number of customer returns/rejects? Could this be reduced drastically if robots were used? Lessons learned in the automobile industry are now being deployed in the food industry, from cutting raw meat with robots (increasing the quality of the cut hence the price/Kg) to handling of salads and fruits (time to market is faster, putting fresher produce on the supermarket's shelves).

Of course labour costs can also be reduced by applying robots. Robots reduce direct manufacturing labour needs and improve labour deployment. Also important to mention are the improved ergonomics and worker safety. By using robots humans can be removed from hazardous and unhealthy processes, such as exposure to gases, acids, extreme temperatures, lifting weights, or avoiding strenuous repetitive motions that provoke injuries. It is a myth however that robots will eliminate all production labour costs. In reality we can state that robots are not panaceas; there will always be some jobs for which people are better than robots. Think also about employee training and turnover. There is a substantial reduction in HR related costs when using robots in your production line instead of human labour: less cost for hiring, training, safety clothes and equipment etc. These hidden costs are often forgotten while calculating the ROI on robot related investments.

With the crisis at hand and the rising pressure from low cost countries many small company owners think that robots are too expensive to set up and to maintain. We see that as with personal computers, prices have declined over the past decades while ease of use and performance has improved. Robots are considered commodities. And thanks to the powerful evolution of CPU's the programming of robots is surprisingly easy. Line operators take ownership of these flexible automation solutions and improve their performance thanks to their knowledge of the underlying process. And it is not only high production runs that can justify robot costs. Robots can perform different tasks for different parts while hard automation usually is limited and often needs more time for change over. What's more, FANUC offers integrated vision in its robots, allowing the robot to see. Capturing images and processing the data into information for the robot and by the robot. No more need for costly and unreliable PC driven systems and interfaces. And what is not there cannot break down and stop the line. It also greatly enhances the reliability and thus throughput of the line. Again a hidden cost saver only recently recognised by the food industry.

info@fanucrobotics.eu

Biography

Bob Struijk is currently FANUC Robotics European Marketing Director. He is also holding general management roles in Spain, Portugal and Hungary.