At IMTS 2018, like at any industrial trade show, the predominant theme was Industry 4.0. Although Industry 4.0 still has not scaled up to cover a significant percentage of manufacturing setups, its vision of near-total automation—and the promise of resulting cost savings—has clearly captured the industry’s imagination.
Did you like the movie? Who is the better candidate? Is that coffee too strong? Clearly subjective decision-making has its place in today’s world. Imagine how boring things would be if everything was cut and dried. When it comes to quality, however, there is no room for guesswork or subjective interpretation. Manufacturers and suppliers must be certain that products meet customer expectations and rigid quality standards.
Innovations in the electronics and semiconductor industries have birthed two relentless trends. Both profoundly impact both product designers and those charged with assuring that what was designed is what was manufactured. The trends are: higher densities for components, boards and processors, and the need for very high precision in the metal plating that enables functionality.
In the early 17th century, Galileo Galilei discovered that he could focus his telescope to examine small objects up close. Around 1620, it is believed that Cornelius Drebbel invented the compound microscope. In the 1670s, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek began experimenting with very high-magnification, single-lensed microscopes that he designed himself.
The explosive growth of robots shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone, especially in manufacturing. We are not quite to the level of a ‘90s action movie, but robots are certainly popping up in a lot more places these days. What may come as a surprise is the many ways companies are now using these robots, especially when it comes to metrology.
Omron Automation Americas announced the release of a brand-new FHV7-series smart camera featuring the world’s first multi-color light alongside a range of best-in-class image sensors (0.4MP to 5MP, with 12MP coming in the near future). This unique technology is designed to achieve the industry’s highest standards of precision in vision inspections on high-mix production lines.
With today’s demands for safe and reliable consumer products, it’s a sure bet that words like efficiency, throughput, repeatability, and safety are often being tossed around in quality assurance departments.
Elettrosystem offers custom engineered solutions for a variety of needs such as plastic vial assembly and test machines for the medical industry or cylinder head assembly lines for automotive applications.