Automatic spray-painting robots

A spray-painting robot is a robot capable of automatically completing surface spray-painting operations, offering advantages such as high efficiency, precision, stability, and energy saving. Spray-painting robots typically consist of a robotic arm, control cabinet, operation panel, spray gun, and material feeding system. They are mainly used in industries such as automotive, aerospace, electronics, chemical, and light industry, and can improve production efficiency and quality while reducing costs and pollution.

This issue's case study uses Shidian Technology products such as XB6S-EC2002 , XB6S-PS20D , XB6S-C01SP , etc.

Production process introduction

Spray-painting robot workflow: Positioning — Data recording — Monitoring system

[Positioning]

The robot needs to accurately locate and move to the area to be spray-painted.

[Data recording]

The control system needs to record data for each spray-painting operation, including relevant information such as paint flow rate, spraying time, and position.

[Monitoring system]

The control system needs to identify faults promptly through detection sensors, and use the alarm system and fault recording function to record fault information and stop the robot in time.

Current pain points

With traditional robot spray-painting solutions, engineers must reprogram the system whenever the product changes, resulting in a high barrier to use. Customers need an effective programming-free control system for spray-painting robots: an operator manually controls a calibration device to teach the trajectory once, and the robot can then run according to the trajectory without engineer programming. To accurately record the motion trajectory during the teaching process, the system also needs to precisely acquire the absolute coordinates and coordinate orientation at each motion node, and must have good anti-interference capability.

I/O module application mode

The device communicates using the EtherCAT bus protocol. The SSI encoder is responsible for acquiring the absolute coordinates taught by the calibration device, while the same coordinate point can have different orientations, so a gyroscope is required to acquire the coordinate orientation. Shidian Technology's Absolute Encoder Counter Module XB6S-PS20D can accurately and quickly acquire the absolute coordinates measured by the SSI encoder.

The gyroscope is integrated inside the calibration device and supports Modbus communication. Through the serial communication module XB6S-C01SP , the calibration device can be connected to the EtherCAT bus system.

Product advantages

Shidian Technology's serial communication module XB6S-C01SP supports three communication interfaces — RS485, RS422, and RS232 — and multiple communication modes including Modbus RTU master/slave, Modbus ASCII master/slave, and Freeport. It occupies little space, is easy to configure, and runs stably. Shidian Technology also offers integrated serial communication modules PN4-GW2MR and PN4-GW2FP as options, which enable conversion between the PROFINET Protocol and Modbus RTU or Freeport.

From left to right:

Shidian Technology integrated serial communication module PN4-GW2MR

Shidian Technology Slice serial communication module XB6S-C01SP

Realpoint Technology integrated serial communication module PN4-GW2FP

Realpoint Technology Slice Encoder Counter Module XB6S-PS20D supports dual-channel SSI Absolute Encoder inputs and features the Probe latch function. Slice Encoder Counter Modules for incremental encoders are also available: XB6S-PL20 supports dual-channel 24 V single-ended signal inputs, and XB6S-PL20D supports dual-channel 5 V differential signal inputs. XB6S-PL20 and XB6S-PL20D support multiple pulse input modes, including AB Quadrature (ABZ), Pulse+Direction (Pul+Dir), and Dual Pulse (CW/CCW), as well as various functions such as reporting channel Real-Time Speed, Probe latch, and Compare output.

Realpoint Technology Slice SSI Absolute Encoder Counter Module XB6S-PS20D

Realpoint Technology Slice Single-Ended Incremental Encoder XB6S-PL20

Realpoint Technology Slice incremental encoder module XB6S-PL20D

Realpoint Technology offers a comprehensive I/O module product portfolio covering a wide range of application scenarios, meeting customers' diverse on-site requirements to the greatest extent and delivering a better user experience.