The historical development of industrial robots

The historical development of industrial robots goes back into the year 1954, where George Devolein filed a patent on the programmable transportation of parts.

After merging with Joseph Engelberger, they founded the first robotics company, Unimation, which installed the first robot for General Motors in 1961. The robot removed cast iron parts out of a machine.

In the next decade most of the sold “Unimates” which where hydraulically controlled, were installed to process parts and to spot-weld car bodies. Both applications were very successful. The Premises for the robots were to be reliable, safe and they had to have a good quality standard. Soon many more companies started to develop and design industrial robots. A new innovation controlled branch of industry was born, although it took many years until this branch would get profitable.

The breakthrough was not made before 1969. In this year Viktor Scheinmann developed the “Stanford Arm” which was used as prototype for research. Viktor Scheinmann workes in those days as a student for mechanical engineering at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab (SAIL). The “6 DOF all-electric manipulator” was controlled by a normal computer, a Digital Equipment PDP-6. This not antromorphe (humanlike) kinematical assembly, was that simple, that the calculations for the kinematics were increased significantly.

In the year 1973 the company named ASEA (today: ABB) introduced the first microcomputer controlled , completely electrified industrial robot, which was called IRB-6. This robot was able to fulfill continuous course movements, which are necessary for arc-welding and the cutting technology.

 

In 1978 the SCARA (Selective Compliance Assembly Robot Arm) robot was invented by Hiroshi Makino, who is currently at the Yamanashi University of Japan. The innovative, cost efficient 4-axes design was perfectly adjusted for the assembly of small parts. Fast and conform movements of the robot arm have been possible because of its kinematical construction. Flexible assembly systems on the basis of SCARA robots, combined with a compatible product design (Design For Assembly, DFA) are important features that have helped to develop high technology production of consumer products which led to a worldwide boom.

 

 

A clever 2-handed treatment is important for complex assemblies, simultaneous operation, the machining of components and the operation of large objects. The first robot for a 2-handed, synchronized machining was introduced to industry by MOTOMAN in the year 2005. As a dual arm robot it can recreate human arms in ability and range. It can be placed into a workstation for humans and is characterized by flexibility throughout 13 axes: 6 axes per arm and one axis to rotate around the machine bed.

 

The requirements towards velocity and weight of the robot led to new kinematics and gear designs. The weight/mass reduction and its correlation of inertia always had been the prime target of research. The human arm with a ratio of weight : load of 1:1 was set as reference mark.

 

In 2006 this goal was achieved by the KUKA lightweight construction robot, which is a compact 7 DOF robot arm with highly developed force controlling abilities. Another approach for light weight and solid structures has been made since the 1980s. The important matter here was developing kinematically parallel working machines with end-effectors (executing tools, such as grippers) that are connected with the machine bed over 3 to 6 parallel cross beams. These so called parallel robots are especially built for high velocities (i.e. sorting), precision (i.e. cutting) or the handling of heavy parts. However the workspace of parallel robots is smaller than comparable free kinematical robots.