Welding Camera description

When is Laser Vision camera needed?

Most problems with robotic arc welding can be attributed to welded part and theire fixture variability, which causes the weld joint to vary in location or fitup. This variation causes both productivity and quality problems.

In arc welding, if joint repeatability of ±0.5 mm cannot be held, then joint finding or joint tracking needs to be considered. This equipment can then be specified, placed in simulation to verify access and cycle-time effects, and integrated correctly into the complete robot cell.

Laser Vision Camera Basics

The technology used for joint tracking and weld inspection cameras is based on the principle of laser triangulation. A relatively low-power laser beam (up to 50mW) is projected on the surface of the part and the reflected scattered light is imaged back onto a CCD or CMOS sensor. The controller then extracts signals from the image that can be used for either joint tracking or weld inspection purposes

Steps in welding process

Preproduction

Preproduction can be used to track the joint and measure the location and fitup variance. Toolmakers can use this information to adjust the fixture clamping to close gaps and get the joint location to repeat. The data can even be used to tell if the detail parts are being correctly made. Without this information, it is tough to determine the root cause of the problems.

IGM icam 100 (Designed and manufactured by us)

Real-Time Finding and Tracking

After parts and fixtures are optimized, the laser vision cameras used for finding and tracking will continue to maintain proper torch position and can allow the operator to select appropriate adaptive weld schedules to compensate for even larger variation. Of course, if the variation becomes excessive, no weld schedule change will be enough to maintain minimum weld quality.

Postweld Inspection

Another approach to improving arc weld quality is to utilize postweld inspection camera systems. Although not real time, this approach can be proactive and may be used along with traditional weld realtime tracking and cross check with measurements on this step reduce rejects.

This project is developed in colaboration with Metrology-lab