Do you know…
90 % of the electronics in a robot can be delivered by TOP-electronics
The most famous robot in the Netherlands is of course Robin (Bassie & Adriaan), and R2-D2 is probably worldwide the most well-known robot.
Beside movie star robots, we have many robots in our daily lives. You can think about your vacuum cleaner, and grass mower.
In the industry you see a lot automated actions done by robots and more and more implementation in the healthcare. For example injections for blood monsters or monitoring of blood pressure, but also a milking machine in the agriculture world, and even full-robotized production facilities for cars.
The fun-fact of all applications above, the bases of all robots are the same… All require solutions for motion, sensing/measuring, control, calculations etc. Of course does a vacuum robot have other requirements for size, power, and functionalities than a milk robot.
TOP-electronics works with different manufacturers that are ideal for this kind of applications.
Sanyo Denki Europe has a wide range of stepper motors that can be used for the smaller movements, but also for medium size power. Their DC and AC servo motion systems are closed loop motor drivers that can be controlled by powerful PLCs for full automated actions in a production process, like manufacturing robots for cars.
Apex Microtechnology is leader in modules that can be used in high density robots, like arms, and autonomous vehicles in warehouses. The SiC modules can deliver a lot of current in an efficient way and are easy to control.
Summit Electronics is supplier of a nice range of stepper driver modules and is with RTA able to help the engineer selecting the best solutions, to drive motors, and PLCs. CUI Devices has a high quality flexible encoders that fits on many different motors and or axis.
When you want some calculation power and a product that is able to run and control all the steps, the SOM modules from GRINN and the SBC from ASUS IoT are ideal for every application. The modules can read out all sensors like the CEVA motion sensors, high accurate 6-axis sensing in combination with an acceleration sensor and gyroscope. This is needed to calculate the location without a infrastructure, like RLTS or GPS.
Summit Electronics is working on a Bluetooth based location-awareness system, with an accuracy of ~1 meter. Goermicro is leading in sensors to measure air pressure to know what level there is in a building. And the proximity sensor will avoid collision for moving robots. Safety is an important piece of the robot as well.
How about talking to the robot by a module from ArkX Laboratories. They work perfect in noisy environments, and are flexible on the wake-words “He robot, STOP!”
Power-supplies are an important piece of the whole motor, FSP Power Solution supplies >1KW AC/DC converters to run the higher power robots, but is also good in smaller power adapters for charging the battery of a moving robot.