In scope of the European Qu4lity project for Zero Defect Manufacturing (ZDM) in Industry 4.0, Jožef Stefan Institute is demonstrating a reconfigurable robotics workcell that allows very short, self-adaptable and affordable changeovers under the conditions demanded and based on end-user needs. This is achieved with the minimum use of additional resources over the system’s lifetime. For the purposes of the Qu4lity project, the cell is used to enable robot-supported quality control in the Kolektor Pilot. A new version of the cell will be presented at the EMO fair in Milan, Italy, https://emo-milano.com/en/the-exhibition/, October 4-9, 2021.

Our aim is to provide a new kind of an autonomous robot workcell, attractive not only for large production lines but also for few-of-a-kind production, which often takes place in SMEs. The proposed workcell is based on novel ICT technologies for programming, monitoring and executing robotic operations in an autonomous way. It can be nearly automatically reconfigured to execute new tasks efficiently, precisely, and economically with a minimum amount of human intervention. This approach is backed up by a rigorous business-case analysis, which shows that the system is economically viable also for SMEs.

The reconfigurable robotic assembly workcell uses flexible, reconfigurable and modular concepts to efficiently manage changeable production. It is a stand-alone robot workcell that allows production of different products in the same workcell, as it is rapidly reconfigurable. It can act on its own, or it can be integrated into a larger system, using ROS or industrial IoT protocols (MQTT, OPC UA) for connectivity.