JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #66 - July/August 2011 - 57

By
SALES

robotics

Robotics and composites: a growth driver within everyone's reach!
In recent years, multi-axis robots have become a major growth driver for the composites industry. Long consigned to fairly imprecise manual operations, of irregular quality and with low productivity, robotics is now being invested in heavily by the composites industry.
OLIVIER PRIOUZEAU,
MANAGER,

COMPOSITES

AND NEW APPLICATIONS

KUKA

lot remains to be done, especially on the part of SMEs!

A strong network of partners
large number of robots are now used in all fields of activity, encompassing the entire composite parts manufacturing cycle. Prime examples of this are the various French SMEs with less than 100 employees working as subcontractors in the fields of industrial vehicles, boatbuilding, sanitation and aerospace and which now use trimming, drilling and modelling robots for composite parts. Machines such as the Kuka KR100 HA, for example, due to their rigidity and their absolute precision in path following, are perfectly suited to the machining of composites. The reliability of robots and their highly attractive price when compared to standard CNC machines have contributed in no small measure to their growing take-up by SMEs. Over the past 15 years, the average price of a robot has been cut by two. However, this boom needs to be put in perspective, considering the fact that France is lagging behind with regard to robotics. The robot fleet in France is six times smaller than in Germany and half as big as Italy's. There is therefore a large potential for growth, and an awful

To facilitate the introduction of robotics in the composites sector and, in particular, within SMEs, Kuka has struck up some major partnerships with the main academic centres of excellence for composites in France. Technocampus EMC2 in Nantes has half a dozen robots, used in the design of various automated processes, such as nondestructive testing and multi-materials assembly. A few months ago, the Compositadour Centre in Bayonne commissioned its first robotised fibre placement cell. The University Institute of Technology in Nantes and the Institut de Maintenance Aéronautique (Aeronautical Maintenance Coriolis fibre placement robot Institute) in

No66 July - August 2011 / jec composites magazine

Mérignac, Bordeaux, are each equipped with a new-generation Kuka machining robot. There is also the UTC engineering school in Compiègne, which recently acquired a robot using the latest Kuka technologies for producing composites with three-dimensional reinforcements by means of stitching technology. All these centres are platforms for testing, pooling resources and transferring technology in order to help SMEs and customers to familiarise themselves with the latest robotised innovations.

Technology & Innovations

JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #66 - July/August 2011

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #66 - July/August 2011