Madeline Gannon is known as “the robot whisperer.” While many of us are getting excited about the possibility of communicating with industrial robots by way of a kiosk or tablet, Gannon has been communicating with them using gestures. Gannon, who has no engineering backgroud, was frustrated by the experience of programming the industrial robots… Read more »
Rexroth is part of a German Industry 4.0 initiative called SmartFactoryKL. Banding together with more than 40 partner companies like IBM and Cisco, Rexroth is working in research and consulting to create the manufacturer-independent smart factory of the future. Here are the elements identified by SmartFactoryKL as essentials for Industry 4.0: Smart objects: Instead of… Read more »
One of president-elect Trump’s most popular campaign promises was his promise to bring back manufacturing jobs to the U.S. Can it be done? We’ve seen reshoring going on, and U.S. manufacturing is reaching new heights of productivity, but bringing manufacturing back to the U.S. doesn’t always mean bringing back manufacturing jobs. How is U.S. manufacturing… Read more »
Chad DeJong wrote in Industry Week, “We need to apply our knowledge and perceptions of social media to the shop floor, in which trends and environmental conditions can be continuously monitored and dynamically presented to any user in any location with a mobile device. Data collected from factory equipment can help determine the health of… Read more »
In the 1960s, packaging was revolutionized by the bottom loading case packer, using MKD motors with absolute encoder feedback. To the uninitiated, “bottom loading case packer” might sound like a Shakespearean style insult. In reality, it’s a machine that can do a task that previously had required human workers. This new machine, created by Sabel… Read more »
Innovations in technology often come from the mavericks, guys in garages playing with motors. There have been some individuals trying out new ideas for self-driving cars. One of these pioneers might be the guy who brings the first successful autonomous vehicle to market, or many of them may be able to sell new tech… Read more »
Not long ago, a group of hackers got control over a bunch of home electronic devices and used them to shut down Twitter, Netflix, and other super important websites. People were deeply upset about not getting to see Nick Cage, and some businesses lost money, and possibly customers. We’re not really saying that this is… Read more »
Security jitters are one of the main factors slowing down the adoption of smart factory technology — and last week’s DDOS attack, which took down Twitter and Netflix for a while, shows that these concerns aren’t paranoid. The hackers who orchestrated last week’s attack hacked into millions of devices, from Playstations to Nest thermostats, which… Read more »
Workplace safety is a primary priority in factories these days. Of course, safety has been regulated in U.S. manufacturing for at least a century, but consumers are now more aware and retailers are more insistent. As a result, machine makers including Rexroth have an even stronger focus on safety. But we also know that it’s… Read more »
The first fatal accident involving an automated vehicle took place in Florida. From the point of view of technology, the Tesla vehicle couldn’t tell the difference between the side of a white truck and the very bright Florida sky. The real cause of the problem, however, was that the human driver wasn’t paying attention, so… Read more »
