3D printing may not yet be ready for large-scale manufacturing, but it’s making its mark in other realms. It’s been used by hobbyists, fashion designers, and chefs. Recently NASA made history by emailing the first wrench to the International Space Station. The process could indeed prove revolutionary, but often overlooked is the impact it could… Read more »
Is American manufacturing experiencing a re-birth? There has been plenty of controversy on this question over the past year or two, but there’s no doubt that it’s doing well. Dow Chemical just secured a $4 billion investment, Flextronics announced its plans to create a $32 billion product innovation center in Silicon Valley, and Airbus decided… Read more »
Servo motors are our business, since we specialize in Rexroth’s legacy electric motion control, so we’re always interested to see new trends in automation. The latest trend goes beyond industrial motion control, however, and brings the Internet of Things to a larger canvas: the city. The world’s population is set to double by 2050,… Read more »
Owning a robot army isn’t a goal for many firms, but leave it to innovative and trendsetting Amazon to be among the few that can. The Seattle online retailer has outfitted several U.S. warehouses with short, orange, wheeled robots that move stocked shelves to workers, instead of having the workers seek items amid the long… Read more »
3D printing continues to be a source of excitement in manufacturing. The ability to create prototypes and replacement parts all at the point of use with less waste is fairly revolutionary. But going further, the technology actually allows for the creation of structures that were impossible with previous technologies. A group from the University of… Read more »
Most of us are surrounded by a bunch of stuff at any given moment. Most of these things are not iPads, 787s, or Rexroth servo motors. Most of the ‘stuff’ we interact with is small, simple, and plastic: pens, buckets, packages, containers, utensils, and the waste bins you dispose of them in. All of these… Read more »
If there’s one thing Henry Ford taught us, it’s that assembling products part by part instead of finishing one object completely before going on to the next is actually quite efficient. With servos, drives, and controls to automate the movement, this type of production allows for complicated products from Roombas to Fitbits to be profitable… Read more »
We’ve been keeping an eye on the list of occupations expected to be replaced by robots in the next decade. Loan officers are pretty much doomed, as are bartenders, security guards, fast food workers, and — as we can see here — retail workers. Lowe’s has been trying out robots with large screens that can… Read more »
