End-effector technology enables extremely gentle handling

Robotic pick and place for poppadoms
November 8th 2006

RTS Flexible Systems has installed a robotic pick and place system to handle poppadoms. As well as carrying out the delicate manoeuvre at 100 picks per minute, 24/7 with a very low breakage rate, the equipment has reduced labour costs over three shifts and increased production capacity.

Previously, individual poppadums were manually picked, having been delivered from a frying machine by conveyor, then stacked into piles of four. The piles were then manually picked again and placed into a vacuum forming machine.

Using a combination of RTS Pixcell vision systems and ABB Flexpicker robots, the RTS system is able to collect four poppadums one by one from the conveyor and place them for packaging in the vacuum forming machine. It is also capable of handling multiple product variants for variety packs. The use of end-effector technology enables the poppadums to be handled extremely gently.

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