Automation

These state-of-the-art components improve the productivity and reliability of these critical machines and increase their service life by 15 to 20 years. A new control and drive system can increase machine downtime to 95 percent, with a payback period of 12 to 18 months. These replacements can be done for a fraction of the cost of a new machine – one-fourth to one-fifth of the cost, on average.

One highlight of HALCON 21.11 is the addition of instance segmentation technology to the range of deep learning functions. This technology combines the benefits of semantic segmentation with those of object detection and enables the pixel-precise assignment of objects to different classes. It is particularly useful in applications where objects are very close together, touch each other, or overlap. This is the case, for example, when gripping randomly arranged objects from bins ("random bin picking") and when identifying and measuring naturally grown structures, such as organic material.

For manufacturers who produce different components on the same line, and therefore need to regularly change grippers, this system is highly beneficial. One and the same programmable gripper solution is used to handle all blanks, regardless of shape and size. The transition is automatic and takes less than two minutes.