Based in Torrington, CT, systems integrator Plastimation has been designing and building robotic automation systems for more than a decade. The company’s portfolio ranges from simple projects, such as a machine-tending application in which a cobot unloads stacks of plastic lids from a molding machine, to complex ones, such as an automated line in which four robots assemble and test a medical device.
Plastimation also offers its own line of flexible robotic feeding systems. The company’s flex feeder employs two conveyors at right angles to each other. An operator loads parts into a hopper. An inclined conveyor with a cleated belt transfers parts from the hopper into a chute, which scatters them onto a backlit conveyor. There, a vision-guided robot picks parts one at a time. Parts that are not picked fall into a second chute, which deposits them back into the hopper.