Getting smart components properties in RAPID

laov

Hello,

I'd like to know how to properly read a smart components property data in RAPID?

For example I would like to get the coordinates and orientations of an object sensed by a position sensor and make my robot go there to pick it up. 

Anders S

Hi,

You can only use I/O signals to communicate between a SmartComponent and a VirutalController. In your case I recommend that you use analog signals to read the coordinates and orientation from the SmartComponent. In the Pack&Go "Random Source demo station" on RobotApps (http://www.abb.com/product/ap/seitp327/5dd4fbc7afcb82d2c12579ad0054401d.aspx) I do exactly what you are asking about.

Regards,

Anders

Skogis

Hi!

This is my first work day after vacation. Coming back and seeing a question like this is inspiring

So... over to your question...

The SmartComponent does not exist in reality so the RAPID program you are making will not function in the real controller... only in the virtual controller. 

So I guess you have (or want to have) some kind of interface from RAPID to the real position sensor, and now emulate it using a SmartComponent?

Do you know how it is intended to work in reality?

I have some ideas, where of some I have never heard being used before. Like readin/writing to a RAPID data from a SmartComponent using PC SDK. That is not exactly what you asked for but I hope it can give the same result.

Using group I/O singals is another more out of the box solution.

 

laov

In reality the robot should analyze the packets randomly coming in from a conveyor and put them to a specified place. It should also determine if the package is flipped or not. If it is it should flip it back and place it in the position correctly.

We are looking at the IRB 360 robot for this. For the analyzing of packages I saw a video of this robot being used with visual recognition and it seemed to work well. In reality I don't have any experience in using visual recognition or any idea if its possible to somehow simulate it in robotstudio but the next semester there is a lecture about Visual recognition in my university so I thought of just trying to make a simple simulation using RAPID and a few sensor that would identify the position of a moving object, perhaps stop it and place it on the correct spot. I thought it would be quite easy if I could just get the position and the orientation of the package.

As for another question about another project I was wondering how well would quite a long program consisting of move commands, procedures, IF's and while cycles work on a real controller? The program basically does what palletizing power pac should without using it. It analyzes inputs / outputs of line sensors sends data to procedures and palletizes the boxes using move instructions. 

As for the random source. Yes it looks to be what I'm looking for for my simulation. I'll try to analyze it

PerSvensson

I thinking of that it should be possible to make your own SC (code behind using visual studio) that use a socket message to send positions to the virtual controller. Have done this but from a .net application against the virtual controller.