There are many ways to do this safely. All robotic arms come with a disable key that powers off the axis motors, latches all the brakes, but leaves the sensors and end of arm tooling powered up to troubleshoot. Troubleshooting can also be done via PC and watching inputs/ outputs on the program.
schmidtster@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I’ve worked on some and that’s just not true, modern machines may have those safety features, but they aren’t on every thing.
WraithGear@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Which again falls on the company not following proper safety, which was the point. This was a foreseeable problem, and the fact that the arm was “looking” for and able to reach for a box of “peppers”, means it was not in the right state to trouble shoot. If the device has no safety mechanisms that would allow safe maintenance then the machine must be replaced. But they don’t have good standards in a lot of countries.
schmidtster@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Even in Canada and US legacy systems don’t have to be replaced with more modern ones, only when they are no longer usable and have to replaced do they need to meet new codes and standards.
Just because a new code comes out doesn’t mean every machine is suddenly obsolete…
kiwifoxtrot@lemmy.world 7 months ago
There are only a few manufacturers of robotic arms, and have this feature as it is required by law in many countries. This was a new installation and I’ll be happy to bet all sorts of money that it had it installed and wasn’t used.
schmidtster@lemmy.world 7 months ago
What model of arm was being used here? Because the article makes no mention and actually talks about a robot, so that sounds like something else than this “arm” you speak of.
Eranziel@lemmy.world 7 months ago
In any industrial context, a “robot” is short for robotic arm. Those things you see in footage of automotive factories.
They also don’t have any kind of AI. It’s just a regular (if specialized) computer in control.