That is why MERGING, a European research project on soft robotics manipulation coordinated by CEA and involving 11 partners from industry and academia, has chosen the fabrication process of fiber composites in the automotive sector as one of its key use cases.
When used in the automotive sector, composites can provide increased strength and stiffness while also reducing the weight of vehicles up to 70% compared to metallic alloys. The possibilities to shape them are also limitless. They already play an important role in the advanced transportation industry, in particular when it comes to reducing fuel consumption and CO2 emissions.
However, fiber composites are still more expensive than lightest metallic alloys, and before they become cost-effective, a decrease of up to 40% in production cost is required. One of the ways to achieve this objective is automation, but these materials pose several challenges to existing robotic solutions. Dry fibers are similar to conventional textiles and thus, highly flexible and highly deformable. Foam blocks are less flexible, but fragile. These individual component parts can be heavy and large, adding further challenges for manipulation.
Currently, manufacturing processes involve a series of manual handling operations of flexible Glass Fiber (GF) textiles in addition to reinforcement foam blocks. The complete workflow takes place on lay-up molds where all types of GF textiles and foams are positioned before resin infusion. The dimensions of the mold itself limit operator access to all areas, resulting in fluctuations in the performance in terms of production rate and quality, in addition to ergonomic issues that can affect workers.
Within MERGING, researchers and engineers from several institutions have worked with VDL Fibertech industries, a member of the VDL group and one of the Netherlands largest composite producers that operates in several markets. Together, they have developed a robotic system that can support human operators in the manufacturing of large composite panels by performing grasping, manipulation and placement of textiles and foam blocks.
The envisioned solution proposes a hybrid cell where humans and robots collaborate within a fenceless environment. LMS, as pilot driver, led the engineering of the system by designing a custom overhead dual arm manipulator. Together with the project’s research partners, namely CEA and AIMEN, besides its integrators, CASP and OPTEAMUM, they have enhanced its dexterity, perception, cognition and interaction capabilities through state-of-the-art hardware and software modules.
Starting with dexterity, LMS designed a multi-tool end-effector that is able to handle all composite materials, or perform layup operations, without excessive and time costly tool changes. In terms of perception, LMS in collaboration with AIMEN, have deployed a number of perception modules for fabric localization and quality assurance, besides human tracking for safety and interaction purposes. Towards even greater cognition, LMS implemented a physical model that accurately simulates the fabric’s deformation within co-manipulation, in real-time. An extension of this model empowers model-based co-manipulation of fabrics either in collaborative schemes or fully automated ones. CEA led the implementation of closed-loop controllers that allow the co-manipulation of fabrics or fragile objects without the need of external sensors, thanks to impedance control, or using sensor-enhanced gloves (allowing also intuitive tele-operation of distant robot arms). Rapid robot and system programming is enabled by the SPIRE framework of CEA, as well as by the Workcell Controller package, of LMS. The former package offers an intuitive environment for system orchestration and monitoring during runtime. For human-centricity, LMS implemented extended reality applications where operators can interact with the digital twin or receive support through intuitive content.
Successful integration and evaluation campaigns proved that the implemented system achieved the project’s specifications and sets new boundaries for robotic automation in composites manufacturing.
The composite industry is only one of the three use cases explored by the project, which also applied similar technologies to food packaging and textiles for clothing industries. MERGING is a four-year project, coordinated by CEA (Commissariat a l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives) in France, and it is involving academic and industrial partners from six countries: LMS (Greece), EPFL (Switzerland), AIMEN (Spain), SELMARK (Spain), VDL (Netherlands), Thimonnier (France), OMNIGRASP (Italy), IPC (France), CASP (Greece), and Opteamum (France).
For more information: merging-project.eu
Media contact: [email protected]
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research
and innovation programme under grant agreement No 869963.
Building on its prior success, MERGING’s innovations have now been tested on the industrial floors. Together with the project’s integrators, research teams have transitioned the robotic systems from the lab to real-world industrial setups. Comprehensive industrial testing and validation have been successfully completed, marking a milestone for the food packaging, textile, and composite sectors.
The MERGING consortium has successfully transitioned its robotic systems from the lab to the demanding environment of industrial shop floors. The developed robotic solutions, designed to enhance automation in flexible material handling, seamlessly integrate a collection of software and hardware modules that equip robots with advanced capabilities, allowing them to perceive and adapt to deformations in flexible materials and manage their interactions in both autonomous and collaborative settings.
The creation of user-friendly tools for system programming and orchestrating is also considered as an important aspect of the developed technologies. Through intuitive interfaces, activities are directed towards simplifying the integration and use of the developed system in industrial setups.
Key to the project’s success are novel gripping solutions developed by OMNIGRASP, LMS and OPTEAMUM. These tools excel in the handling of a diverse range of materials, from flexible packaging and garments to fiberglass fabrics and composite core materials. In collaboration with LMS, CEA and AIMEN, these solutions pave the way to innovative handling strategies using single or dual-arm robot manipulators. Designed to meet the requirements of industrial tasks, the MERGING solution can either operate in a fully automatic way or collaboratively with human operators, translating their handling intentions into robotic movements.
The outcomes from industrial integration signal the project’s final milestone.
Following the laboratory testing phases, the three setups underwent practical testing in real-world industrial settings, resulting in all consortium partners’ building blocks integration across diverse facilities.
The intermediate setup developed at AIMEN research facilities in Spain, dedicated to the automation of lingerie manufacturing, has been integrated into SELMARK facilities. The design and development activities by the partners were based on specifications from the SELMARK industrial case, and the final solution involves dual-arm manipulation using new electro-adhesive (EA) grippers.
Similarly, a system for the semi-automation of composites manufacturing, initially designed and implemented at LMS facilities in Greece, has been successfully integrated with the partners into the VDL Fibertech facilities. The innovative approach, centered on an overhead dual-arm manipulator, yielded results that reflect the efficiency and precision demanded by this challenging sector.
The robotic setup, originally developed at CEA LIST facilities in France, was successfully integrated with the partners into THIMONNIER facilities. This integration addressed challenges inherent to the flexible materials encountered in food packaging industry. The final solution involves two collaborating robots and the use of a new electro-adhesive (EA) gripper.
Beyond achieving their primary objectives, the demonstrators also provided valuable insights regarding essential MERGING components, highlighting the project’s fundamental results adaptability across diverse sectors.
The observed achievements are results of the collective dedication and expertise of the technology developing partners. Through collaborative workshops, the consortium achieved significant outcomes, reinforcing the value and effectiveness of the project’s innovations. The enhancement of handling capabilities of robots for soft objects manipulation revealed the potential of automation for improved quality and consistency. It will also improve the working conditions of operators. By shifting the technological baselines, the consortium is now motivated on further extending robot capabilities within future initiatives, widening also the domains of application.
The project has successfully realized its integration milestones, marking a notable advancement in the evolution of soft material handling solutions. The progress made by MERGING underscores its potential in shaping the future of industrial applications.
MERGING is a four-year project coordinated by CEA (Commissariat a l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives) in France and is involving academic and industrial partners from six countries: LMS (Greece), EPFL (Switzerland), AIMEN (Spain), OMNIGRASP (Italy), IPC (France), CASP (Greece), Opteamum (France), SELMARK (Spain), VDL (Netherlands) and Thimonnier (France).
For more information: merging-project.eu
Media contact: [email protected]
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research
and innovation programme under grant agreement No 869963
13 September 2023
The technological outcomes of MERGING have started to demonstrate their potential. Research partners, supported by the project’s integrators, have collaborated on delivering the project’s integrated robotic systems. Industrial integration and validation get underway for the food packaging, textiles and composites industries.
The consortium of the European project MERGING, coordinated by CEA, has tested its new intelligent robotic system for enhanced material handling through cost efficient robotized solutions.
The project has developed a series of technological modules for furnishing the robots with the abilities of perceiving flexible material deformations and managing their behavior within autonomous or collaborative scenarios. Now, the system is able to orchestrate numerous software and hardware modules, despite the sophistication of infrastructure that can be required for non-rigid workpiece handling. The partners have aimed on delivering tools for easy system programming and commissioning, using intuitive interfaces or teleoperation schemes.
As for the handling, pioneer gripping solutions by OMNIGRASP, LMS and OPTEAMUM have excelled in the manipulation of flexible packaging, garments, fiberglass composites, and composite core materials. These empower the deployment of pioneer handling strategies, by LMS, CEA and AIMEN, involving single or dual-arm robot manipulators. Depending on the industrial needs, the robotic solution can operate autonomously or collaborate with human operators by translating their handling actions into supportive actions.
The results from the three pre-pilot demonstrators initiate the last project phase
At this step, three integrated settings have been materialized in parallel, in three different countries.
The first one, located at AIMEN research facilities in Spain, focuses on the automation of lingerie manufacturing. The specifications deriving from the SELMARK industrial case drove the integration activities, involving dual arm manipulation through electro-adhesive (EA) grippers.
On the same basis, a demonstrator for the semi-automation of composites manufacturing has been established at LMS facilities, in Greece. LMS has conceptualized and materialized a pioneer system based on an overhead dual arm manipulator, sufficiently close to an industrial solution.
Finally, there is one additional experimental setting, supervised by CEA. Located at CEA LIST facilities, in France, the demonstrator deals with one industrial case of the food packaging industry. It also provided useful outcomes regarding important MERGING building blocks, proving the applicability of our project’s solutions on different application sectors.
The results have been obtained through joint activities between the technology developing partners. Collaborative workshops have delivered quality results and important insights for the upcoming activities. The partners are confident for the success of the next phase.
In overall, the project’s integration milestones and objectives are achieved and “we are ready to start industrial integration”, says the project’s steering committee.
MERGING is a four-year project coordinated by CEA (Commissariat a l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives) in France and it is involving academic and industrial partners from six countries: LMS (Greece), EPFL (Switzerland), AIMEN (Spain), SELMARK (Spain), VDL (Netherlands), Thimonnier (France), OMNIGRASP (Italy), IPC (France), CASP (Greece), and Opteamum (France).
For more information: merging-project.eu
Media contact: [email protected]
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research
and innovation programme under grant agreement No 869963
December 2021
Robots have transformed many areas of manufacturing, to the point that whole industries –from automotive to electronics and chemical – would now be unthinkable without them. But other sectors are far more resistant to automation, and yet could equally benefit from it.
The textile industry is a good example. Textile and clothing are essential pillar in the European economy, involving around 160,000 companies employing over 1.5 million workers, with a turnover of 162 billion euros. Here, manufacturing processes are mostly manual, and in an effort to contain costs, businesses often end up outsourcing them to low-cost labor countries. As a result, Europe exports € 61bn worth of textile products, but imports € 109 bn – a trend that automation could help reverse.
For the European clothing sector, innovating through automation could be a way to increase competitiveness and reduce outsourcing, but there are huge scientific and technical challenges to overcome for automating the manipulation of textile materials. That is the reason why MERGING, a European research project on soft objects robotic manipulation coordinated by CEA and involving 11 other partners from industry and academia, has chosen the textile industry as one of its key use cases. Within MERGING, researchers and engineers from several institutions are working with SELMARK, a leading manufacturer of lingerie based in Vigo (Spain), to develop a robotic system that can support human operators in the most repetitive and tiring tasks that happen before the stitching of the final product: in particular de-stacking textiles from storage, grasping, placing and unfolding them to avoid wrinkling, measuring parts for intermediate quality control before next steps of the process. These operations are impossible for traditional robotic manipulators designed for rigid objects, as they cannot easily adapt in real time to the unpredictable behavior of fabrics. Total or partial automation of these tasks can promote the allocation of personnel to tasks that have more added value, while reducing the global production costs.
The MERGING solution is to combine various building blocks. At the basis, there are two collaborative robot arms that can safely work close to humans. The arms are equipped with a dedicated gripper, enhanced with EPFL’s electroadhesive skin, a technology that uses electric fields to make objects stick to the jaws. Stereo cameras provide perception and high precision tracking of textiles developed by AIMEN, that -together with computer models of fabric’s behaviour– allow to adapt the robot’s movements in real time. The robot arms can be easily programmed by unexperienced users, thanks e.g. to robot programming by demonstration or other control features developed by CEA. Thus, the operator can show the robot how to perform the required tasks, rather than programming every movement on a computer. All data are combined into LMS’s “digital twin”, a digital representation of the working environment that allows to simulate process before transmitting orders to the combined industrial work cell supervision system.
When all these technologies are combined, the robotic grippers can grasp a ply from the textile materials stack, carefully detaching it from the ones below. The ply is then placed on the thermoforming device, and if any wrinkle is detected by the perception system, the robot will use corrective actions to undo it. The robot then feeds the fabric to presses that give the material the desired 3D shape (e.g. a cup, in the case of lingerie production), and places it on a stack of modified parts ready for the next step of the process.
MERGING started in late 2019 and is now halfway through its work programme, perfecting the system’s building blocks. In early 2022 it will start working on the integration phase before setting up the pilot demonstration at SELMARK premises, which will be overseen by AIMEN covered by IPC.
The textile industry is only one of the three use cases explored by this project, that will also apply similar robotic technologies to food packaging and to the manipulation of fabrics in the automotive industry.
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The MERGING collaborative project, involving twelve partners from academia and the industry, will pioneer the use of robotics and Artificial Intelligence for manipulating flexible and fragile objects. The resulting technologies are to be applied to the textile, food and transport industries
A newly-launched European research project will develop and test new technologies to give robots one of the key abilities they still miss: the ability to manipulate soft, flexible and fragile objects.
Current robots are mostly used for industrial applications, where their tasks typically consist -of handling rigid objects such as car parts or electronic components, interacting with them in repetitive operations. On the other hand, a big part of the European and global industry is comprised of sectors where soft and flexible items are manipulated. For example the textile industry, with the fabrication of garments, shoes or lingerie; the food supply chain, that encompasses a wide range of difficult tasks like the processing of meat, canning, packaging or manipulation of food, liquids, fruits, vegetables, and all sort of tasks in retail; the transport sector, involving the manipulation of glass fibre, carbon fibre or other materials for the manufacturing of composite parts for building structures of vehicles. All these materials do not behave in an entirely predictable way, due to their high flexibility, and can be easily damaged. Grasping and manipulating them requires a gentle grasp, fine and adaptive control of movements that is beyond the current state of the art in robotics.
The European project MERGING (Manipulation Enhancement through Robotic Guidance and Intelligent Novel Grippers), that launched in November 2019, aims to design a versatile, low cost and easy-to-use robotic solution that manufacturers can apply to support or automate tasks involving the handling of flexible or fragile objects. It will consist of a new robotic dexterous gripper taking advantage of an integrated adaptive electro-adhesive skin. This skin will induce electrostatic attraction between the gripping surface and the object, thanks to an electric field produced by skin-enclosed electrodes. The skin will also have the ability to conform to the objects to handle to raise the contact surface. Thanks to this skin, the new gripper will show enhanced gripping performances, while reducing the gripping forces, thus avoiding damaging the soft objects. The control of the complete robotic system will include, firstly, perception and supervision functions to adapt the system’s response to the execution conditions and to high variability of the flexible object’s behaviour; secondly, control abilities to make the human-robot or multi-robot co-manipulation of the flexible object safer, using Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. Thus, the robot will be able to learn how to handle soft objects without damaging them, as well as how to safely work side by side with humans.
The Merging technology will be tested in three different applications and sectors. The first one is lingerie manufacturing, with the manipulation of fine textile parts during a critical step of the process, the thermoforming process. The second one is food packaging, more specifically the handling of soft plastic pouches. The third one is the transport industry, where robots and humans will collaborate in handling glass-fibre textiles and foam to manufacture composite panels.
MERGING is a three-and-a-half years project coordinated by CEA (Commissariat a l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives) in France, and involving academic and industrial partners from five countries: LMS (Greece), EPFL (Switzerland), AIMEN (Spain), SELMARK (Spain), VDL (Netherlands), Thimonnier (France), Shadow Robot (UK and Spain), IPC (France), CASP (Greece), Opteamum (France).
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