A method for controlling a dispensing system is provided, including the steps of dispensing, by a dispensing device, a coating material onto a substrate according to a first dispensing operation, inspecting, by an inspection device integrated with the dispensing device, the coating material applied to the first substrate, and altering the first dispensing operation based on the inspecting so that the coating material is dispensed onto a subsequent substrate according to a second dispensing operation. An associated coating machine is also provided.

A liquid discharge apparatus includes a head, a position changer, and circuitry. The head has a nozzle. The head discharges a liquid from the nozzle to apply the liquid onto a surface of an object. The head has a prescribed discharge condition. The position changer changes a relative position between the object and the head. The circuitry determines a linear trajectory along which the position changer moves the head based on the prescribed discharge condition, outputs a first command including multiple moving positions along the linear trajectory to the position changer to cause the position changer to move the head along the linear trajectory, and outputs a second command including multiple discharge positions to the head to cause the head to discharge the liquid at the multiple discharge positions.

A method and associated system provides automated abrasive paint repair using automated abrasive paint repair devices that selectively sand, buff, and polish a substrate in response to received instructions generated by a controller. The controller receives coordinates of each identified defect in the substrate along with parameters describing characteristics of each defect, selects a sanding process, a buffing process, and/or a polishing process based on empirically derived rules established by skilled/expert human operators and the received parameters. The controller outputs instructions to cause the automated abrasive paint repair devices to execute the selected sanding process, buffing process, and/or polishing process using the received parameters. The empirically derived rules and parameters may be stored in a lookup table and/or updated by a machine learning module.

The invention relates to a coating method for coating a component surface (4) with a coating agent, in particular for painting a motor vehicle body component with a paint, having the following steps: ⋅ emitting a spray jet (1) of the coating agent onto the component surface (4) of the component to be coated by means of an atomizer (2), said spray jet (1) having a main axis (5) and having an asymmetry with respect to the main axis (5) such that the spray jet (1) generates a spray pattern with a corresponding asymmetry on the component surface (4), and ⋅ at least partially compensating for the asymmetry of the spray jet (1) such that the asymmetry of the resulting spray pattern on the component surface (4) is reduced. The invention further relates to a corresponding coating device.

The present disclosure provides a method and system by which a precise amount of a viscous fluid sealing compound can be dispensed at required locations through computer vision-based observation of the fluid deposited, its rate and amount of deposition and location; and that the dispensed fluid may be accurately shaped through robotic or other special purpose mechanism motion. The invention enables instant quality inspection of the dispensing process in terms of the locations, amounts and shapes of newly created seals.

Described herein is a system and method of manufacturing an insulated member (500). The method includes the steps of: providing, to a computing cloud (310), geometric data of at least a section of a raw part (501) having at least one application section to be applied with an insulation material (502), determining, using the computing cloud (310), a movement data for a relative movement between an manufacturing-site applicator (410), determining, using the computing cloud (310), an amount of the insulation material (502) for applying onto the application section, generating, using the computing cloud (310), a control data set at least comprising the movement data and the amount of insulation material (502), and providing the control data set to a manufacturing site control computer (420) site (400) that is remote to the computing cloud (310) and/or a planning site where the geometric data is generated.

The disclosure concerns a coating method and a corresponding coating device for coating components with a nozzle applicator with several nozzles, in particular for painting motor vehicle body components. The disclosure provides that the nozzle applicator is flexibly controlled during the coating method.

A robot controller is adapted to execute a program an indication of a setpoint speed of a robot arm, an indication of a contemporaneous setpoint fluid flow per unit time of a spray gun supported by the robot arm, and an indication of a contemporaneous further setpoint quantity of the spray gun. The robot controller is configured to obtain an estimate of actual speed of the robot arm; determine whether the estimate deviates from the setpoint speed; and, in case of a deviation, adjust the setpoint fluid flow per unit time in accordance with a first compensation function. In an embodiment, the robot controller is further configured to concurrently adjust, in case of a deviation, the further setpoint quantity in accordance with a second compensation function, which is different from the first compensation function.

A machine vision-based method and system for measuring 3D pose of a part or subassembly of parts having an unknown pose are disclosed. A number of different applications of the method and system are disclosed including applications which utilize a reprogrammable industrial automation machine such as a robot. The method includes providing a reference cloud of 3D voxels which represent a reference surface of a reference part or subassembly having a known reference pose. Using at least one 2D/3D hybrid sensor, a sample cloud of 3D voxels which represent a corresponding surface of a sample part or subassembly of the same type as the reference part or subassembly is acquired. The sample part or subassembly has an actual pose different from the reference pose. The voxels of the sample and reference clouds are processed utilizing a matching algorithm to determine the pose of the sample part or subassembly.

Among arbitrary positions on the course of a sealing gun, a position ahead of and separated from the arbitrary position in the moving direction of the sealing gun by a given distance, where an application part falls within a given allowable size in a direction perpendicular to the moving direction on the basis of the sealing gun, is a first position, and a position where the application part is deviated from the allowable size is a second position. A control device corrects the course of the sealing gun that is defined by an operation plan, based on the shape of the application part measured in a measurement point located at the first position.