A shear stud welding system is disclosed. The system comprises a shear stud holder, a robotic arm and a microcontroller. The shear stud holder comprises a turret and a first motor coupled to the turret and configured to rotate the turret about an axis to a predetermined angle such that a shear stud among the plurality of shear studs is at a dispensing position. The robotic arm is configured to transfer the shear stud from the shear stud holder to a workpiece. The microcontroller is configured to control the movement of the robotic arm to pick up the shear stud from the dispensing position and transfer the shear stud holder to the workpiece at a welding position and cause the first motor to rotate the turret to a predetermined angle to cause a shear stud among the plurality of shear studs assume the dispensing position.

A positioning apparatus including a base structure; a first workpiece support; a second workpiece support; a support member supporting the first workpiece support and the second workpiece support; and a drive arrangement arranged to drive the support member relative to the base structure from a first position, where the first workpiece support is positioned on a processing side of the base structure and the second workpiece support is positioned on an opposite loading side of the base structure, to a second position, where the first workpiece support is positioned on the loading side and the second workpiece support is positioned on the processing side; wherein the drive arrangement is arranged to drive the first workpiece support along a first path and the second workpiece support along a second path when driving the support member from the first position to the second position, the first and second paths being non-circular.

For control about a remote center of motion (RCM) of a surgical robotic system, possible configurations of a robotic manipulator are searched to find the configuration providing a greatest overlap of the workspace of the surgical instrument with the target anatomy. The force at the RCM may be measured, such as with one or more sensors on the cannula or in an adaptor connecting the robotic manipulator to the cannula. The measured force is used to determine a change in the RCM to minimize the force exerted on the patient at the RCM. Given this change, the configuration of the robotic manipulator may be dynamically updated. Various aspects of this RCM control may be used alone or in combination, such as to optimize the alignment of workspace to the target anatomy, to minimize force at the RCM, and/or to dynamically control the robotic manipulator configuration based on workspace alignment and force measurement.

An automated fiber bundle placement apparatus including a placing head having a pressing device, and a multi-jointed robot. The pressing device includes a pressing part, a pressing mechanism having a drive device, and a drive control device. The drive control device includes a drive command unit configured to output a drive command corresponding to a contact width of a placement die with the pressing part, the contact width being a length in the width direction of a part of the placement die facing in parallel to a contact range of the pressing part during pressing against the placement die, and is configured to control drive of the drive device to apply a pressing force corresponding to the drive command to the pressing part.

A first robot for handling at least one first workpiece in a first processing operation of the apparatus, a second robot cooperating with the first robot for processing the at least one first workpiece in the first processing operation, and at least one first workpiece holder for holding the at least one first workpiece during the first processing operation. In order to improve robot-assisted processing of workpieces which differ from one another, the first robot handles at least one second workpiece and the second robot processes the at least one second workpiece in a second processing operation of the apparatus. The first robot or the second robot in order, in a changeover operation of the apparatus, to replace the at least one first workpiece holder automatically by at least one second workpiece holder for holding the at least one second workpiece during the second processing operation.

An apparatus includes a platform configured to traverse a stationary base along a motion path; a drive coupled to the platform; and a movable arm assembly. The movable arm assembly includes a pivoting base connected to the drive, first and second linkages connected to the pivoting base, each linkage having links connected via rotary joints and each link having at least one end-effector. The platform is configured to traverse the stationary base along a motion path in two opposing directions and the drive and the movable arm assembly are configured to cause independent and simultaneous movement and transfer of substrates from at least one of a first substrate holding area, a second substrate holding area, a third substrate holding area, or a fourth substrate holding area into or from a respective substrate workstation.

A feeder that feeds objects to be picked up by a robot, includes an object container unit having a first planar portion including a first planar surface in which the objects are thrown, and a groove portion including a plurality of grooves extending in a first direction from the first planar portion as seen from a normal direction in which a normal of the first planar surface extends, and a vibrator unit that applies vibration to the object container unit, wherein the vibrator unit has a first vibration mode in which the objects are moved in the first direction.

A wiring harness assembly cell includes an automation zone housing a robot for performing automated assembly operations on a series of wiring harness assembly boards. A plurality of wiring harness assembly stations is located about the automation zone, each including one or more wiring harness assembly boards holding the wiring harnesses. Manual operator zones are located outside the automation zone that are associated with the wiring harness assembly stations. The wiring harness assembly stations are reconfigurable between a first configuration in which a first wiring harness assembly board faces the manual operator zone such that it is accessible to a manual operator, and a second configuration in which it faces the automation zone such that it is accessible to the robot. The robot is moved within the automation zone between a plurality of assembly locations where it accesses and operates on the respectively the plurality of wiring harness assembly stations.

A method for dispensing discrete medicaments with a dispensing device includes the steps of predicting a depletion time in the future when the medicaments in the container of a first feeder unit of the plurality of feeder units will be depleted; providing a notification ahead of said depletion time that a second feeder unit holding medicaments with the same composition as the first feeder unit needs to be presented to the dispensing device, together with a due time for presenting said second feeder unit to the dispensing device; and continuing the dispensing of the medicaments from the first feeder unit at least until the due time.

A fiber includes M primary cores and N redundant cores, where M an integer is greater than two and N is an integer greater than one. Interferometric circuitry detects interferometric pattern data associated with the M primary cores and the N redundant cores when the optical fiber is placed into a sensing position. Data processing circuitry calculates a primary core fiber bend value for the M primary cores and a redundant core fiber bend value for the N redundant cores based on a predetermined geometry of the M primary cores and the N redundant cores in the fiber and detected interferometric pattern data associated with the M primary cores and the N redundant cores. The primary core fiber bend value and the redundant core fiber bend value are compared in a comparison. The detected data for the M primary cores is determined reliable or unreliable based on the comparison. A signal is generated in response to an unreliable determination.