From November 26 to 28 at smart production solutions (SPS), Leuze electronic demonstrated its technological competence in the areas of safety at work, smart factory and intralogistics and let trade show visitors experience sensor systems up close using live demos.
Figure 1: "Smart Process Gating" is based on the MLC 530 safety light curtains from Leuze electronic.
Leuze electronic was exhibiting at SPS in Nuremberg, Germany, from November 26-28. The Sensor People demonstrated their full range of solutions for safety at work, their technological expertise for smart factories, and the many years of experience in intralogistics.
Protect people, ensure smooth-running processes.
The Sensor People demonstrated to trade show visitors in Nuremberg that everything they do is driven to provide safety for people and machinery paired with the aim of making the customers' automation processes as efficient as possible. They presented themselves as a partner for machine and system safety. In addition to the company's extensive range of safety products, Leuze electronic showcased its efficient safety services for the entire lifecycle of a machine or system. A safety trade show highlight from the Sensor People was their RSL 400 safety laser scanner, which is available in new variants. Using a demo, Leuze electronic let visitors to its booth experience the Smart Process Gating (SPG) process it developed live and up close. The process is based on the the company's MLC 530 safety light curtains and completely eliminates the need for signal-emitting sensors. This makes it a true alternative to muting. In 2019, it was honored with gold multiple times: with the GIT Security Award, with the Best-of-Industry-Award as well as with second place at the handling award.
Optimize the flow of goods, increase productivity.
In the intelligent production processes of the future, production plants and logistics systems will work without any human intervention. Among other things, automated guided vehicles (AGV) will autonomously complete logistics tasks and navigate automatically. Already today, Leuze electronic has two innovative solutions at the ready for AGV: the RSL 400 as well as the OGS 600. The RSL 400 safety laser scanner combines safety technology with a high-quality measurement data output for AGV in a compact device, thereby enabling reliable AGV safeguarding and navigation. By parallel-monitoring several protective fields, the speed of the automated guided vehicles is safely reduced. These new functions are also available as device variants with a PROFINET/PROFIsafe interface, which makes their integration into industrial networks particularly easy. They are also available in an AIDA-compliant model for the automotive industry. Alternatively, the navigation of automated guided vehicles for the transport of materials and goods can be solved via flexible optical guidance. With the OGS 600, Leuze electronic offers a compact sensor for this purpose that was honored with the "Innovative Product Award" in China by the jury of experts from the trade journal "Modern Manufacturing". With its edge detection and control signal transmission to the drive, the trace can be guided optically, which means that driving can be automated in the simplest of ways. The routes of the automated guided vehicles can be flexibly adapted by means of optimized trace tapes. The compact design of the OGS 600 and its low minimum distance to the ground of 10 mm means it can be integrated even into flat vehicles. Other intralogistics highlights presented in Nuremberg by the Sensor People were the IPS 400i and the CMS 700i from Leuze electronic. With the IPS 400i, Leuze electronic was expanding its IPS series with a model that offers optical double-depth compartment fine positioning. The IPS 400i is the world's smallest camera-based positioning sensor for high-bay storage devices. It detects round holes or reflectors both in single-depth and double-depth bars. The CMS 700i is a newly developed 3D contour measurement system from Leuze electronic based on the company's CML 730i measuring light curtains for the fault-free storage of goods. The complete system includes all components, the switch cabinet, fastening elements and connection technology all under one part number and can be customized for each customer. The CMS 700i measures the volume and shape of passing objects regardless of their surface structure and identifies protrusions and bulges. Even flat objects such as polybags can be precisely and economically detected without complicated camera installation. The intuitive WebConfig interface saves time and money and allows customers to handle the commissioning and maintenance themselves. And because the system collects additional data from bar code readers and scales, it is suitable both for new and existing systems.
Designing industrial automation.
Standardized industrial communication assists in an intelligent production environment (Smart Factory). This type of standardization or simplification is made possible - among other things - by fieldbus solutions with EtherCAT interface or IO-Link. Products with the IO-Link Smart Sensor Profile, such as the ODS9 optical distance sensor, enable both reliable sensor identification and access to all process and diagnostic data, even without IODD device descriptions: this profile makes the IO-Link sensors much easier to integrate or replace in the system. Using live demonstrations, the Sensor People showed how process-related information such as the reading quality of a bar code scanner or the function reserve of a retro-reflective photoelectric sensor can be captured and how changes can be monitored in the cloud. This makes the maintenance and repairs predictable so that the failure probability of a machine or system can be mitigated and their availability and cost effectiveness increased. Thanks to the dual channel principle from Leuze electronic, the real-time data required for the production process can be transferred simultaneously with the status information directly to the process control.