In the second of our ongoing series of blog posts showing how Universal Robots cobots are being used in the battle against COVID-19, we look at some exceptional face shield and mask production set ups, meet a unique cobot barista and admire a remote controlled mobile cobot performing key medical tests in China.
Making Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) With Cobots
As COVID-19 began its spread in the United States, Hurco North America (a machine tool supplier headquartered in Indiana) set its employees a challenge –to adapt a machine tool into a system for making N95 masks. The employees chose to deploy a UR5 cobot integrated with the ProFeeder from UR Certified Systems Integrator ProCobots to tend a heated mold for shaping the mask. The UR5 loads a stack of four plies, two polymer outer layers and two spun-fiber filter layers, and these become a mask through a five-minute cycle involving molding, welding and cutting. Thanks to the system, Hurco is able to produce masks for all its employees with enough left over to donate to customers and distributors.
Peter Zelinski, Editor-in-Chief at Modern Machine Shop visited Hurco’s Indiana facility to find out more…
