March 2019

| 46 | March 2019 www.smartmachinesandfactories.com | INTERVIEWS & REPORTS | T he past few years have seen the arrival of several linear motion systems designed to transport items along production lines. The ability to move items individually along lines to stations where processes are performed upon them is seen as a key technology to achieving the Industry 4.0 goal of producing items in “batch size one”. The idea is that every item rolling off a production line could be different, and tailored to the precise requirements of a specific customer. The various linear transport systems are designed to allow bespoke production to be achieved at high speeds. Instead of hundreds or thousands of identical products moving along inflexible conveyor lines and having identical processes performed on them, the new breed of linear systems allow items to be carried on platforms (known as carriers, movers or shuttles) that can follow individual paths taking the item to those processes specified by the end-customer. In some cases, they can bypass processes that are not required for that item. Smart Machines & Factories looked at some of the contenders last June. They each adopt slightly different Floating a vision of levitating production systems In tomorrow’s factories, workpieces will be transported flexibly between workstations on magnetically levitated carriers. This vision of the future was demonstrated at a recent German exhibition by two rival automation companies who believe that their technologies will help manufacturers to achieve “batch size one”. Contributing editor Tony Sacks reports. Beckhoff’s XPlanar levitating transport system can move workpieces with six degrees of freedom