A SMART ROBOTIC ARM FOR AUTOMATIC SORTING OF OBJECTS WITH DIFFERENT TAGS

N. I. Giannoccaro, L. Spedicato, A. Lay-Ekuakille

Abstract

This paper presents a mechatronics application to automatically sort objects with a robotic arm. The robotic arm picks similar objects and moves them in order to read the information contained in tags. In this way, the arm is able to place the objects in different final positions depending on the captured information. The starting position of a box is perceived by processing an image acquired by means of a webcam. The reading is made by using a Reader placed in a pre-fixed location inside the work space of the robotic arm. The movement of the robotic arm is guaranteed by an accurate kinematic model.<br />The robotic arms are widely used in industry, but most of them are programmed to follow a previously learned trajectory. Very few robots are able to make real-time decisions and so they may not be considered smart systems. One example of smart robotic arm is provided by a device which can sort some objects taking advantage of the information contained in tags glued on the basis of the same objects. These systems can be used in several applications for protecting the environments aimed to automatize the processes of waste stocking and disposal simply differentiating the tag information.

Keywords

robotic arm, sorting objects, protecting environments, RFID, waste logistics

Download

IMEKO-TC19-2013-019.pdf

DOI

-

IMEKO TC

TC19 - Environmental Measurements

Back to the proceedings