CONVEYER BELT WITH 2-LINK ROBOTIC ARM ABSTRACT

Many manufacturing applications could benefit from an automated sorting system. The ability to accommodate a variety of objects and sort them by weight could have many possible advantages over traditional sorting methods. The repeatability of robots and the possible cost reduction associated with replacing human sorters are two such advantages. The idea of this project is to use a 2-link robotic arm in combination with a conveyer to sort objects by weight. The conveyer belt is used to simulate a production line and is essentially the mechanism that carries the objects to be sorted. The systems sensing capability allows the object to be anywhere on the conveyer belt allowing for increased flexibility. The goal of this project is to create a complete system to demonstrate the objective of sorting objects from a conveyer belt. The focus is on integrating hardware and sensor systems with software that can be used as a basis to determine the feasibility of this type of automated sorting system. The result is a fully completed system that is successfully used to sort objects by weight. It is tested for repeatability, which revealed concerns about the use of the IR range sensor in determining the location of the object. With that exception, the system proved to work very well in many other aspects and showed that this type of system may have some potential uses where automated sorting is desired.

Block Diagram