KitPaDy: Robot co-worker in kitting process: Basic concept and computation of working time

Abstract

Some processes in the manufacturing industry still need manual work. In particular, kitting processes in assembly factories require human workers because of the need to handle several kinds of parts and because of time constraints. Herein, we propose, a novel robot co-worker, Kitting Parts robot Delivery system (KitPaDy). KitPaDy transports shelves with parts needed for kitting to the worker. It consists of a handful of autonomous carriers and various shelves implementing some mechanisms. In this paper, we describe KitPaDy and discuss its effectiveness.