A decision tree methodology for selecting the use of robots in a manufacturing system has been developed for sheet metal work.

Collaborative deals between Japanese and major USA companies have been hitting the headlines recently. The UK government has been trying to encourage similar deals on this side of the Atlantic. Brian Rooks reports on one of the first of these.

MTM and other time measurement systems have been applied to human operators for many years. Now it is the time for robots to come under similar scrutiny. RTM uses different analysis methods to give predictions of cycle times within −2% to +3% for optimising selection and operating methods of...

Prab Robots is one of the USA's big robot manufacturers specialising in a wide variety of machine servicing operations. Two installations in the USA are described here.

Eight years after introducing its first industrial robot Cincinnati Milacron has expanded its range with a new series of electric drive robots. These were first seen in the USA in March this year and will have their European debut in June at the Paris industrial robot exhibition.

The present and future developments of a new robot company, only formed this year are outlined, and details concerning the selection of the new factory site are presented.

A new means of detecting leaks in car bodies has been developed by BL Technology. Both the sensor itself and its incorporation into the production system is described in detail.

The development of CRAG's robot technology data base, ADR‐l Expert System, is described and findings from the data base discussed. Relevant characteristics of available robots including accuracy, load carrying capacity, and application capability are reviewed and the role of data base systems...

There is a large market for new systems and now, following a period of several years in which few revelations were made, ASEA has introduced several new products. Brian Rooks, who recently visited ASEA, reports on all the Robot Division's new developments.

A method for developing the kinematic equations of motion for a six degree‐of‐freedom manipulator is presented, which can be applied to most commercially available robots. Cartesian coordinate frames are assigned to each link so that the number of transcendental and arithmetic operations...