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Safety seal assembly

Ten plastic seals in one body, a small metal clip in each and a plug on top, welded shut. On one rotary table, two robots set the clips, the plugs are welded, every seal gets its own barcode and a camera checks it. One operator loads the bodies.

Watch the machine
  1. From above: gloved hands take the finished seals out of the nest and lay a new empty body in it.
    01Loaded by the operator
  2. Over the lit feeder plate, the robot’s magnetic gripper comes down, picks clips and lifts them.
    02Clips picked from the feeder
  3. The plug magazine comes down over the body and sets the plugs on it.
    03Plugs set
  4. The validation station’s light comes on over the seals, the camera above it.
    04Checked by camera

Three parts, one seal

A safety seal is pulled through and locked once; it can only be opened by breaking it. Each one is made of three parts.

  1. 01

    The body

    Ten seals moulded together, still empty when the operator lays them in.

  2. 02

    The clip

    A small metal clip in each seal, which locks the tail once it is pulled in. It has a top and a bottom, and only one way is right.

  3. 03

    The plug

    A plastic plug over each clip, welded to the body so the clip cannot be reached.

Ten finished seals of one body, as the validation camera sees them: each head closed, each with its own barcode.
Ten finished seals under the validation camera, each with its own barcode.

Eight stations, one table

The rotary table turns one station at a time, and every body goes all the way round. Hover over a station to watch it.

4×
One turn of the table, seen from a nest.
  1. At the loading station, by the green lights, the operator lifts the finished seals out and lays a new body in the nest.
    01LoadThe lights by the nest show which seals passed. The operator takes the finished seals and lays an empty body in the nest.
  2. Wide view from beside a robot: it swings in over the table and sets clips in a body.
    02Clip insertionTwo robots set the clips, each from its own feeder. A camera checks every clip is in place before the table turns.
  3. The plug magazine comes down and sets plugs on the body.
    03PlugsA magazine sets a plug over each clip, five at a time.
  4. The sonotrode comes down on the body and lifts again.
    04Ultrasonic weldingThe sonotrode welds the plugs to the body.
  5. A body comes round to the laser marking station.
    05Laser markingEvery seal gets its own barcode.
  6. IROVISION screens from the validation camera: every seal head is checked, each barcode is framed in green and read, then the printed text is read.
    06ValidationUnder its own light, a camera checks every head, reads every barcode and the printed text. One more station is kept free for a later step.

Clips from a flexible feeder

The clips are tiny, and they only fit one way up. So they come from a flexible feeder: a plate lit from below, with a camera above that sees each clip.

The hopper drops clips, the lit plate shakes them apart.
  1. 01

    Filled from outside

    The operator tips clips into the hopper from outside the machine. When the plate runs low, the hopper shakes more onto it.

  2. 02

    Lit from below

    The plate is lit from underneath, so every clip shows as a sharp outline to the camera above.

  3. 03

    Which way up

    The camera finds each clip and sees which way up it lies. A clip turned over cannot be used; it stays and is shaken again.

  4. 04

    Picked one by one

    A magnetic gripper on the SCARA robot picks the clips one by one, five on each trip, and sets them in the body.

IROVISION screen: clips on the lit plate outlined in green, one outlined in red because it lies upside down.
IROVISION: green, ready to pick. Red, upside down.
4×
Two robots, two feeders, from above.
The robot at its feeder, the second robot swinging past behind it.Real speed
At the feeder, the other robot behind, at real speed.

Plugs from the bowl

The plugs come from a vibratory bowl.

  1. 01

    Hundreds at once

    The operator tips hundreds of plugs into the bowl, again from outside the machine.

  2. 02

    Up the track

    They walk up the bowl’s track and along linear feeders, lined up, to a magazine.

  3. 03

    Five at a time

    The magazine fills ten places and sets the plugs on the body, five at a time. The welder seals them in at the next station.

Plugs walking out of the bowl.
Close up: the plug magazine fills and slides out over the table.
The magazine fills.

A camera at every step

A missing clip never gets a plug, and a code that cannot be read never leaves as OK. IROVISION, our own vision software, decides at each station.

IROVISION screen: the whole feeder plate, every clip outlined, most in green, a few in red.
Every clip on the plate found.
IROVISION screen: five clips in their places in the body, each inside its own frame.
Five clips in place, the table may turn.
IROVISION live in production: five camera views, feeders, clips in the body and barcodes, each marked OK or NOK.
IROVISION live: five cameras, OK or NOK at every one.
The operator lifts a body the machine caught: the head of one seal is damaged.
Caught: one seal’s head is damaged. The body does not leave as OK.
8×
The whole table, from above.

One operator, outside

The operator loads bodies at one station and never reaches into the machine.

  1. 01

    Loading behind a light curtain

    The loading station is open to the operator, guarded by a light curtain. Everything else is behind glass.

  2. 02

    Feeders filled from outside

    The clip hoppers and the plug bowl are filled from outside, while the machine runs.

  3. 03

    OK at a glance

    The touch buttons by the nest show the result for every seal as the body comes back.

What a machine like this takes

Ten seals a body, three parts each, a weld, a code and a check for every seal: a lot to do on one table, in a short cycle.

  1. 01

    Short cycles, hard problems

    Many parts, many checks, little time per part. We take on that kind of problem and design every move around the cycle your plant needs.

  2. 02

    SCARA robots near their limits

    We tune the moves, grippers and timing until the robots run close to what they can do, without slowing for the stations around them.

  3. 03

    Everything on one platform

    Feeding, assembly, joining, marking, inspection and packing fit on one base. It is built and tested at our plant and leaves as one piece.

  4. 04

    Vision we write ourselves

    IROVISION is our own software, written by our own team: matching, measuring, surface defects, fine measurements in the image, telecentric optics. When a check needs something new, we add it.

Gallery

The film of the machine in production, and a few more views of it.

Safety seal assembly machine: eight stations, one platformWatch on YouTube
From above: the welder, the laser and the validation station, its light flashing as a body arrives.
Welding, marking and validation, from above
The camera pans to one of the vision units, marked IROVISION and Kamera 4.
One of the machine’s cameras
An arm reaches to the switch on a door beside the plug bowl and resets it.
A door reset at its switch, from outside

The machine in brief

Application
Clip assembly, ultrasonic welding, laser marking, vision check
Solution
Assembly and Quality Control
Product
Plastic safety seals, ten to a body
Stations
Eight on one rotary table, one in reserve
Robots
Two SCARA robots, magnetic grippers
Clip feeding
Flexible feeders, lit from below, camera above
Plug feeding
Vibratory bowl, linear feeders, magazine
Joining
Ultrasonic welding
Marking
Laser, a unique barcode on every seal
Inspection
IROVISION at every step
Operator
One, outside the machine
Platform
One base, built and tested at our plant, shipped in one piece

Also: final control and packaging

O-rings fitted, every fitting measured, rejects sorted, the good ones packed.

Also: valve assembly and testing

Three parts joined, two screws torqued, a leak test through the full travel, a code on every valve.

Machine tending with IROCUBE

The same vision, finding parts without fixtures for CNC machines.

Questions we are asked

Why a flexible feeder for the clips?

The clips are tiny and only fit one way up. A flexible feeder with a camera finds the ones lying the right way up and leaves the rest to be shaken again.

What if a clip is missing?

A camera checks the five clips in the body before the table turns. A body with a clip missing does not go on as OK.

How is every seal traced?

Each seal is laser-marked with its own barcode, and a camera reads and checks it before the body comes back to the operator.

Why is one station empty?

It is kept free so a step can be added later, without rebuilding the machine.

How fast is it?

Fast: the robots run close to their limits and nothing waits for anything else. The cycle depends on the product; tell us yours and we will tell you the cycle for it.

Does it need more than one operator?

No. One operator loads the bodies, fills the feeders from outside and takes the finished seals.

Send us your part

Every machine starts with the product. Send us your parts or their drawings, how they go together and what has to be checked, and we will work out the machine with you.

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