Robotized Assembly of a Wire Harness in a Car Production Line

This paper addresses an engineering attempt of utilizing multiple robot arms in the assembly of deformable parts. The robot system developed in this research simulates a practically existing assembly process in an automobile plant where wrapped cables (wire harness) have to be fixed on the body of a car. This operation is performed by skilled workers and is considered to be difficult for automation. In this paper, a synthetic robotized solution is proposed for this process. For the first time, it realizes robotized assembly of a complex deformable object (wire harness) under a condition similar to an actual plant. Although some of the problems are simplified in the implementation, those critical to assemblies involving deformable objects are investigated and solved with experimental validation. Therefore, this research is expected to contribute to exploring the feasibility and potential of robotized assembly using deformable parts in actual plants. (C) Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden and The Robotics Society of Japan, 2011