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Cognex optimises Maco production process

A Cognex UK product story
Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Jan 14, 2009

Using cameras from Cognex and support from Buxbaum Automation, Mayer and Co, known worldwide as Maco, were able to find a solution to optimising its production process.

Maco is involved in the manufacture of rotary and tilting hinges for windows and doors.

The components are manufactured at the company's main plants in Salzburg and in Trieben.

Maco distributes its products through a global network, although Europe is its dominant market.

Both plant I in Salzburg and plant II in Trieben have state-of-the-art tool-making facilities.

Special machines such as assembly equipment are designed and produced in-house.

Maco's success has always been based on the quality of its products.

Reflecting its assumed responsibility to the customer, all products undergo stringent monitoring and improvement processes, from development to production to delivery.

When selecting the right vision system for the task at hand, the company faced a particular challenge in that they required the vision system to detect whether the workpiece has been inserted with the correct side facing upwards.

If not, the camera immediately sends an error message to the machine controller.

A separate mechanism then rotates the gear to the correct position and it can then be processed as normal.

All kinds of vision systems had previously been tested, which underlines how difficult the problem was for Maco to resolve.

Satisfactory results could not be achieved for a period of two years.

In order to solve the problem, a DVT 510 camera sensor from Cognex was recently fitted on the machine.

A recess in the gears allows the camera to detect immediately whether the piece is facing the right way up.

'With the camera sensors from Cognex and support from Buxbaum Automation, rejects have been reduced to practically zero,' said a Maco engineer.

'The technical capabilities of the Cognex DVT 510 - such as the Ethernet port, compatibility with standard bus systems, remote operation in real-time, Cmos image chip, 32MB DRAM data memory, 8MB Flash memory and the Intellect camera software - were crucial in overcoming the issues we faced.' Motivated by the success with the Cognex DVT 510 series, the Maco engineers will be relying on Cognex quality for other production areas and lines in the future.

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