Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Technology and Advanced Materials IFAM
Painting processes are essential to give products specific surface properties. While painting in mass production is mostly automated, in small batch sizes, the paint application is manually carried out by employees. Workers are exposed to significant physical strain during this process. Protective clothing and respirators are essential due to harmful paint components, and challenging body postures, such as overhead painting, pose additional difficulties. Additionally, this manual process is very cost-intensive. Therefore, the MemoLaRo project aims to design a future-proof painting workspace that significantly improves working conditions for employees. The goal is to develop assistive painting robots that, with the help of sensor systems and automated painting programs, can efficiently paint components.
Approaches to Developing a Future-Proof Painting Workspace
To achieve these goals, the project will take a modular approach to the parts of a geared motor and create individual automatic robot painting programs. A sensor system will be developed to convert the geared motor into machine-readable data, thereby creating a digital twin of the motor. Based on this data, a painting program will be generated and transmitted to the robot. A user-friendly software will allow employees to review and approve the automatically generated painting program. By the end of the project, a modern painting workspace will be created that improves working conditions and secures the future of the painting profession.
Fraunhofer IFAM will actively participate in the project by developing painting programs and evaluating them through painting trials on real components.
Application Potential
The developed technologies will potentially be applied in areas with small batch sizes, such as contract painting, as well as by manufacturers of pumps, fans, refrigeration machines, and in special machine construction.