Equipa:	Grupo 04: Renato Pouseiro (Coord.) , Luís Fernandes , Catarina Jacinto , João Rodrigues
Empresa:	Siroco – Sociedade Industrial de Robótica e Controlo, SA
Orientadores:	Prof. Pedro Fonseca (DETI) Eng. Hugo Nogueira (Siroco - Sociedade Industrial de Robótica e Controlo, SA)

This project showcases an inspection system with artificial vision to detect remaining products on an industrial conveyor where different type of products transit but cannot be mixed. Through wireless communication and control algorithms, this system can also minimize human errors that can occur during the product exchange.

Challenge

In the context of industrial manufacturing a constant inspection and verification of production lines is a crucial factor to ensure high quality on the final products.

Cork Supply, a company especialized in the production of natural stoppers, develops new ways of improving their services to achieve high quality products for their customers and, for that, have a thorough process on the production lines. This process consists on supplying a conveyor belt with a model of stopper that transits through it until reaching the end. Although the process is simple, the conveyor is placed at higher ground with difficult access which undermines its control and verification.

The primary problem with this is the fact that, between products exchange on the line, it is needed to ensure that no remains are left on the conveyor and, with this latter being on higher grounds with difficult access, the verification is made by humans through a mirror placed on the conveyor which has associated flaws and constraints.

Therefore, the challenge consisted in developping an inspection system that is capable of doing this verification automatically and give the workers a debugging solution to see if residual product is present on the conveyor or not.

Results

In terms of vision algorithm we were able to achieve the automatic inspection that was required for the project. Once the laser starts the inspection, the camera turns on and starts capturing frames and checks the presence of the laser beam. As soon as this latter dissapears, the result of the inspection is a message stating that remains are present on the conveyor and must be removed.

Regarding the mechanical parts everything is working as expected. We have 3 eletrovalves, 2 for the laser system and 1 for the camera system.

For the wireless communications the team was able to create a simple client/server communication and also assign, to the same microcomputer, the possibility of it working both as a client and a server. Initially, the Central Unit sends a message to the Camera System (which works simultaneously as a client and server) to start the scan, then the camera system sends a message to the laser system to lower the pneumatic cylinder and activate the laser, thus starting the camera system to scan.

More Information (Mechanical Concept)

*Mechanical Concept

The mechanical part consists of implementing two gantries, one at each end of the conveyor. For the laser system, we chose to implement a gantry equipped with two pneumatic cylinders. One of these cylinders lowers the laser to about one centimeter above the conveyor belt, while the second moves the laser along the width of the conveyor belt. The camera system, on the other hand, uses a simpler gantry. The camera remains fixed, pointing downwards, while a pneumatic cylinder moves a surface inclined at 45 degrees and with a thickness of 3/4 mm, this surface serving as a base for the laser to hit, with the camera picking up the laser beam.

Mechanical Concept