Denmark-based
Inrotech ApS — a designer and manufacturer of automated welding solutions for shipbuilding, renewables, offshore, and heavy industries — has chosen 2-D/3-D laser profile scanners from
Micro-Epsilon for use on its ‘Inrotech-Crawler’ welding robot. A ScanControl 2900 laser profile scanner is mounted on the Inrotech-Crawler and measures the geometry of the seam to be welded before the automated welding process starts.
Due to its compact, lightweight design with integrated controller, the ScanControl 2900 is ‘ideally suited’ to this measurement task, having a measuring width of 100mm, a measuring rate of 300Hz and a resolution in the Z axis of 12µm. Furthermore, various connectivity options offered by the SDK (software development kit) enable Inrotech to directly transmit the profile data, from the sensor, calibrated to its own software, via the ScanControl DLL.
The ‘Weldlogic technology’ from Inrotech then calculates, among other things, the number of weld passes, the position of the weld seams, the weld speed and the oscillation width required to produce a high-quality weld. Directly after the calculation, the Inrotech-Crawler automatically performs the welding process. Designed for mobile applications, the Inrotech-Crawler is designed for a variety of applications, including pipeline welding tasks in the oil and gas industry, offshore, shipbuilding, wind turbines, and building construction. The ScanControl 2900 is integrated into a protective housing by Inrotech.