16 AUTOMOTIVE Vision drives quality
Vision can benefit the entire automotive supply chain from parts and components, including major subsystems, to automotive manufacture itself. This sector is one of the most demanding in terms of product quality and aversion to component failures. The ability of vision to both measure and classify helps the modern quality inspection approach of differentiating between critical and non-critical defects – those that affect the functionality of the object and those that do not. Although the integration of vision technology into complex 24/7 manufacturing processes can pose many practical challenges, the return on investment timescales for industrial vision systems are very short, especially when the costs associated with product recalls is taken into consideration.
Components and assemblies
Inspection continues to be one of the most importance uses of vision in this industry, ensuring the quality of components ranging from engines, drives, and chassis components to safety-relevant parts such as brakes, steering, airbags and seat belts. 3D imaging has many applications such as measuring flush and gap alignment when vehicle doors are fitted. A multitude of electronic components including cable tracks, switches and displays can be inspected with machine vision during production. Elsewhere in the assembly process, machine vision can be used for robot guidance to position and bond windscreens or other guidance tasks such as fitting of doors.
FOOD Getting things right
Vision technology can offer food manufacturers a competitive advantage. It opens up possibilities in quality assurance that were previously impossible to implement, including inspection of the food product itself, inspection of food packaging integrity to avoid premature spoilage and inspecting food labelling for accuracy. Newer technologies such as hyperspectral imaging are likely to have a big impact in the future.
Controlling the product
Vision can be used in the processing of virtually any food, living, grown or manufactured. In almost every case it is carrying out previously labour-intensive tasks as diverse as the vaccination of live fish to the checking of pizza for shape, size, edge defects, holes, and the presence and distribution of the correct toppings, using both 2D and 3D imaging. Vision can also be integrated into slicing equipment for portion control for products such as bacon, cheese and ham in order to maximise the on-weight percentages and minimise giveaway.
Vaccination of fish - Courtesy Scorpion Vision Sustainability 3D-vision Raw materials
Vision is also used in the inspection, classification and selection of raw materials. Specific lighting techniques or structured lighting can be used to help expose any typical defects to ensure that defect- free raw metal sheets are used for visible parts of the bodywork. Metal that has been classified as structurally sound but contains blemishes, can be used on non-visible parts of the vehicle.
Other applications
Beyond the manufacturing phase, code readers can track vehicle shipments and optical character recognition systems can read the VIN (vehicle identification numbers) and number plates. High-speed vision systems enable accurate analysis of vehicle behaviour in crash tests to help reduce the impact on passengers in accidents. In car use of vision technology can include parking aids and collision avoidance systems. Perhaps one of the most interesting new applications of vision is its use in autonomous vehicles. And finally, when vehicles reach their end of life and need to be recycled, vision technology is responsible for reliably identifying and separating materials and routing them to the appropriate recycling stations.
www.ukiva.org
Sustainability is a critical aspect concerning food producers in the UK today. A report by WRAP (Waste and Resources Action Programme) has estimated that up to 480,000 tonnes of food is wasted in the UK each year because of poor seals in packaging. Up to 24% of all packs are “at risk of failure” yet only 1% were detected in the factory using conventional means. Not only is this food wasted, but its carbon footprint is made worse by having to be then transported for disposal. Vision can be combined with existing methods to radically improve the detection of poor seals. For example, thermoformed and top sealed trays can be pressure-tested for integrity. However if food has become trapped in the seal itself, the pack may pass that test but leak later as the trapped food dries and shrinks. Vision systems can be used to identify packs with food trapped in the seals.
Food labelling
The correct labelling is vitally important for the consumer with regards to allergen information, ‘use-by’ dates and other data such as price, weight, country of origin etc. With the costly penalties imposed by supermarkets for incorrectly labelled and presented products, there are signs that the food industry will follow the pharmaceutical industry in terms of traceability. Here, however, the entire label needs to be verified. This includes the artwork, any promotional ‘flashes’ as well as 1D/2D barcode verification, overprinted coding, date and time verification and printed text verification. The need for 100% inspection makes vision essential essential and a vision system can yield a very quick return on investment.
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