The presence of robotics and automation in production lines continues to increase, driven by the rapidly-decreasing cost of these machines combined with ever-improving ease of use, the continuing shortage of human labor, and the need to improve product quality by eliminating assembly errors and increasing repeatability.

Collaborative robots, or cobots, represent the fastest growing segment of the industrial robotic market. Being safe, easy to deploy, and with relatively short time-to-value, these robots are becoming increasingly prevalent in assembly lines across various industries.
Robots can handle repetitive and dangerous tasks, freeing up human workers to focus on more complex tasks that require higher-level skills.
According to a report by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR), the global sales of industrial robots reached a record 517,000 units in 2021, with the automotive industry, the largest user, accounting for around 30% of total sales. Asia remains the world’s largest market, as three quarters of all new robots were deployed there; China in particular accounted for more than half of all new robot installations. In other words, more robots were deployed to the productions lines in China in 2021 than the rest of the world combined!
That being said, growth remains healthy in Europe and the Americas as well, and is expected to continue for the rest of the decade. In fact, following the massive supply-chain issues that were caused by the COVID-19 global pandemic, more European and USA-based manufacturers have started repatriating some of their production lines. These manufactures understand that relocating some of their operations on-shore can’t happen without adopting industrial robots who alleviate labor shortage issues; at the same time, reviving their domestic factories means that more jobs become available for skilled programmers that can deploy, calibrate and maintain these high-tech devices. 
As robot production has ramped up, their cost per unit has fallen. In fact, over the past 30 years, the average price of robots has halved in real terms, while labor costs have more than doubled over the same period. Shifting part of their production to lower-cost regions will further decrease their unit price in the years to come.
In concomitance with this drop in price, robot interfaces have been simplified to the point where initial setup and integration into an assembly line has become virtually immediate and their reduced weight makes them suitable for being moved frequently between production lines.

Screwdriving, thanks to its repetitive nature, has always been one of the most appropriate areas for robotic integration, even more so in industries like electronics manufacturing, where the delicate nature of the components being assembled can surely benefit from higher precision and removal of human-error potential.

One of Kolver’s longtime partners in automation is Universal Robots (UR).
Pairing Kolver’s K-DUCER with a UR collaborative robot arm, manufacturers can achieve repeatable and accurate assembly, with all the other benefits of Industry 4.0, like communication with other smart factory devices and full traceability of each tightening operation.

Deploying a K-DUCER + UR arm system is simpler than ever, thanks to the intuitive interfaces on both. Even inexperienced users can now quickly set up a fastening application, making this no longer the exclusive domain of larger companies with bigger budgets.
The decreasing purchasing costs translate to a lower threshold of production volume necessary to justify the purchase, making these robots an economical choice for niche tasks and smaller businesses, where monthly volumes are measured in the  hundreds rather than in the thousands or hundreds of thousands. 

Here’s a video from our Danish partners of Alsmatik illustrating a robot cell with a UR robot mounted with a K-DUCER transducerized screwdriver along with a Kolver NFK automatic screw supplier, on an electronics manufacturing application.

The robot and K-DUCER work together to ensure that the desired torque and angle are reached with every tightening operation.

This next video from our friends at Olympus has two different UR cobots, the UR5e and the UR10e, along with a K-DUCER, with each one coordinating with the others to drive screws in the right location at the right torque.

Allied Automation, on the other hand, with the following video likes to showcase how a UR16e robot and K-DUCER screwdriver can be paired to handle a heavy payload with precise torque and angle requirements all within small footprint:

Need help exploring automation opportunities for your line? Contact us today!