Holiday Woes? Robotic and Automation Technologies Can Help!
Crying loud for all to hear? For many, holidays can be a stressful time. Luckily, you can ease your woes with the help of the latest robotic and automation technologies to get gifts under the tree and cookies on the table.
Over two billion people worldwide celebrate Christmas. While originally celebrated as a Christian holiday, Christmas is now observed worldwide, regardless of one’s religion.
While often considered a day of festivities, the increasing commercialization has made the holidays more of a decorating and gift giving stress than a fun time for many. This is why we have decided to put together a useful guide to show you how robotic and automation technologies can help ease your holiday woes!
Using robotic and automation technologies can ease the stress of holidays! Image used courtesy of dukesn
Christmas Tree Decorating with UR3s
Getting a Christmas tree up and decorated can be a pain! But with the help of two Universal Robots’ cobots, your tree will be up and decorated in no time. We were inspired by this video from Axis New York of two Universal Robots' UR3s decorating a Christmas tree:
See how you can use the UR3e to decorate your Christmas tree. Video used courtesy of Axis New York
The UR3e is versatile, finding use in a variety of applications, including assembly, welding, and machine tending. Considered a "table-top" robot, the UR3e is small and lightweight with a 3 kg payload and 360 degrees of rotation.
The best part? The UR3e is easy to program. With a minimal learning curve, users can drag the UR3e's arm to intended waypoints.
Wrapping Presents with YuMi
Are you limited on time or just straight awful at wrapping presents? Using ABB’s YuMi dual-arm cobot (inspired by the following video from Andreas Stolt), you don’t have to worry about the painful gift wrapping process anymore.
Using the dual-arm cobot from ABB, you don't have to worry about wrapping your gifts any longer. Video used courtesy of Andreas Stolt
The revolutionary two-arm collaborative robot is used in applications that may otherwise be difficult with single-arm bots. This includes certain tasks in the assembly of small components, automation in labs, and inspection. Compared to its single-arm counterpart, the YuMi dual-arm cobot has fourteen degrees of freedom, giving it the ability to wrap presents like a champ.
Christmas Lights Controlled with a PLC!
Using a programmable logic controller (PLC), you can make the most epic of Christmas light shows, sure to wow any guest. Inspired by Automation Groups' "PLC Controlled Christmas Lights" video, you can use your PLC programming skills to one-up your neighbors this Christmas.
Video used courtesy of Automation Group
While we don't yet have a guide to programming a PLC for Christmas lights, we do encourage you to check out some of our other PLC programming guides that you'll likely find useful anytime of the year!
The In-Laws
Looking for industrial automation technology to navigate tricky political discussion between the families and talk to the in-laws?
Erm…sorry, we can’t help you there.
The editorial team at Control Automation would like to wish you a happy holiday season! Thanks for being a part of our thriving community of control engineers, educators, students, and hobbyists. We can't wait to share more educational and insightful content with you in 2023.
