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A new manufacturing plant has been installed in Solihull, UK, to manufacture the new Range Rover sports utility vehicle. An important aspect of the £80 million investment at the site is a body‐in‐white assembly shop containing 123 robots, many of which are employed in multi‐tasking roles.

Two models of the Vauxhall Vectra passenger car are now manufactured at Ellesmere Port, UK where there is a completely new bodyshop with over 600 Fanuc robots. John Mortimer reports.

This paper aims to provide a background to the use of robots by the automotive industry and describe a number of applications which illustrate the capabilities and importance of robotic machine vision technology.

Following an historical background to the use of robots by the automotive industry, this paper discusses a selection of applications which involve the use of robotic machine vision. Brief conclusions are drawn.

This shows that robotic vision technology is playing an important and growing role within the automotive industry and can yield improved product quality and greater productivity.

This paper illustrates how robots equipped with machine vision are contributing to the automotive industry's needs for greater productivity and improved quality.

Friction stir welding (FSW) is a novel method for joining materials without using consumables and without melting the materials. The purpose of this paper is to present the state of the art in robotic FSW and outline important steps for its implementation in industry and specifically the automotive industry.

This study focuses on the robot deflections during FSW, by relating process forces to the deviations from the programmed robot path and to the strength of the obtained joint. A robot adapted for the FSW process has been used in the experimental study. Two sensor‐based methods are implemented to determine path deviations during test runs and the resulting welds were examined with respect to tensile strength and path deviation.

It can be concluded that deflections must be compensated for in high strengths alloys. Several strategies can be applied including online sensing or compensation of the deflection in the robot program. The welding process was proven to be insensitive for small deviations and the presented path compensation methods are sufficient to obtain a strong and defect‐free welding joint.

This paper demonstrates the effect of FSW process forces on the robot, which is not found in literature. This is expected to contribute to the use of robots for FSW. The experiments were performed in a demonstrator facility which clearly showed the possibility of applying robotic FSW as a flexible industrial manufacturing process.

The automotive industry has been the principal driver in the development of robotics; however, as car design becomes more sophisticated, demands on robot makers will continue undiminished.

This paper aims to provide a European perspective on the collaborative robot business and to consider the factors governing future market development.

Following an introduction, this first describes the collaborative robots launched recently by European manufacturers and their applications. It then discusses major European research activities and finally considers the factors stimulating the market.

This article shows that collaborative robots are being commercialised by the major European robot manufacturers as well as by several smaller specialists. Although most have low payload capacities they are inexpensive and offer a number of operational benefits, making them well suited to a range of existing and emerging applications. Europe has a strong research base and several EU-funded programmes aim to stimulate collaborative robot development and use. Rapid market development is anticipated, driven in the main by applications in electronic product manufacture and assembly; new applications in the automotive industry; uses by small to medium-sized manufacturers; and companies seeking robots to support agile production methods.

This paper provides a timely review of the rapidly developing European collaborative robot industry.

A new application for the industrial robot has emerged, inspection, with two players emerging, Stäubli and Amatec Robotics of the Kuka Roboter Group. Both companies’ systems and their competing benefits are discussed. Until this new development, car bodies were inspected on‐line with arrays of laser sensors fixed in position over the production line. Using a robot to manipulate the same type of sensor gives more flexibility in the areas of the car to be measured and also reduces the number of sensors needed. It emerges that virtually all of the applications to date are to be found in European car plants, and some of these are described.

Outlines the factors causing the automotive industry to increase machine vision application, reviews new developments in vision technology that are targeted at expanding and improving it use in the automotive industry, reports on an innovative application of vision guided robotics at DaimlerChrysler

Automotive robotics R&D and application developments concentrate on methods, tools, and procedures, that enable industry leaders to reduce cost, whilst simultaneously increase quality and productivity. Furthermore, in particular in the USA, manufacturing and assembly system, plant security, safety and reliability, and real‐time performance evaluation and control became key too. The focus is appropriate, since downtime in automotive robotics can mount to typically US$5‐10K, and even to $20K loss per production minute. Introduces some key trends and methods, as well as some implementation examples, showing quality solutions.