Beckhoff provides turnkey automation solutions based on EtherCAT and PC for automotive manufacturers
Efficient motion control enhances the precision and performance of five-axis fiber laser cutting systems
BOS Innovations implemented a turnkey L-MS fiber laser cutting system solution for a global leading automotive manufacturer. The Beckhoff drive technology they adopted can precisely coordinate five-axis motion for cutting, ensuring that high-power laser cutting equipment can process parts with strict tolerance requirements. Furthermore, the PC-based control technology can flexibly respond to different customer needs.
Headquartered in Dorchester, Ontario, BOS Innovations is both an original equipment manufacturer and a system integrator. They not only provide complete equipment but also develop upgrade solutions for outdated equipment, integrating them into existing production lines. “For 25 years, we have collaborated with major manufacturers in North America to develop innovative profit-driven solutions for heavy industrial applications like automotive manufacturing.” said Ben Huigenbos, president of BOS company. “We have core competencies in fully automated assembly lines, advanced welding and laser processing robots, multi-robot coordinated motion control, collaborative robots, and quality inspection.”
BOS implemented the Laser-Motion System (L-MS) for an automotive tier-one supplier, which exemplifies this well.L-MS is an advanced fiber laser cutter equipped with a direct-drive linear motion system for precise CNC machining. This high-power laser cutter processes complex parts with strict tolerance requirements through five-axis motion. “L-MS also requires the addition of a robot that can load and unload workpieces and move them to deburring, visual inspection, and marking stations to become a true turnkey system.” said Steve Van Loon, technical manager of laser and motion systems at BOS company.
Laser cutting focuses on flexible modular control
To ensure that L-MS can provide customers with a win-win solution,BOS prioritized flexibility and modularity from the design stage. In addition to the standard 1 kW fiber laser, the cutting head can accommodate two 0.5-6 kW laser sources and can even support welding (including remote welding). The system can be equipped with smoke extraction devices, automatic slag removal devices, automatic doors, and safety scanners for operators or robots to load materials. When cutting, the fiber laser cutter first places the workpiece upright on a flat bed or uses a pivot system with an additional servo axis to rotate the workpiece 360 degrees. By adding such a turntable, the loading process can occur simultaneously with the laser processing. The equipment size is also flexible:L-MS system is a cube approximately 2 meters long, designed to process workpieces up to 1300 millimeters long, and can be extended on all sides to accommodate various sizes of workpieces.
To achieve such high flexibility, a high-performance and highly adaptable control system and network technology are first required to integrate the equipment with other systems on the production line. Secondly, the cutting axes need to be equipped with highly synchronized motors and drive products to ensure workpiece processing quality. Equally important is openness, which guarantees real-time communication with robot controllers, deburring components, and vision systems. To address this issue, Steve Van Loon collaborated with mechanical designers Riley Tomiuck and Scott McCall on the design. Their team determined that the performance requirements of theL-MS system far exceed what traditional fieldbus and hardware PLC can provide, so they turned to Beckhoff solutions.
“Beckhoff is our savior for achieving various demanding servo applications, such as the L-MS system.” Van Loon said. Ten years ago,BOS first adopted Beckhoff’s automation technology on a large cardboard processing system equipped with about 50 motion axes and expanded its application to more projects. Subsequently, in 2018 , the company successfully created the first generation of L-MS system for cutting SUV car panels using Beckhoff technology, which became a standard product in the company’s product line. In this project,BOS team closely collaborated with Beckhoff’s local automation sales engineer Dean Herron and application engineer Zhang Rui to form an engineering team.
EtherCAT-equipped motion control system performs excellently
BOS achieves precise motion control in L-MS by using various rotary servo motors and direct-drive solutions along with the EtherCAT communication system. The equipment processes octagonal steel pipe workpieces with varying wall thicknesses, cutting 21.5 degree angles at one end of each workpiece and handling workpieces with 6 or 12 holes while maintaining strict tolerance requirements.
The horizontal axis uses Beckhoff AL2800 series linear motors with speeds up to 6 m/s and maximum thrusts of 4500 N. “X and Y axes have high dynamic requirements in acceleration, speed, and precision, so linear motors must be used.” Steve Van Loon said. The automotive manufacturer’s equipment has a Z axis and a pivot system, both using AM8000 servo motors. The AX5000 servo drives equipped with high-speed control technology are very suitable for achieving high-dynamic applications, allowing easy integration of a smaller third-party motor to control the θ axis on the cutting head. The single-cable technology (OCT) used in the servo motors and drives significantly reduces wiring workload.
“Each device is equipped with EtherCAT distributed clock functionality, allowing precise synchronization and time errors of less than 1 μs, making it very suitable for controlling coordinated motion systems like L-MS.” Dean Herron explained. Beckhoff’s EtherCAT I/O product range is diverse and open, supporting 30 communication protocols, making it easy to connect to other systems on the production line by adding EtherNet/IP bus couplers.
BOS not only uses various space-saving EtherCAT couplers and I/O terminal modules provided by Beckhoff but also installs TwinSAFE terminal modules to ensure functional safety of the system. In this way, engineers can directly integrate safety functions into the standard I/O network segment. Zhang Rui explained: “BOS equipped this device with EL6900 TwinSAFE logic terminal module as a safety PLC, eliminating time-consuming hard-wiring of safety switch devices and reducing complexity. All I/O is deployed in the same rack or installed on the device via IP67 EtherCAT terminal boxes, and they can also conveniently create safety logic in the standard TwinCAT development environment.
TwinCAT allows engineers to choose the programming language they are most familiar with or most suitable for their projects. In this project, they used TwinCAT PLC and CNC software packages, and among many features, they praised the performance of G code usage and other functionalities. “TwinCAT Motion Designer was also very helpful for selecting AM8000 series servo motors.” Steve Van Loon added.
The core of the control platform is a Beckhoff CX2040 embedded controller equipped with an Intel®CoreTM i7 quad-core processor. A 15.6 inch high-resolution CP2916 multi-touch control panel is very suitable for viewing visual inspection results.
A win-win system
The completeL-MS system officially went online and was delivered to end-users at the end of 2020. The system achieves a cycle time of 40 seconds or even shorter for each workpiece through high-speed control and automatic loading functions. “L-MS system operates smoothly at 2 meters/second and 1.25 g acceleration, and customers praise it as the highest precision cutting system they have ever seen.” Steve Van Loon concluded. “This is thanks to the computing speed of the controller and the fine-tuning we accomplished withTwinCAT Scope. Using the software oscilloscope, we can see all parameters on the screen and collect data for each axis, including following errors, acceleration, and deceleration, to optimize system performance.
“Coordinated motion requires transferring a large amount of data between the servo drives and motion planners. Practice has proven that EtherCAT is the only fieldbus capable of handling this situation.” Van Loon explained. The finished laser cutter not only meets all the requirements of the automotive manufacturer but also helps BOS win orders from other customers.
For more information:
www.beckhoff.com.cn/machine-tools
Image translation
BOS deployed the L-MS laser cutter for a tier-one automotive supplier, integrating automatic loading, inspection, and deburring functions
For dynamic axis control, 2 channels AX5000 series servo drives
Beckhoff’s high-resolution CP2916 multi-touch control panel serves as an industrial-grade operating interface
Beckhoff’s CX2040 embedded controller provides sufficient computing power for coordinating the five-axis motion of high-speed laser cutters
