Flexible Manufacturing of High-value Low-volume Electrical Machines through Robotic Coil Winding

The development of conventional winding machines has progressed over time, providing highly automated solutions that are ideal for mass production. These machines excel at manufacturing large quantities of nearly identical coils with great reliability and efficiency. However, they often require significant reconfiguration to produce coils with specific geometries, limiting their usefulness for variable and low-volume production, where the setup costs become prohibitive. To address this challenge, the utilisation of standard industrial robot manipulators is proposed as a foundation for reconfigurable manufacturing systems capable of automating variable, low-volume production. These manipulators offer precise control over position and torque at each joint, enabling iterative and rapid optimization of the manipulator’s path and force profile. This capability could be leveraged in real-time to adapt to factors like variations in wire temper on a part-by-part basis. This research investigates the application of a standard six-axis industrial robot manipulator as the core component of a flexible needle winding system. The study presents a series of experiments conducted using the six-axis industrial robot manipulator equipped with a customised end-effector for needle winding. Concentrated coils made of 0.8 mm round copper wire are the focus of these experiments, which aim to assess the suitability and potential benefits provided by six-axis robot manipulators in this context.