Continuing our celebration of 1 year in operation, today we are looking at one of the first projects of the Centre – the Shorts project with InfraBuild. The project is just about to complete its first phase in which a proof of concept has been completed.
The “Shorts” project with Infrabuild aims to improve the health and safety of steel factory workers by utilising a Cobot (collaborative robot) to remove off-spec steel bars from the production line. Currently, a worker performs this job which requires repetitively monitoring and throwing fast moving, heavy, hot steel bars off of a conveyor which poses an inherent risk of injury.
Infrabuild’s production line is unique, in that they produce a wide range of steel bars with different shapes and sizes. While this makes them unique capability-wise globally, current off-the-shelf solutions for automating this detection and removal process cannot deal with the variety of bars. Hence, our researchers and engineers are aiming to develop a flexible system using a Cobot with inbuilt and external sensors that shifts away from traditional automation approaches and can adapt to the different steel bars that they manufacture – even new ones in the future – while working safely around workers.
The project had two distinct phases of initial work to prove that a cobot could complete the task:
The identification of the shortest bar in the group via an automated system
The use of a cobot to remove the bar from a moving conveyor belt
Benefits
providing safer working environment for their staff by removing humans from the dangerous part of the process
potential for higher production efficiency as the system can run at all hours
Project Team
Andrew Thomas, InfraBuild
Mark Christianson, InfraBuild
Fred Sukkar, Australian Cobotics Centre Postdoctoral Research Fellow (UTS)
Dasun Gunasinghe, Australian Cobotics Centre Lead Engineer (QUT)
Gavin Suddrey, Australian Cobotics Centre Engineer (QUT)
Teresa Vidal-Calleja, Australian Cobotics Centre Research Program Lead (UTS)
Jonathan Roberts, Australian Cobotics Centre Director
In celebration of our incredible first year, over the coming weeks, we will be sharing our key achievements and highlights from the past 12 months.
This is all ahead of our official launch by the Australian Research Council, which will be take place in December. Our launch event will be a showcase of the impact of our Centre’s research on Australian Manufacturing so far and a taster of what we have planned in future!
Thank you to our researchers and industry partners for their enthusiasm, engagement and commitment to collaboration. The next 4 years, and beyond, are looking very bright!
On 25th July and 8th August, researchers from the Centre (Glenda Caldwell,Greg Hearn,Penny Williams, Stine Johansen, Melinda Laundon and Alan Burden) visited B & R Enclosures to conduct a survey with their employees and to facilitate an introductory cobotics workshop. The survey will provide insights into worker perceptions of new technology at work, including cobotics, to help inform our Human Robot Workforce research program’s specific topic areas.
The workshop included many of the staff who will be involved in our projects and provided an opportunity to priotitise and understand key challenges within the space. Thanks B & R for having us and for being so open with the team.
In early 2022, the Australian Cobotics Centre conducted a survey of Weld Australia members about their workforce and technology challenges. This feedback is crucial for us to understand how we can support the welding industry as it is a key driver and enabler of advanced manufacturing.
Tasks that Weld Australia members identified as potentially suitable for cobots included grinding, overhead welding, repetitive welding, and manual handling. The key challenge relating to the workforce was seen as labour shortages and skills shortages. A wide range of critical job roles were identified, with welding highlighted as the most critical. Other critical roles included managers, project managers, supervisors, trainers, and staff with knowledge of welding standards and health and safety standards.
The prize is awarded annually to one paper in each of the BSA’s prestigious journals: Cultural Sociology, Sociological Research Online, Sociology and Work, Employment and Society and is awarded to the paper published in the previous year’s volume judged to represent innovation or excellence in the field.
We are pleased to announce that the ARM Hub (and Australian Cobotics Centre) will be hosting Dr Steph Hutchison through an Australian Network for Art & Technology (ANAT) Residency over the second half of 2022.
ANAT’s prestigious flagship program has supported creative research collaborations between more than 100 artists and scientists, since it was established in 2004.
ANAT Synapse involves Australian science organisations hosting artists in residence, leading to profound artistic and professional development for the participants, while also building a sustainable support base for interdisciplinary creative collaboration in Australia.
The Project entitled, Cobotic Improvisations, draws on dance improvisation and choreographic methodologies to research how humans might predict the movement of their robot collaborators. The ARM Hub and the Australian Cobotics Centre have the potential to benefit from the embodied practice methods and viewing human-robot collaboration through a new lens – choreographic, improvisation and embodied practice. The capacity of choreographic and dance improvisational methods enable Steph to quickly prototype and perform different scenarios. And, the sensitivity of the dancer to read the relationships within the environment have the potential to inform interaction and test the thresholds of comfortability of both humans and robots in close collaborative environments. Steph’s work will help the fundamental research in how humans can predict how a robot is about to move, which is a very under investigated issue in robotics.
We sat down with Glenda recently to find out more about why she does what she does.
Tell us a bit about yourself and your research with the Centre?
My disciplinary background is in Architecture with a particular interest in computational design and digital fabrication. I have always been fascinated – a little intimidated and inspired – by technology (software and hardware) and its impact on how we make things, how it impacts our design processes, and our ability to visualise and communicate our ideas. The research we are doing in Program 3: Designing Socio-Technical Robotic Systems looks to explore and further understand what and how human centered design methods and processes can facilitate or drive the integration, implementation and adoption of Collaborative Robots into manufacturing tasks of industry partners. We explore the human factors such as ergonomics and motivation, the design factors such as use of space, design of systems and robotic tools, and the virtual factors such as use of VR to simulate and validate cobotic tasks in safe virtual environments. We intend to use design approaches to take the people on the workshop floor on the journey with us of exploring how and why a cobot can improve the manufacturing tasks they are working on. The outcomes we seek will deliver safer working environments that are more productive and efficient while more importantly will also be more enjoyable and stimulating for humans working collaboratively with robots.
Why did you decide to be a part of the Australian Cobotics Centre?
I see being a part of the Australian Cobotics Centre as a natural next step and evolution from the completed IMCRC Design Robotics Project where I was a Chief Investigator. There were many research opportunities that arose from that project where we could see the tremendous value for further Cobotics research in manufacturing. The ACC provides opportunities to work with researchers from a range of disciplines and backgrounds from UTS, Swinburne and QUT while collaborating with diverse industry partners who create different types of products using different manufacturing processes and materials. This mixture and breadth of expertise from both the academics and the industry sides is super exciting and essential to collaborate on and address the different challenges and many opportunities for cobotic solutions. This is an ideal test bed for progressing impactful design and cobotic research which is emerging in recognition not only in manufacturing but in other sectors such as construction and for helping to develop the next research superstars who are embarking on their own research and career journeys.
What project are you most proud of throughout your career and why?
During my PhD I was able to secure internal seed funding for a project called the InstaBooth, a purpose designed and built pop-up interactive booth for community engagement. Its purpose was to include and capture the voices of people from public places and assist in their communication and envisioning of the city they wanted to live in. This tiny, but quick to grow large, project was highly collaborative with colleagues from across disciplines, with other PhD students, undergraduate students, other universities including California Polytechnic University and University of Sydney, and numerous community partners. The project was creative, collaborative, and so much fun while also highly impactful not only for the researchers and students involved but also for the community members who participated and engaged with it. I am most proud of this project.
What do you hope the long-term impact of your work will be?
My ambition and long -term impact of my work will not only be for the successful design of the integration of cobots into our industry partners’ manufacturing lines but also more broadly to the manufacturing and construction industry demonstrating that human centered design is essential in creating workspaces, places, and processes that respond to the needs of humans while being safe, efficient, and sustainable. I am driven by openness, collaboration and creativity for innovative outcomes and hope that these key ingredients will help to create environments that support gender equity in research and climate responsible processes and solutions.
Aside from your research, what topic could you give an hour-long presentation on with little to no preparation?
I could talk about teaching in Architecture or Research Methods. I could talk broadly about Computational Architecture and Design Robotics. My other research topics – Media Architecture (can put together quickly) or Human Building Interaction (would need time to put this together though) is something I could also talk about. I could also talk about being an academic and a mum, and the juggle of work life balance : )
Glenda also works with the QUT Design Lab. Read more about one of Glenda’s recent projects which was a collaboration between QUT, Griffith University, The University of Melbourne, La Trobe University, and Monash University: Transforming Aged Care with Virtual Reality.
A Life-Cycle Framework to Manage Collaboration and Knowledge Exchange in Open Organisation
We are very proud to announce the Centre’s first official publication authored by the Centre’s Open Innovation Team – Dr Matthias Guertler, former CI Prof Nico Adams, A/Prof Glenda Caldwell and A/Prof Jared Donovan.
The paper was accepted as part of the International DESIGN Conference held from 23-26th May. The paper presents and evaluates the first part of a framework to manage successful collaboration and knowledge exchange across the entire life cycle an Open Organisation (OO).
Dr Michelle Dunn will take over the co-leadership of program 4 with Dr Lee Clemon from UTS and Assoc Prof Mats Isaksson will become co-lead of Program 1 with Prof Teresa Vidal-Calleja from UTS.
We would like to officially welcome our first PhD students to the Centre.
Baris Balci, is based at QUT and his project is part of the Biomimic Cobots Program. Baris received his BSc degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Ozyegin University in 2018. During his undergraduate studies, he was a research assistant at OzU Robotics Lab where he worked on medical robotics, haptics, and planetary rovers. His current research interests include robotic manufacturing and physical human-robot interaction.
Jagannatha Pyaraka is based at Swinburne and his project is part of the Biomimic Cobots Program. Jagannatha received his Bachelor of Engineering degree from GITAM Deemed University in 2018 and Masters degree in Mechatronics, Robotics and Automation Engineering in 2021 from Swinburne University of Technology. Following his undergraduate degree, he worked as a Senior QA Automation Engineer at NTT DATA Services. Jagan is excited to continue to work in the field of Robotics/Automation that serves and inspires society in leading a simple and better quality of life.
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searchers, co-lead Dr 
