Accuracy of transferring microparts in a multi stage former

Many fasteners used in electromechanical systems are micro metal parts which should be manufactured with high accuracy and reliability and in large quantities. Micro forming is promising to fulfill these demands. This research focuses on investigating a gripping unit in a multi stage former, as the positioning unit was discussed earlier. The parameters which play important roles in the gripping unit will be discussed and the precision and reproducibility evaluated to show the performance of the unit. This includes two different tests. The first test will show how accurately the unit can locate the parts and the second one is intended to depict how the unit transfers the parts with different diameters with respect to the front profile of the fingers. The experiments showed that the manipulator can handle the parts with 7 μm accuracy, 2 μm reproducibility and 9μm uncertainty for a 20mm distance between two adjacent stations. Copyright © 2013 Trans Tech Publications Ltd.