FORMING AND FABRICATING AUTOMATION
Robotic Destacking and Press Tending a Huge Time and Labor Saver ...
inhouse patented sheet metal flooring support, Sukup Manu - facturing again reached out to Yaskawa Motoman to help with a manufacturing solution. Robot Slashes Cycle Time The result: A Yaskawa Model GP180 robot for automated press tending (the company also boasts metal stamping profi - ciency), replacing manual blank and part loading and unloading. Specifically, the robot destacks 20-gauge steel blanks, using an embedded thickness gauge to confirm single-piece pickup, and places a blank in a 300-ton mechanical press housing a forming die. Following the press stroke, the robot removes the workpiece, now a tube section, and places it in a hydraulic press to produce a 12-in. bend. The 13.25-in.-long finished part is manually unloaded and pallet-stacked while the robot begins the cycle anew with blank destacking. “This automates what had been three manual operations,” Sukup says, noting again that such automation frees personnel for other duties. “Cycle time saw a 30% improvement, but the real payback was going from three operators to one, allowing us to use the other two operators in other departments.”
for grain-storage and-handling systems and equipment. That’s good news for suppliers in this sector, including Sukup Manu- facturing Co. However, rising steel prices and a dearth of skilled labor have proved chal- lenging—a common refrain in the metal forming and fabricat- ing world. Helping to meet such challenges, and specifically to fulfill increasing customer de - mand, have driven the company to increasingly explore and im- plement automation. One of the latest automation additions at
This press-tending robot at Sukup Manufacturing automates what had been three manual operations, according to Steve Sukup, company president and CEO. “Cycle time saw a 30% improvement,” he says, “but the real payback was going from three operators to one, allowing us to use the other two operators in other departments.”
F or Sukup Manufacturing, an Iowa- Robotic destacking and press tending is a huge time and labor saver for Sukup Manufacturing, an Iowa-based agricultural supplier that adds automation to free shop-floor personnel for other duties. Good, stable pricing of agricultural commodities such as grains over the past few years has meant steady demand based agricultural supplier that adds automation to free shop-floor personnel for other duties.
the Sheffield, IA-based manufacturer, to meet said demand: a Yaskawa Motoman robot that destacks blanks and tends two stamping presses to produce flooring supports for use in grain-storage operations. “Here’s a fun stat,” Steve Sukup, company president and chief executive officer, tells MetalForming : “Since we brought in our first robot in the 1990s, we've more than tripled our employment. It’s not a case where robots take jobs away, they just allow peo- ple to better utilize their skills.” In the spring of 2021, needing high-quantity production of an
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