Help the car smart manufacturing! Comau developed a new quality inspection and control program

Comau has developed an innovative online inspection and quality control solution-MI.RA/Thermography, which can optimize the structure and assembly of the battery. MI.RA/Thermography is one of the latest solutions of Comau’s cutting-edge vision system series “Machine Inspection and Recognition Prototype” (ie MI.RA).

MI.RA/Thermography is specially designed for large-scale battery manufacturing. It uses thermal imaging and artificial intelligence to perform non-destructive automatic evaluation and control of welded joints to ensure battery integrity and prevent waste. Its non-destructive testing method can maintain the existing production rhythm without changing the existing manufacturing layout.

The battery pack consists of a large number of individual cells, which are fixed in structure and electrically connected through many welded joints. In the past, the high resistance caused by poor joint quality would cause high energy consumption and heat generation. The increase in joint temperature not only brought safety hazards, but also reduced production efficiency. The MI.RA/Thermography application can automatically evaluate the surface defects and resistance of each joint before the final assembly to save manufacturing time and cost.

In addition, because the system is based on the online collection of thermal images, these thermal images can be immediately pre-processed, cropped and analyzed with the help of the previously acquired knowledge base, so the system does not require additional energy. After receiving the trigger signal of the laser welding robot, the system will record the cooling process and perform feature-based analysis to complete the work of comprehensively assessing the quality of the joint.

Advantages of MI.RA/Thermography:

· Online process monitoring and follow-up process quality assessment

· Test, measure and control the quality of welded joints without affecting the production cycle or production line layout

· Before the final assembly of the product, evaluate each welded joint through a fully integrated infrared camera and artificial intelligence solution

· The accuracy of appearance defect detection has been improved, (generally exceeding the accuracy of visual inspection)

· Collect real-time results and use them for analysis and retraining

“High-precision connection is essential to the assembly and integrity of the battery. The combination of infrared vision and artificial intelligence allows Comau to directly identify appearance, structure and electrical defects in a non-invasive manner during the manufacturing process.” Comau Electrification Division Chief Technology Officer Giovanni Di Stefano explained, “Through MI.RA/Thermography, we can better help our customers meet the changing requirements of the electrification market.”

Source: Control Engineering Network