External Axis components (Beta)

Example files for the new External Axis components are here!

This feature is in Beta. It's been tested on a Kuka in the real world and it works, but you should still be aware that Beta software may have bugs and your set-up may differ from what we tested. If you find any, please note bugs in the comments so we can fix them, thanks... Greg

The implementation is pretty logical, and open enough that you can use GH to easily link the robot toolpath and rail/table control for 1,2 and 3 axis linear rails and 1, 2 and 2x1, 1+2x1 etc. rotary tables. The 'Create External Axis' component is included so you can add you own geometry, or create other configurations.

Linear Rail: Plug External Axis into P on the robot.

The basic idea is that you instruct the rail to move the robot base plane either independently or relative to the toolpath. The later is preferable, so when you modify the toolpath the robot base position remains linked. For smooth toolpaths this works well, if you have a lot of back and forth movements, the whole robot will do that too, in which case a direct approach may suit you better, or some bracketing (we'll generate some examples for that soon).

Note: To keep the Linear Rail static while it is working on the Rotary Table, you can input a list of duplicate values to the Rail Axis input.

Rotary Table: Plug External Axis into E on the robot.

Control this through a list of angles in radians. The list of length values for the Linear Rail or the list of angles for the Rotary Table must be the same length as the number of Planes in the Path - as each value goes onto the same line of robot code.

There are two basic examples in the attached file: