The Benefits of Automation

The Industrial Robot is now a proven and mature industrial product. There are no significant issues regarding design life, reliability, construction or control capabilities. The robot will work tirelessly, 24/7 if so required. MTBF's in excess of 5000 hours are now commonplace. The main issue is how well the robot applied.

The benefits of automation are not an automatic 'given'. Any solution should present a response to inherent process difficulties. These problems should be itemised at the beginning of any investigation into process development.

A detailed study of any potential application should be undertaken by an experienced application engineer, and an accurate specification developed. The spec should incorporate both the primary and secondary benefits of the solution. At some point a value can be attached to these benefits to aid in the financial justification of the project.

It is difficult to list specific benefits as they will normally be 'solution specific' but listed below are an indication of the areas worth considering.

PRIMARY BENEFITS

• Increased Productivity
• Improved Quality
• Improved consistency
• Improved Process Control
• Improved Reliability
• Improved Safety
• Reduced Scrap and Rework

SECONDARY BENEFITS

• Planned maintenance
• Fixed Costs
• Tireless repetition
• Flexibility
• Residual Value
• Marketability
• Onward Automation
• Improved employee satisfaction

There would normally be some HSE issues to address like RSI, lifting injuries, handling difficulties, hazardous materials and hazardous environments. In a highly repetitive manual task, boredom can also be considered a contributory factor. We find, associated with these items, sickness, absence, Health and Safety compensation issues, staff turnover, loss of training, retraining costs.

Some or all of these benefits have a value and should be incorporated into any payback calculations when applying for CapEx approval.