Yaskawa Electric and Motoman: robot demonstrations and innovative at Hannover trade fair

With the slogan “Yaskawa ahead of the time”, Yaskawa Electric (www.yaskawa.eu.com) and its subsidiary Motoman are exhibiting innovative automation and robotics solutions at the

2008 Hannover trade fair, taking place from 21-25 april 2008.

New servo control and inverter products plus exciting live demonstrations are on view in the

Japan Pavilion in Hall 17.The Yaskawa exhibits include amazing feats performed by robots. A special attraction on the Yaskawa stand features four robots playing traditional Japanese

drums, so-called “taiko” drums. While two “Da20” dual-arm robots with 13 axes and two

“Hp3L” robots with six axes beat the drums, an additional dual-arm robot plays the

cymbals. The principal challenge for the engineers and programmers at Yaskawa

was to endow the robots with a sensitive ‘human’ touch as they play these traditional

instruments, as well as to make the humanoid and engaging robots interact.

Enabling robots to adopt human behaviour was also the idea behind the second robot

installation. They are able to use their arms to make interactive, virtually human

movements.

Motoman is demonstrating another attraction, the single-arm “Ia20” robot with seven axes performing the traditional Japanese lion dance, the “Shishimai”.

The new “J1000” series of inverters is being exhibited for the first time at the Trade fair.

As well as saving energy, this range of products is exceptionally compact, as well

as being easy to install and control.

Also introduced in 2007, the “V1000” series of inverters is on show as an interesting,

energy-saving demonstration model. The latest inverter technology is represented by

the “Matrix-Converter”, which features a regenerative energy function.

Yaskawa is showing the “Sigma-5” servo package, introduced in 2007, for servo

control applications. This unit comprises servo motors, servo amplifiers and a high performance commissioning tool in the form of impressive demonstration models.