What do the current future trends, such as detoxing, have to do with drive technology? The word comes from the Greek and means "away from poison." FAULHABER has taken this approach one-step further, applying it to more than just sustainability and environmental aspects in its own production. Instead, the drive specialists took a deeper look at how drive systems might contribute to innovative detoxification methods and, thus, to a better future. While the drives themselves are not able to detoxify anything, they can, for example, help agriculture be more environmentally friendly, e.g., through precise dosings of fertilizer or weed control without chemicals. After all, what good is a farm-fresh smoothie if fruits and vegetables are contaminated with herbicides?
Smart farming protects the environment
Smart farming concepts are becoming increasingly popular. Unlike the traditional large agricultural devices, the machines and components used in smart farming are generally more compact and lighter. This means that there is often little space available for the motors. Nevertheless, as drives, they must supply sufficient power to reliably perform the respective task over countless cycles.
One typical application is the targeted application of fertilizer: In the ideal case, the fertilizer granulate lands on the field with pinpoint accuracy in dosed amounts. Each individual infeed uses sophisticated technology: The fertilizer is guided through multiple funnels to six metering shafts with five segments each. The controller communicates with the metering shafts via CAN bus. The cam wheels on the shafts then divide the granulate into small portions. Next, a blower accelerates the granulate with a stream of air and transports it to the outlet. Brushless flat motors of the 4221…BXT series are the driving force of the individual cam wheel segments. With a diameter of just 42 mm, they are able to deliver a torque of 134 mNm thanks to innovative winding technology and optimized design. They were also equipped with an application-specific gearhead. The speed of the motor controls the quantity of the fertilizer applied.
The trend towards detoxing can be observed in weed control as well: By using less or no herbicides here, we detoxify our bodies less. If, for example, robots that employ targeted laser radiation are used on the field to burn undesired weeds, weeds can be controlled without chemicals. Compact drive systems from FAULHABER are again the driving force for the precise positioning of the laser beam. These drive systems reliably perform their job in countless cycles, but are still highly efficient and robust enough to function on the field on a permanent basis even under harsh ambient conditions.
Patient-friendly medical technology
Another area in which innovative drive systems can contribute to detoxing is medical technology, e.g., in supplying insulin to diabetes patients. For this purpose, insulin pumps that patients wear on their bodies have been available for some time. They constantly deliver a small dose of insulin; the additional insulin required after meals can be controlled by pressing a button. For most users, this represents a great relief; for the body, the uniform regulation means less stress.
The central component of the insulin pumps is an ampoule with the insulin, which enters the body with the battery-powered pump as needed via a catheter and a cannula. A small motor pushes the plug of the insulin ampoule forward via the threaded rod, causing insulin to be released. Extremely high demands are made of the motor: In order to be able to keep down the weight of the wearable device the motor must be compact, and as a rule the diameter must be no more than about 10 mm. The motor must be reliable and precise, since too little or too much insulin is harmful to the patient. In addition, the motor must operate in a very efficient manner due to its battery operation. FAULHABER offers various motor technologies for this purpose: DC motors with precious-metal brushes, brushless motors with 2-pole technology and stepper motors.
As a wearable medical pump, the insulin pump is already used by many diabetes patients today. But, other application areas are beginning to emerge. Because patients with other chronic illnesses such as Parkinson’s disease or immunodeficiency are also reliant on regular injections.
Quickly bringing drive systems to the field
The second future trend being implemented by the drive specialists in their own developments is "simplexity." In futurology, this refers to the simple, most intuitive operation of complex systems, i.e., the user friendliness of technical devices, which also include drives.
For drive technology, the analog era lies mainly in the past. In modern automation technology, networked solutions are the state of the art. Equipment manufacturers face the challenge of integrating drives in heterogeneous systems in which 50 W servos operate on equal footing directly next to drives with multiple kW of power. Where once micro servos were also integrated via analog set-points or simple RS232 interfaces, in areas like robotics and machine construction, the continuous availability of standard communication interfaces such as EtherCAT all the way to small sizes is more the rule than the exception. As a result, the drive configuration is today much more complex than even just a few years ago. With respect to simplexity, however, it should not be any more complicated.
In essence, FAULHABER addresses the requirements from the heterogeneous systems with significantly expanded product support. Users from robotics and machine construction are experts for their specific processes; the details of the drive configuration are just a hurdle. The drive experts therefore place great value on the simplest possible commissioning of a wide range of drive configurations using the freely available FAULHABER Motion Manager.
Operating and configuration program for speed and motion controllers
The software offers the user comprehensive support during commissioning and configuration. The graphical user interface makes uniform and intuitive procedures possible independent of the device family and interface used. In addition to a newly designed area for easy commissioning and configuration of the drive systems, the new Motion Manager includes various tools for controlling and observing the drive behavior, a development environment for sequence programs and a maintenance area for diagnostics and firmware updates. During configuration, the conditions particular to the application are taken into account, the exchange of drives is supported and direct access to the manual is also possible.
The next hurdle facing users is then the integration of the operable axes in the wide range of PLC environments. Help can be found in the support area. Here, prepared application examples and application notes simplify the work. Where necessary, the drive experts use TeamViewer to connect to the customer system.