DECEMBER 20218 MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY INSIGHTSIN MY OPINIONIN MY OPINIONIn the world of manufacturing, solution offerings are abundant. Yet for all of the effort in offering, most solutions rarely deliver the expected results.Machine Vision solutions walk a fine line along a very dangerous cliff of failure. For most facilities, machine vision is a "side job." Machine Vision solutions can quickly become complicated or complex. Hardware selection, software packages, and program methodologies each carries its own vast and rapidly evolving choices. Selecting and integrating the best solution for a specific application can become difficult and uncertain. For this reason, one must approach each application as a practical vision engineer. Practical vision engineers take time to understand the scope of the application and ask three fundamental questions that lead them to choose one of three tiers of machine vision solutions.Tier 1 -- Basic Sensor TechnologyThe first question a practical vision engineer asks is, "Does the application actually need a camera?" Yes, cameras can do presence/absence inspection, measurement and checks for proper color but so can basic sensors. The advancement in sensor technology has made it possible for simple inspections to be robust and cost-effective. Very little reason exists to add smart camera if the inspection requirements are merely to check between two or even three colors. Sensors can do that for a fraction of the cost. Measurement applications can be solved by a laser sensor or simple photo-eye. In fact, I spoke with a customer who had an application that required certain work be performed on the product based on the measurement of a buss bar. The common solution discussed was to use a smart camera. However, after a quick discussion about the scope of the inspection, a much more cost effective and robust solution was discovered. Questions of a Practical Vision EngineerBy Alex Reznichenko, Machine Vision Specialist, Edgewater Automation LLCAlex Reznichenko
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