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Siemens, Festo and Rexroth join forces on carrier system
At the Hannover Fair in April, Siemens and Festo will present an new linear motor drive and control concept, said to offer flexible, efficient and high-performance motion for short-cycle applications. Siemens and Festo have integrated their Multi-Carrier System (MCS), first announced in 2015, with Bosch Rexroth’s TS 2plus transfer system, adding the modular MCS to Rexroth's building-block system which is based on standardised units.
The developers say that integrating the existing systems in this way will merge their individual advantages, allowing users to combine them in almost any way for maximum flexibility. They add that this will open up new possibilities in assembly technologies, or in battery production, for example.
The Multi-Carrier System allows carriers be accelerated, moved and positioned independently of each other on an MCS track. Different product formats can be manufactured on one production line, decreasing cycle times and increasing production volumes. The carriers will travel smoothly between the MCS and TS 2plus systems, with loading and unloading from one to another described as being “seamless”. They can also be integrated into existing intralogistics systems.
The MCS is based on Festo linear motors that allow free, dynamic movements as well as precise positioning and transportation of items weighing up to 50kg. Integrated motion control functions are provided by Siemens’ Simotion and Simatic technologies, allowing movements to be controlled precisely and different machine modules to be coordinated.
Siemens and Festo say that the Multi-Carrier System can form part of a digital transformation process and, because the kinematic data is already available in a digital format, could be used by companies of any size. This data can be used to program a controller directly, resulting in shorter commissioning times.
Rexroth’s rugged TS 2plus transfer system is designed to transport carriers. Its standardised building blocks can be combined flexibly to create complete systems. The modular design is said to allow manufacturers to increase efficiency at a reasonable cost.
