Industrial Robot

Choosing the right category of industrial robot is one of the first and most consequential decisions in any automation project, because it constrains almost everything that follows, the achievable cycle time, the payload the cell can handle, the footprint required, and the cost.

An oversized 6-axis arm bought for a light, high-speed pick-and-place job will underperform a SCARA or delta robot built for that speed range, while an undersized robot chosen to save on capital cost may simply be unable to handle the payload or reach a project actually needs. This is why a competent integrator will usually ask detailed questions about part weight, cycle time and reach envelope before recommending a specific robot family, rather than defaulting to whichever brand they distribute.

Industrial robots are classified primarily by their mechanical structure. Articulated robots, the most common type, use a series of rotary joints, typically six, to move an arm through a wide, flexible working envelope, making them suited to tasks like welding, palletising and machine tending where reach and orientation flexibility matter.

SCARA robots move in a more constrained, largely horizontal plane and excel at fast vertical assembly and pick-and-place tasks. Delta robots, recognisable by their spider-like design with three arms hung from a fixed overhead base, are built for very high-speed, low-payload picking, common in food and pharmaceutical packing lines. Cartesian or gantry robots move along linear rails in straight X/Y/Z axes rather than rotary joints, offering a large working area and straightforward programming at the cost of some flexibility.

All types are driven by a robot controller running motion-control software, and are typically taught their paths either by manually guiding the arm or by programming coordinates directly in the controller’s software.