Then
d
n
a
NOW
MECHATRONICS: THE NEW
WORD IN ROBOTICS
by Tom Carroll
Ijust read an interesting article in the
June 30th Design News Webcast
entitled “A Mechatronic Marvel: The
Barcode Scanner.” The statement was
made: “There are few things in the
world today that would disrupt society
more than if barcode scanners stopped
working. Just think of all the places
where you rely on one to accomplish
some task. But what is a barcode and
how does a barcode scanner work?
This webcast explores the role of
mechatronics in the development of
this nearly indispensible technology.”
These things have been around
for decades and many of us — myself
included — have torn grocery store
versions apart and hacked them.
What a neat pile of very interesting
parts! A laser, various types of moving
mirror systems, motion control
electronics and signal electronics all in
a hand-held or surface-mount
package. The previously mentioned
three-part article was most informative
and got me to thinking about how we
integrate mechanisms and electronics,
to produce the most useful items.
Just leaf through any technical
magazine designed for the professional
engineer, whether they are a mechanical,
electrical, manufacturing, or computer
engineer. The magazine’s headlines tout
“Mechatronics Solves Factory Systems
Dilemma,” “Mechatronics used in
Innovative Medical System,” and similar
feature articles in Design News, Machine
Design, Electronic Design News, and
other technical magazines. The ‘
mechanical’ people are discussing how they
can implement electronics in their
mechanical systems and the ‘electrical’
people are looking over at the
mechanical engineers for commonality.
It’s just like the status of computers
50 years ago — most people in management didn’t really know what to
do with them but they knew that they
just had to have one in the back room
to “keep up with the competition.”
Fortunately, mechatronics has passed
that stage and engineers are jumping
on the bandwagon to implement
electro-mechanical systems engineering,
or, as it is sometimes called — control
and automation engineering.
People just love to throw words
around — especially cool-sounding
ones — and this word is one of them
that has been applied to all sorts of
electro-mechanical programs. It really
isn’t new as I remember hearing it
used almost 40 years or more ago.
It has become more of an ‘in’ word
these days, however. It comes from
mechanical and electronics and is just
another name for electro-mechanical
technology. (We technical types just
love to hook words together to better
describe what we are doing at the
moment and end up confusing everyone else.) Some people may say,
“Wait a minute. This word can apply
to a washing machine, a crane, or
even a lowly toaster. Why not say
compucanics, roboelectrocanics, or
some other choking pile of words?”
Well, besides being a mouthful,
the word mechatronics can certainly
encompass our particular field of
robotics and sounds a lot better than
those other two I just made up.
Applying Electronics
to Control Motion
In days past, consumer major
appliances such as a washing machine
were controlled by a mechanical timer
with a series of cams that triggered
different washing functions and other
relays as time passed. ‘Programming’
was done by setting the timer at
different points, depending on the
type of washing required. This is one
of those cases where “then and now”
can be almost the same.
Electronic control is not only more
reliable, but a lot cheaper than a stack
of motor-driven mechanical cams
triggering a row of micro switches.
However, electro-mechanical controls
still rule for most of the complex
major appliances used today, though
that seems a bit ridiculous due to
the lower cost of electronic systems.
When we wash or dry our clothes, we
still twist a ratcheted knob to a specific
time and depress the knob to start
the timer motor rotating the series
of cams through their cycle. This
time-proven method seems to work
best for major appliances.
As the industry entered the 80s,
electronics had become cheap enough
for manufacturers to use electronic
means to control functions in higher-end
machines, with digital readouts and
solid-state relays driven by microcontrollers. Of course, it certainly wasn’t
consumer appliances that first used
mechatronics. Industry first used
electronics to control manufacturing
functions in the early part of last
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