Gentle giant is world champion

Third Quarter 2007 Robotics & Mechatronics

KUKA Roboter celebrated the unveiling of its latest product with an entry in the Guinness Book of Records. The KR 1000 titan is claimed to be the world's first industrial robot that can lift a payload of 1000 kilograms with a horizontal reach of 3200 mm. The 3200 mm horizontal reach of the titan is complemented with a vertical reach of 5000 mm.

The titan gave the first public demonstration of its prodigious strength in Rottweil, Germany.

Guests at the event lent a helping hand, heaving dumbbell plates onto the robot's arm. Weight by weight was loaded by the team members onto the KUKA titan's dumbbell bar, which it had to lift until the 1000 kg mark was reached and its world-beating achievement was honoured with a place in the Guinness Book of Records.

The titan has been developed for the really heavy work and will be applied in such sectors as the building materials, automotive or foundry industries. In the automotive industry for example, it is capable of moving whole car bodies entirely unaided.

A total of nine motors are installed in this 6-axis robot. Combined, these motors deliver the power of a mid-sized car. As a result, the robot's design called for a robust steel base frame and a completely new drive concept. In axes 1 and 3, two motors feed into a single gear unit. Axis 2 is likewise powered by two motors, each with its own gear unit. This gentle giant can withstand a static torque of 60 000 Newton metres (Nm). This is all the more remarkable if you consider that a powerful car has a maximum drive torque of only 600 Nm.

The power and reach of this model means that in some applications it can perform the work of two or more robots and can eliminate the need for auxiliary lifting stations.

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