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Purpose – The purpose of the following work was to work out the dependency to allow for the determination of the repeatability positioning error value of the robot at any given point in its workspace, without the necessity of conducting time-consuming measurements while routing a precise surface of repeatability positioning. Design/methodology/approach – The presented dependency permits for the possibility to determine, even at the planning phase, the optimal connection point in the workspace, ensuring the best parameters for the process of machine assembly, without needless overestimation of precision of the utilized equipment. To solve the task the sequential quadratic programming (SQP) method implemented in the MATLAB(R) environment was used. To verify the hypothesis of the compatibility of the empirical distribution with the hypothetical distribution of the robot’s positioning error, the Kolmogorov test was used. Findings – In this paper, it has been demonstrated theoretically and experimentally that the industrial robot accuracy can vary over a very wide range in the workspace. This provides an additional opportunity to increase reliability of the assembly process through the appropriate choice of the point of parts joining. The methodology presented here allows the designer of assembly workstations to rapidly estimate the repeatability of robot positioning and to allocate at the design stage of assembly process the optimal position in the robot workspace to ensure the required precision, without unnecessarily high accuracy of equipment used and, therefore, without inflated costs. Originality/value – An alternative solution to the stated problem can be the proposed method for determining the robot’s positioning errors, requiring a much smaller amount of measurements to be taken that would be necessary to determine the parameters of the random variable errors of the joint coordinates of the robot and for their verification by the repeatability of positioning in randomly selected points in the workspace. Additionally discussed in the study, the methodology of identifying connection place was designed for typical combinations of machine parts, most frequently encountered in assembly process and was taken into account, typical limitations occurring in actual manufacturing conditions.

The welding process used in fabricating thin-walled structures by refill friction stir spot welding (RFSSW) should be characterized by a high strength of welds and high process repeatability which is demonstrated by a small dispersion of the load capacity of the joints. The present work is designed to optimize RFSSW process parameters for 7075-T6 Alclad aluminum alloy sheets used to fabricate aircraft structures. The optimization was performed by scalarization of the objective function using the weighting grades method. The study considers the effect of process parameters, i.e., tool plunge depth, duration of welding, tool rotational speed, on the tensile/shear strength of the joints, and dispersion of the load capacity. It was found that it was possible to choose the optimal welding parameters taking into account maximization of the load capacity and minimization of the dispersion of the joint strength via a best compromise between the tool rotational speed ensuring adequate plasticization of the base material and the duration of welding ensuring that a fine-grained joint microstructure is obtained.

No abstract

In the aerospace industry, the refill friction stir spot welding (RFSSW) method is increasingly used to join thin sheets, especially those made of 2xxx and 7xxx series aluminium alloys. This paper presents the results of spot welding lap joints of 7075-T6 aluminium alloy sheets. The load capacity of joints was determined by tensile/shear tests using a universal testing machine. The effect of tool plunge depth, tool rotational speed and duration of welding on joint load capacity and failure mode was investigated. The polyoptimisation of the values of welding process parameters was carried out to ensure the highest load capacity of the joint at a minimum variance of the results obtained. The selection of the optimal parameters of the RFSSW process was carried out using an adequate mathematical model obtained on the basis of Weierstrass' theorem. It was found that tool rotational speed had the greatest impact on the load capacity of the joints. It was possible to increase the load capacity of the joint by increasing the duration of welding but only to a limited extent. The selection of optimal welding parameters requires a compromise solution, i.e. the selection of a tool rotational speed that ensured adequate plasticisation of the material with a welding duration that ensured that an appropriate joint microstructure was obtained and assured the required load capacity of the joint. The methodology of mathematical modelling of polyoptimisation presented can be useful in optimising similar joining processes.