China News Service, Beijing, September 30 (Reporter Zuo Yuqing) From humanoid robots on the Spring Festival Gala stage to four-legged robot dogs in factories, from navigation service robots in shopping malls and hotels to inspection robots in power systems, embodied intelligent products are accelerating into production and life.
However, the more complex the robot, the more important quality becomes. Once the quality cannot be guaranteed, problems such as motion control delays and reduced movement accuracy may occur; at worst, electrical failures may occur, or safety accidents such as the robot falling down and injuring people may occur.
In recent years, relevant departments and enterprises in Guangdong have actively strengthened quality and standard construction, and empowered the "intelligent manufacturing" upgrade of the robot industry with quality.
Chain owner enterprises shoulder the main responsibility for quality
Industrial robots are not only carriers of emerging technologies, but also important equipment for the transformation and upgrading of the manufacturing industry. Their product accuracy, stability, and reliability directly determine the manufacturing level of downstream industries. For a long time, the industry has had pain points such as inconsistent quality standards for core components, lack of quality control throughout the entire process, separation of manufacturing and service quality, and uneven supply chain quality.
According to KUKA, KUKA has built a closed-loop quality control system for the entire industry chain covering R&D and design, parts matching, manufacturing, testing and verification, after-sales service, and industrial collaboration to solve industry problems. It uses all-round, full-life cycle quality management to break the industry quality bottleneck.
In Shunde District, Foshan City, KUKA Robot (Guangdong) Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Midea Group, has built the largest robot production base in South China. It has made every effort to promote the localization of core components and achieved a localization rate of more than 85% of key components such as motors and reducers. This has shortened supply chain quality control links from the source and reduced quality risks and manufacturing costs. In order to promote the development of industry quality standardization, KUKA, as the main enterprise in the industrial robot industry chain, took the lead in establishing a national industry-education integration community in the robot industry, attracting more than a hundred cross-regional and cross-subject member units, and jointly established a "robot + domestic supporting" alliance with local companies to build a platform for industry quality exchanges, technology sharing, and standard construction.
In recent years, the embodied intelligent robot industry has developed rapidly. While many robot companies in Guangdong continue to iterate their products, they are also actively exploring quality management and standard formulation.
Embodied intelligent robot carrying boxes. Photo by Zuo Yuqing
"Quality runs through all aspects of supplier access, production process, R&D control, etc. It can reflect the overall stability and consistency of the product, and translate into the ability to meet market demand, and meet actual functional needs in the scene implementation." In Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, the relevant person in charge of Shenzhen Zhongqing Robot Technology Co., Ltd. told reporters that the robot is a system with stacked functions, integrating sensors, joints and other sections. The overall machine control coordination requirements are extremely high, and it must be comprehensively managed from component consistency to complete machine consistency to product stability.
According to reports, at present, two group standards, the "General Guidelines for Interoperability and Safety of Humanoid Robots" and the "Standard Framework for Intelligent Decision-making and Autonomous Behavior of Humanoid Robots" developed with the participation of Zhongqing, have been put into trial use by enterprises within the alliance. Relevant companies have formed unified basic requirements in terms of robot structural interfaces, communication protocols, performance testing methods, etc. The adaptability between components and modules has been significantly improved, and product versatility has also been significantly improved.
In addition, Shenzhen Youbi Technology Co., Ltd. also participated in the establishment of the first batch of national standards for humanoid robot series. Under the coordination of the National Robot Standardization Technical Committee, UBTECH, together with Beijing Humanoid Robot Innovation Center Co., Ltd., Shanghai Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, etc., jointly launched the first domestic national standards in the field of humanoid robots, involving many technical requirements such as environmental perception, decision-making and planning, motion control, and operation operations. Among them, UBTECH takes the lead in formulating technical requirements for operation operations and standardizes dexterous operations, leg movement operations, double-arm operations, etc., which is expected to fill the gaps in many technical standards in the field of domestic humanoid robots.
Quality infrastructure strengthens testing and standards support
Behind the quality practice of enterprises, it is inseparable from the support of quality infrastructure. In Guangdong's "one-stop" service station for quality infrastructure, testing consultation, standard docking, on-site quality diagnosis, etc. have become the most frequently used and most effective services for enterprises.
In a 10-meter French anechoic chamber of the Shenzhen Institute of Metrology and Quality Inspection, the surrounding walls are covered with absorbing materials, and antennas stand quietly, preparing to capture the electromagnetic waves emitted by the products under test. This is the electromagnetic compatibility laboratory for measurement and testing institutions serving robots, drones, smart terminals and other industries. Products from Shenzhen high-tech companies such as DJI and UBTECH have all undergone "physical examinations" in the electromagnetic compatibility laboratory of the hospital.
According to the relevant person in charge of the electronic and electrical testing department of the institute, the laboratory can conduct electromagnetic compatibility harassment and anti-interference experiments, has a turntable that can measure the electromagnetic compatibility of the entire vehicle, and serves digital electronic products, electric vehicle charging piles, drones, large industrial intelligent products, and embodied intelligent products.
An electric power inspection robot is being tested. Photo by Zuo Yuqing
At the Foshan base of the National Industrial Robot Quality Inspection and Testing Center (Guangdong), an electric power inspection robot is undergoing a test of crossing obstacles. It has the only national-level comprehensive service organization in South China that specializes in quality inspection and type testing, standard formulation and revision, and product research and development for complete robot parts. It has built multiple professional laboratories.
The center also actively plays a leading role in standards and took the lead in formulating the first domestic group standard for reliability control of the entire chain of industrial robots, the "Guidelines for Reliability Control and Quality Improvement of the Industrial Robot Industry Chain", which fills the standard gap in the systematic management and control of the reliability of the entire chain of domestic industrial robots and provides unified practical compliance for industry quality improvement and upgrading. In the past five years, the center has led or participated in 30 standards in the field of robotics, including 2 international standards and more than 21 national standards.
Quality is the core competitiveness of robots based on the world, and it is also the confidence for China’s intelligent manufacturing to go global. Guangdong is using full-chain, full-cycle, and full-ecological quality control to continue to improve the core quality and international voice of domestic robots, and join hands with the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain to empower the high-quality development of the intelligent manufacturing industry with excellent quality. (over)
