Macron Offers New TBG Single Belt Driven Gantries Ideal for Pick and Place Automation
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 9:49PM 
Croydon, Pa- Macron Dynamics Inc., a manufacturer of linear actuators and multi-axis automation systems, today announced the development of a product line featuring scalable, cost effective, single belt driven robotic gantries suitable for pick and place applications.
“Macron has introduced a line of belt driven X/Z gantry systems with fixed motor mounting,” says Steve Evers, director of business development. “These gantry systems are perfect for pick and place processes requiring automated transfer of products from feed conveyors to final package assemblies,” he says.
With these gantries, a single belt provides range of motion throughout a dual axis envelope. The fixed motor design reduces the axis load and allows for a higher speed of operation, while also lowering overall system inertia. “With fixed mount motors your cables never move, so now there is no need for costly cable carriers in your design,” says Evers.
The architecture of the TBG line allows for smaller travel heights for the Z axis, because no motor is mounted on top. This design provides a more compact structure which is easier to integrate into existing designs. Macron highlights this gantry system with a video on their applications section of their website atwww.macrondynamics.com/applications.html.
Macron’s single belt driven gantries, and other automation solutions, allow for automation that can save companies time and money, often increasing production rates while driving down costs. Evers explains, “In traditional dual drive X-Z systems the weight of one motor is added to the Z axis decreasing speed and or payload capabilities. Resultant reduction in the weight of our Z axis increases payload capabilities and top speed.” For packing and production companies, increased speed amounts to higher throughput for manufacturers.
“A popular version of this line is our Macron TBG-12 X/Z gantry with a light duty single belt and a dual fixed motor multi-axis actuator,” says Evers. “This model features travel lengths on the X axis up to 1000 millimeters and Z axis up to 500 millimeters, repeatability and precision within .025 millimeters, and a speed of 3 meters per second,” he says.
The TBG gantries are particularly attractive for light duty X-Z pick and place applications in industries and markets such as packaging. High speeds and the ability to mount very large motors to these gantries put these gantries in contest with dual axis linear motor systems, which are significantly more expensive.
“We had a client using one of our automated gantry systems that actually could outperform their conveyor. They were getting an extra two cycles of product rotated, and they could have done even more, but their conveyor was limited by speed and couldn’t keep up with our gantry system,” says Evers. Macron had to slow the gantry down to fit the performance of the company’s conveyor.
Other systems available in the Macron TBG line include the Macron TBG-25, which allows for longer travel requirements, and the Macron TBG-50, which is suitable for heavy duty applications. All three systems rely on the MacFRAME line of aluminum extrusions and hardware, which allows for customized, configurable framing architecture to support any of Macron’s linear actuators and belt drives.
Macron’s motion and automation engineers can assist customers in building and selecting the correct gantry system for their application needs. Macron’s scalable single belt driven gantries are backed by Macron’s lifetime warranty. For additional information, visit www.macrondynamics.com or call Macron Dynamics, Inc. at 1-800-MACRON-1 (1-800-622-7661).
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