A new robot, again not humanoid

Loading and unloading a truck is a gruesome job. The heavy stuff has to go at the bottom, the lighter stuff on top. But it has to be packed together, Tetris style, to stop cargo from shifting during transit. And it has to be done in 100° heat or sub-zero temperatures without air conditioning, and at any time when the truck pulls in.

The new loader/unloader is operating, experimentally, in a couple dozen places, and consists of a long conveyor belt attached to a single-arm robot (like those you have seen in an auto plant welding line) outfitted with rubber suction cups to pick up the boxes.

It can load/unload about double the human equivalent, and pays for itself in roughly two years. Better, it’s available 24/7 so you don’t have a lot of (expensive) dock workers standing around.

The robot uses AI to “guess” what’s in the box so it has a better idea of weight, center of gravity, etc. No solution yet for “bags” or other oddly packaged items.

The Holy Grail of Automation: Now a Robot Can Unload a Truck

Technology breakthroughs are allowing DHL and other companies to automate the laborious, injury-prone work of loading and unloading

(WSJ link, which for some reason won’t transfer correctly, so I changed it to a tinyurl.)
https://tinyurl.com/4udu5ye6

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That’s a great use of AI and robots! But something tells me the displaced workers won’t be writing songs and making art.

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There are a great variety of robots. The Venezuelan version of UPS (Aerocav) had a fascinating automated loading platform in Caracas, the main hub, some 40 or 50 years ago.

Packages had to be loaded in the reverse order they were to be delivered, the last stop had to be loaded first and the nearest stop last. Each destination had it’s loading station and the trucks somehow were guided to manage the maze. Sorry, I never paid attention to how it worked so i can’t tell more about it.

The Captain

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