The company manufactures marina products through robot milling but observed important errors in the surface quality of their machined parts. It uses an ABB IRB 6640-130/3.2 robot, which has 130 kg payload, 3.2 m reach, 0.050 mm repeatability, and was not factory calibrated. On top of that, the robot is placed on a linear track, which introduces yet another source of errors.

Industrial robots are highly repeatable but not very accurate. However, through a robot calibration process the accuracy of a robot arm can be improved to the point where it is close to its repeatability, usually under the 0.100 mm mark. This is becoming very attractive to small and medium enterprises as robot arms are very affordable and can be used for multiple manufacturing applications, including machining materials such as wood, plastic or marble.