Developments in robot grippers for soft fruit packing in New Zealand

摘要

SUMMARY The heavy reliance which New Zealand places on its primary industries makes it important that every effort be made to automate these industries to improve their productivity. This presents many unique problems, especially when consideration is given to the use of robots in the horticultural sector for the handling of soft fruit for export. As part of this process, fruit must be individually packed in trays without the risk of damage. This is currently achieved through labour-intensive manual handling and for this reason a range of specialised robot grippers have been developed. These, to varying degrees, overcome many of the problems associated with the harsh handling which occurs when conventional industrial robot grippers are used.