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Vision system / CMM combo?

mhajicek

Diamond
Joined
May 11, 2017
Location
Maple Grove, MN, USA
I'm looking at trying to get a combo vision system / CMM in here. What machines should I be looking at and how much should I expect to spend? We're a small medical device company, make some parts including bone plates and surgical implements in-house, and job out a ton of Swiss parts like bone screws and need to be able to inspect them reliably and efficiently.

Thanks
 
I think a CMM may be overkill for the typically small parts seen in medical.
I would suggest a good comparator and a contracer.
 
You also need to realize (if you haven't already) that there will be a learning curve involved with new equipment. If you decide to go with a CMM, there will be the a learning curve with the CMM itself, AND with the software that the CMM runs on. IME, most CMM sellers will try to sell you a CMM with WAY MORE capabilities than you really need. There are manual and DCC (computer-controlled) CMM's out there, and they all have their "pros" and "cons". Depending on how familiar you (or whoever will be operating and/or programming it)are with them, it may take you a couple of months or more to be fully familiar with it. I'm not trying to turn you against them; just pointing out some things to help you make some decisions. Good luck!
 
Thanks for the replies. I have programmed Zeiss Calipso in the past (about a decade ago now), and I program 5 axis for machining now, so I'm not afraid of the software learning curve. Here are the reasons I think we need a vision system with a contact probe. We currently use a manual machinists microscope for inspecting bone screws, hexalobe driver tips, etc., and our inspection guy spends endless hours doing this tedious process over and over every time we receive a lot. This should be solved by an automatic vision system. For the bone plates and drill guides pictured below, we have angled holes and organic surfaces that I think can only be properly handled by a CMM:
7537 1.jpg
IMG_20190705_194520.jpg
Guideblock 02.jpg

For the tapered threaded holes, I'm thinking make a dowel pin with a matching thread on one end, and the other end ground a set distance from the reference pitch diameter, and the hole axis and thread depth should be probe-able. Those can then be related to datum points on the organic surface.
 
If you have organic shapes like your pictures, you might even need a cmm with a scanning (?) head, which will raise the price even more. Curious as why you think you need a cmm AND a vision system (or I am confused with terms?)....

I would *think* a cmm would do everything a vision system could do (dimensional), minus the obvious 31-62-90-xxxx zoom capability to examine visual features of a part.

We had a large micro-vu at one place I worked (motorized/auto) that you could program and it would check holes and such, then flag them if they were out of tolerance OR stop the program when it encountered a 'bad' hole/feature. For something like that I think it is much faster than a cmm because it does not have to physically probe hole locations.

Micro-Vu Precision Measurement Equipment

I think it was one of these models. I think the table was around 3' x 6', maybe the 1051/52 model? They start around 80k from the website...

edit: it appears they do offer a touch probe, not sure how that affects price, or if it is comparable to a bonafide cmm...
 
If you have organic shapes like your pictures, you might even need a cmm with a scanning (?) head, which will raise the price even more. Curious as why you think you need a cmm AND a vision system (or I am confused with terms?)....

Well, what I'm thinking, is that the vision system would be great for quickly checking the bone screws, including the tapered thread on the locking head. I can whip up a tray to hold 100 or so screws at a time, lay them in, and run the inspection program. I've seen machines that are primarily automated vision systems but that have a CMM probe as well; I'm thinking that would be great for getting the angles and positions of the holes in the plates (with pins in the holes to beep on), plus a few datum points on the organic surfaces. Yes, to fully characterize the surface I'd have to scan the whole thing, but I think if I specify some number of points to beep on it should be sufficient.

Thanks for that link, they list prices!
 
Well, what I'm thinking, is that the vision system would be great for quickly checking the bone screws, including the tapered thread on the locking head. I can whip up a tray to hold 100 or so screws at a time, lay them in, and run the inspection program. I've seen machines that are primarily automated vision systems but that have a CMM probe as well; I'm thinking that would be great for getting the angles and positions of the holes in the plates (with pins in the holes to beep on), plus a few datum points on the organic surfaces. Yes, to fully characterize the surface I'd have to scan the whole thing, but I think if I specify some number of points to beep on it should be sufficient.

Thanks for that link, they list prices!


Right?!? LoL that is getting harder and harder to come buy with industrial equipment....
 
You might try looking at a Keyance system. I've run one before, it has an extensive thread program built in. It makes quick work on screws. Doesn't have a touch probe though. I run a Hexegon Global Advantage with a vision head and a touch probe on it that does an very good job.
 
I'm looking at trying to get a combo vision system / CMM in here. What machines should I be looking at and how much should I expect to spend? We're a small medical device company, make some parts including bone plates and surgical implements in-house, and job out a ton of Swiss parts like bone screws and need to be able to inspect them reliably and efficiently.

Thanks


At a previous employer, we purchased a hexagon "Dual Z" cmm with rotary.

Optiv Dual Z | Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence

We used it to measure organic surfaces, and custom thread features. I think it cost around $140k but I do not remember. It was a good machine, and I think would work very well for the type of parts that you make.


I vote against the Keyence. It would be good for some of the bone screws and similar, but would fail miserably at the bone plates. I could be wrong, because my exposure is limited, but a straight vision system is for very specific work.

If you wanted a little demo, Keyence is always willing to bring a machine out. The small entry level version costs about $70k I think. We have one here at the shop. I could probably get one of my quality people to give you a demo if you didn't want the sales pitch.
 
This might be a good application for a small robot combined with a Keyence or Cognex vision system and probing station. We are building an aerospace fastener manufacturing and inspection system now that will do closed loop adjustments to the forming section based on inspection results.
 
Renishaw offers two 5-axis probes heads. The Revo and PH20. The Revo is a scanning head and the PH20 is touch points only. They also offer a vision probe. Might be worth a look. I would think they would be able to be installed on most cnc cmm frames.

Ken
 
Dear mhajicek,
there are a lot of solution for your reques.
A traditional cmm as for example 600 x 500 x 500 with probing system and vision sistem complete with software is about 65k€
This is a fully equipped machine but may be you could save money with different solution/ dimensions.
For example if you don't need a motorized head you can save up to 12k€.
If you need some more information and you can give me some more details regarding object to be measured I would be pleased to support you
best regards

Alessandro Rotondi
 
If you are in the Medical Device / Pharmaceutical field and use the system for cGMP purpose. Consult with your Quality and Validation team. If yes, the very first task you should do is to evaluate the software for 21 CFR Part 11 / Annex 11 compliant. Evaluate the software features against your user requirement specification. If a software cannot satisfy Part 11/Annex 11 requirements, forget about their hardware. Most of CMM software fail miserably when it comes to data integrity, including many well known ones. There are only few CMM software offer Part 11/Annex 11 features. But be careful, although some will claim Part 11 complaint, but it only applies to their SPC software and not the CMM software.
 
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Matt
are you envisaging measuring the surface against the CAD data with a profile tolerance - and then "best fitting" it to the model?

Well, either that or pick three datum points on the organic surface to set a plane. Being an OEM we have the freedom to define how we want to tolerance the part. Currently we're sticking a locking screw in each hole and measuring protrusion. We have some threaded gauge pins on order so we can at least eliminate the variability of using a screw as a gauge. Still working on nailing down our inspection system requirements, the cogs turn slowly.

Thanks
 
I can give a +1 to the Keyence optical 3D profiler. We just got a VR-5200 and man, does that thing kick ass! Price tag is not for the faint of heart, but it's in the same ballpark with some of the CMMs and Micro-Vu machines above. We deal with a lot of rubber molded shapes so we needed a non-contact method to measure 3D features.

Micro-Vu is still rock solid for strictly 2D profiles though.

The one thing the Keyence unit struggles with is vertical (80° or more) surfaces. You can make up for that somewhat by taking measurements from different angles, and the software allows you to take two surface profile cross-sections (essentially a curve where a plane or cylindrical shell intersects the scanned surface) and stitch them together, but I'm still not completely comfortable with the results of that feature yet.
 








 
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