Why Is My ABB Robot Joystick Not Working?
One of the most frustrating things for people repairing ABB robots is when you're in a hurry to manually adjust a position and end up grabbing the FlexPendant joystick and pushing it around, but the robot's big arm doesn't even lift its eyelids. The screen is brightly lit and the menus can be flipped, but the robot looks like it's asleep. This scene, adjusting the program when encountered, show teaching trajectory when encountered, do maintenance when encountered, equipment failure to restore a little also encountered.
Many people's first reaction is: “Finished, the rocker is broken.” But I'll tell you the truth, we have repaired so many years of ABB robots and accessories, really is the rocker itself hangs up and leads to can not move, very little. Most of the haunted place, in fact, is the safety circuit, operating mode, enable switch, and communication status of these things. I've even had a customer already call and ask how much a new demonstrator costs, only to have us remotely check in ten minutes or so that it was a safety gate that hadn't been reset. So next time your ABB robot rocker suddenly does not work, do not rush to pay, let's follow the vine down to see.
Emergency stop did not reset, stabbed the rocker it will not care about you!
We've seen this situation too many times in the field. Customers pick up the phone and say: “ABB robot rocker does not move, give a price.” We asked him to take a picture of the control cabinet panel and send it to us, and boy, the emergency stop button is still red and sunken in. This is more common than you think, the ABB control system, as long as it detects that the emergency stop circuit is disconnected, you don't need to shake the lever, it will block you to death. Sometimes it's the emergency stop on the trainer that's accidentally touched down, sometimes it's a peripheral safety gate that's open, sometimes it's another workstation that taps the emergency stop and breaks the whole safety chain. Especially when several people are debugging together, this kind of oops often happens. So the last thing you should do is to remove the joystick, first take a look around the control cabinet to see if there are any safety tips.
The joystick shouldn't be moving in auto mode in the first place.
There's another scenario that's particularly common. Equipment just after maintenance, the robot cut back to the automatic mode, the operator picked up the teach pendulum began to break the rocker, a little response, the heart thumped that the rocker hung. In fact, ABB robots in automatic mode, the vast majority of the system does not allow you to move manually through the joystick. The program can run, the robot can work automatically, but you want to use the FlexPendant directly to move the axis, not even a door. Novice engineers are especially prone to tossing themselves in this pit. So if you find that your ABB robot won't move manually, look down at the key switch and see which gear it's in, that's all it takes for a lot of problems.
That three-speed enable switch, press the wrong equals nothing!
If you have carefully touched the back of the ABB tutor, you will know that there is a three-position enable switch. A lot of people who are new to ABB have been confused about this, thinking that they can just press it like other robots. This is not true. This switch has three positions: fully released, pressed to the center, and pressed to the end. The only way to really get the robot under your control is to press it to the center at just the right position. You can't loosen it, and it can't be clutched to the end, but it must stop firmly in the center. Often customers say, “The joystick doesn't move, but sometimes it suddenly gets better.” We went to take a look, that is, he was so nervous that he pinched the switch dead, a pinch dead instead of triggering the safety protection. So don't just focus on fighting with the rocker, you need to practice your hand work too.
If the motor is not powered up, it's useless to stab the rocker until your hands get sore!
There is another common situation: after the equipment is shut down and restarted, the controller is running, the teach pendant is normal, and the joystick feels good when pushed, but the robot is just standing still. At this time you have to look at, is not “motor power” has not been implemented. ABB robot to really move, is to be servo system power up to work. When the motor is off, the robot is still in “deep sleep”. After many alarms are cleared, the system does not automatically restore power to the motor, and engineers think it is broken when they see no response from the joystick, but the servo is not activated at all.
Instructor cable, looks fine, but may have been bent inside!
If you've ruled out the safety conditions and operating conditions mentioned above, it's time to move on to the hardware, and one of the most problematic pieces of hardware on the ABB FlexPendant is actually the connecting cable. Particularly in some fast-paced production plants, the teach pendant is picked up and put down, bent over and over again, and sometimes squeezed and pressed by the equipment, so that the core wire inside the cable can be injured over time. The characteristics of this fault is particularly typical: today good, tomorrow and does not work; sometimes can move, sometimes not; the oscillator is occasionally dropped. If you find that the rocker is intermittently malfunctioning and is accompanied by occasional communication flashes, it is important to check the cable, especially at the root of the plug and where it is often bent, where it is most likely to break internally.
When the communication is jammed, the joystick will also “play dead”.
Sometimes the joystick itself is fine, but the communication between the FlexPendant and the controller is not. The most obvious thing is that the screen gets stuck, the touch doesn't follow your hand, the menu page flips over and over, and sometimes a communication warning pops up. At this point, the commands you send from the joystick don't even reach the controller properly, so you can't control the robot's movements. We have encountered several cases of old IRC5 controllers, after a few years of use, the communication interface is a bit oxidized contact is not good, the customer has always thought that the joystick is bad, the interface module is replaced, and immediately the problem is solved.
If the joystick is worn out, there are signs of it.
If your ABB robot every day to carry out a large number of demonstration debugging, such as automotive welding line, automation integrators, training centers, the frequency of rocker than the ordinary factory, it is true that it will slowly wear out. But the joystick doesn't usually die a complete death, it slowly gives you some signs. For example, pushing forward works, pushing backward is not responsive; or left and right movement is normal, up and down movement is not working; sometimes the response is intermittent; or a loose hand rocker back to the center. These may be the potentiometer inside or the mechanical structure is worn out. If you happen to have another FlexPendant on hand, the easiest way is to try to adjust it, and you can often tell in a few minutes if the joystick itself is the problem.
Software jerks can occasionally take the blame.
After some ABB systems have been upgraded, or a backup has been restored, the odd thing will pop up. For example, you can't find the menu, you can't select a manual function, you don't have enough permission to move it, and the control interface doesn't display properly. At this time, even if the hardware is all good, the robot may not care about your joystick input. So if you run into trouble, besides checking the hardware, you should also look up the system logs and alarm records, as many answers are actually hidden in the event records.
So when is it time to change the joystick?
According to the way we have been doing it for years, we must have eliminated safety circuits, operating modes, enable switches, motor status, communications, cables, and so on, before moving the joystick. Especially when the following situations occur: no response in a specific direction for a long time, the rocker is obviously loose, can't return to the center position, the shell is cracked, and change an instructor immediately, then basically we can conclude that the rocker assembly is not working, so it should be replaced.
