Client: Oticon / Distributor: Armiga

Robot handles microscopically small parts

Modern hearing aids are becoming smaller and smaller so that you can barely notice them nestling in someone’s ear. This makes great demands on precision in production. The high-tech hearing aid manufacturer Oticon now uses robots from Universal Robots to handle parts that are just a millimetre long. 

Oticon has been using robot technology for the last ten years, but the innovative trend towards almost invisible hearing aids means that very small parts have to be manufactured and assembled.

“Parts for modern hearing aids are often around one millimetre in size, so we need a solution that is able to draw small parts out of a mould. It’s impossible to do this manually,” says Arne Oddershede, who supervises the maintenance unit at one of Oticon’s manufacturing plants.

The large two- and three-axis robots, which Oticon used in the past, were no longer up to the task. Movements that only go in and out and up and down are not good enough.

“If a small part is in a mould, for example, you may have to tilt it,” says Lars Gasberg, Sales Manager at Armiga, the system integration specialist that distributes Universal Robots’ products.
 

Larger range, smaller production runs

Another challenge associated with Oticon is that the company is offering more and more variants and models but in smaller production runs, which have naturally been manufactured in the most economical way possible.

“We have switched to Universal Robots because we wanted a more flexible solution which is also financially viable for smaller production runs. It’s important that the robot is easily accessible and designed in a logical way, as well as being easy to reprogram. Specialists are required where traditional robots are concerned, but with this robot all our technicians are literally able to take the robot and show it the movement pattern,” Arne Oddershede says.

It only took one day to install the robot for its new task in Oticon’s foundry where it handles very small parts such as wax filters measuring no more than one millimetre, if that.