2021

BLUE SERIES

BROCHURE
AVRAMOV

METROLOGY LAB | Bigla 7, 1407 Sofia, Bulgaria | [Link]

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WHAT IS THE BLUE SERIES DOING?

The Blue Series is a set of different camera systems for measurements and scanning of objects attached to an
industrial robot or a cobot or an underwater robot. The camera delivers measurement data for the observed objects.
Some models are suitable for guiding of the robot in real-time including during welding. Some are suitable for
inspection. Some are used in positioning only.

KNOWING WHEN LASER WELDING SENSORS MAKE SENSE

Since the revolutionary launch of welding robots over 40 years ago, innovation and process improvements have
continued to permeate product development focused on customer needs. In the past, it was easy to program a
robot to turn an arc on and weld a simple yet short seam with many different types of metal joints. However, not
all components are created equal.

Over time, the need arose for smarter machines capable of delivering greater efficiency, fewer errors, less rework,
and lower cycle times. As a result, weld processes and robots have greatly improved, and manufacturing industries
are deploying industrial robots at an exponential rate to reduce operational costs and increase profit margins.

LASER SEAM TRACKING

When the latest technology laser sensors are combined with high-speed controllers, seam and part locations can
be processed in real time. Like through-arc solutions, a dedicated program compensates path and even adapts
welding parameters for seam location and variation.

SkyBlue products reliably track thin gauge metals and allow fast tracking at up to 100 frames per second. This
allows automation in parts that inherently have changing gaps, such as welding around larger cylinders. Like
laser sensing hardware, this also requires a box that may limit the torch access into tight areas of the weldment.

These sensors are also used for weld inspection when coupled with a proper data tracking system. Weld
inspection and traceability is quickly becoming an industry standard for automotive and safety critical welds. Arc
data from the power supply is combined with individual scans of the weld to track each part that comes through
production. Return on investment here comes as a figurative insurance policy that can reduce widespread part
recalls and the weighty liability that comes with any potential part failure.

WHEN DO SENSORS MAKE SENSE?

Sensor technology has come a long way in the recent past, providing game-changing advantages for end users
spanning diverse industries. From industrial welding robots to human- collaborative robots (cobots), sensor
technology improvements are helping companies handle the diversity of applications required, especially where
robotic welding is concerned. Even 3D scanning and modeling sensors that have been developed for inspection
are being researched for one-off weld automated programming to open yet another generation of innovative
solutions.

So, when do sensors make sense? If one has a redundant part with variations that tooling and part consistency,
or design, cannot resolve, there will be a sensor that can. Keeping that in mind, expectations for ROI should be
set with clear-cut goals associated with the investment (reduced waste, improved quality, less down time,
improved production, etc.). While the initial cost of robotic implementation may seem overwhelming to some
manufacturers, understanding the cost savings associated with a long-term approach to automation – and
subsequent technologies, like sensors – is essential.
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Return on investment is usually realized quickly aside from sticker shock and should be discussed in more detail
with an automation integrator. Moreover, education about the different types of sensors (and their capabilities)
available for The Blue Series sensors will make it easier for manufacturers to tackle the most difficult, dangerous,
and dirty tasks, leading to higher production, better quality, and ultimately increased profitability.

LASER TRACKER PROCESSES

In the last 30 years a lot of development and progress has been done in laser scanning technologies related to
robot sensors. From expensive, complex, not reliable, and huge devices laser scanners evolved to useful and
important extension of welding robot systems. Laser tracker sensors are operating in front of the welding torch.
This leads to the fact that measurements are done a bit before the welding tool reach the weld point in the seam.
Because of that the time of collection of the data is very important. It has to be propagated to the robot in a
synchronous manner. Some robots accept a parameter called “aging” and based on that and a proper time
calibration procedure it is possible to evaluate the actual position of the correction being sent to the robot. It is
possible as well to make these computations inside the controller of the camera system and the blue series provide
full possibility for coordinate transformation and configurable time interpolation providing the robot data for
specific robot time.

SEAM FINDING AND POSITIONING

Before starting a welding process usually robot program has an “approaching” stage where the robot is programed
to approach the target workpiece. During that process it is needed to precisely position the workpiece in the robot
case to achieve proper access to the welded joint. This task usually requires a lot of work of the operators or
customization/parametrization of the robot program for each workpiece. A seam finding camera can solve this
problem easily and provide simple positioning information for the robot. The process is fast and provides good
positioning. It is possible to make a fast offline scan of the workpiece and introduce some corrections of the points
in the program.

SEAM TRACKING
Seam tracking delivers significantly more than seam finding. On one site workpieces are not always precisely
machined and a CAD drawing of a workpiece is not enough for programming the robot. Adapting the program for
each workpiece is of course a very undesirable operation. In addition, during welding the workpiece can be distorted
by the welding heat which causes improper weld or even stop of welding. If this is not monitored by an operator the
workpiece must be scrapped in most of the cases. All these cases can be handled by a seam tracking camera. The
seam trackers deliver fast and accurate information to the robot and influence the core robot interpolation cycle
trough specific protocols provided by robot manufacturers. This way the robot program is kept simple, and details
are adjusted with an intelligent measurement procedure built in the software of the camera and the robot.

ADAPTIVE WELDING
The SEAM TRACKING function provide precise positioning data for the robot TCP, but the welding process may be
affected by other parameters as well. The welding gap depending on it’s size may require adaption of speed, the
voltage or the waive in case of waiving welds. The volume of the seam is as well important for detailed optimization
of the quality of the welds. The mismatch when it occurs because of welding heat may require stop of the weld and
adapting of the fixtures. Modern robots provide built in function to support adaptive welding. To do so they need
from the sensor system to provide adequate measurement information for several geometric parameters of the
seam.

QUALITY INSPECTION AND CONTROL

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Quality inspection can be done before or after welding. Before welding it can follow the seam and verify the quality
of the plates or record the track in the robot and use it after in the welding case. After welding the quality inspection
is used to make visual qualification of the final job.

WHAT ARE THE MODELS IN THE BLUE SERIES?

LIGHTBLUE
LightBlue is a laser scanner operating for positioning and pre-scanning
of workpieces. LightBlue is not operating during active welding.

SKYBLUE
SkyBlue is our standard laser scanner. It can be used during welding and
provide measurements for Tracking Point and other geometric
parameters usable in adaptive welding. These camera models support

Air Knife for clean view during welding and

protection of optical parts from smoke and
welding sparks. It has as well a water-cooling
component for protecting the camera of the
welding heat.

SMARTBLUE

FAR STD RANGE SKYBLUE SHORT RANGE SKYBLUE

SmartBlue is the inspection camera of the Blue series. On top of laser

scanner, it supports ultrasonic transducers to support internal
inspection of the workpiece cracks and problems inside the weld. It can
be used during active welding. By positioning SmartBlue on the backside
of the welding torch one can scan for quality in the same pass after
welding.

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DEEPBLUE
DeepBlue operates underwater in saline water
and can be used for quality inspection of Ship
Bottoms, Naval constructions, Ship Propeller
quality status. If underwater welding robot is
used it can guide the robot in a similar way like
extra water path correction.

BENEFITS OF DEEPBLUE SYSTEM

- High precision detection of defects in underwater objects
o ship bottoms without dry dock use
o cavitation defects or other problems of ship propellers.
 As the price of new propeller of a big ship is high and propeller maintenance is
about 5% of the cost of the propeller (e.g., 500 000$) The maintenance or
replacement must be done only when needed. An underwater evaluation of the
quality of the surface of the propeller could save significant resources to the ship
owner.
 Equipping an underwater drone with grinding, polishing tool and DeepBlue
camera system a controlled polishing of the propeller can be achieved.
o Inspection of defects on underwater constructions. Offshore platforms, Port underwater
constructions, other border equipment operating below water level in the see can be
scanned to detect early defects and potential damages leading to bigger problems if not
solved on time.
o Pipeline quality inspection and repair
 Pipelines and other infrastructure tubes are produced in segments. The
segments are weld or sealed otherwise, before putting them under water. Once
installed underwater a repair and maintenance of the infrastructure can be done
only underwater using divers or expensive submarines. With DeepBlue mounted
on a drone with appropriate equipment the quality validation, defect evaluation
and eventual repair.
- Control and trajectory correction near surfaces for scanning and of underwater inspection.
o Robot / Drone path correction underwater.
o Underwater path correction during welding.
o Underwater adaptive welding
o Underwater seam inspection
- Scanning of archaeological artefacts with high resolution in gentle conditions to keep the aged
materials (e.g., wood), intact before physical extraction of the pieces for in air examination and
qualification.

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WIDEBLUE
WideBlue operate at high distances of 1000 mm, 1500 mm, or 2000 mm from the front of the camera.

OFFLINEBLUE
Offline Simulator. Offline simulator is a PC based application compatible with all Blue Series models. It allows playing
and offline adjustment of saved live tracks. The simulator is a powerful too for remote and offline programming of
Blue Series devices. It is possible to integrate the simulator with external robot simulators or even live robots. The
simulator is using the same configuration tool as other Blue series members.

6DBLUE
6DOF camera for general purpose applications. The camera uses specially structured light to increase the
measurement capabilities by adding on top of the coordinates of the welding path it can delivers the Euler angles to
the welded surface.

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PRODUCT SELECTION MATRIX

Offline Blue
SmartBlue

WideBlue

DeepBlue
LightBlue

6DBlue
SkyBlue
Live Welding Applications Y N Y N Y N Y

Adaptive Welding Y N Y N Y N Y

Simulation Y Y Y Y Y Y Y

Scanning and Positioning Y Y Y Y Y N Y

Offline Education N N N N N Y N

Underwater operation N N N Some Y N N

models

Reprocessing of scans Y Y Y Y Y Y Y

Measurement 2.5D 2.5D 2.5D 2.5D 2.5D 2.5D/6D 6D

Other parameters

Air knife Y Y Y N N N Y

Water Cooling Y N Y N N N Y

Laser beam 660nm 660nm 660nm 660nm/ 450nm N/A 660nm

450nm
Line Line Line Cross Line

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Line

Process

Seam finding Y Y Y Y Y N Y

Seam tracking during welding Y N Y Y/N N N Y

Adaptive welding Y N Y N N N Y

Quality inspection Y Possible FULL FULL FULL N FULL

WHAT ARE THE VIEWING RANGES?

For all systems we have standard viewing ranges. Customized viewing ranges are possible as well on customer
request.

Stand Off Far end viewing Depth of View Precision Application

Short range 20mm 75mm 55mm 0.01mm Precise fine

Objects

Standard 110mm 230mm 120mm 0.05mm Regular

Range workpieces
of different

Kind

Far Range 250mm 450mm 200mm 0.1mm Big

Workpieces,
Complicated
objects

Wide Blue 500mm 1500mm 1000mm 1mm Far range

Range positioning.

Deep Blue Range 250mm 500mm 250mm 0.1mm Underwater

inspection

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PHYSICAL DIMENSIONS

BLUE SERIES PROCESSING CORE

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All blue devices are equipped with a powerful industrial controller. The controller incorporates a set of powerful
image and pattern processing algorithms supporting

 high quality noise, reflection and time filters

 intelligent finding and recognition of desired patterns
 computation of different geometric parameters of the observed object
 providing interfaces for interaction with many different kind of robot systems from different manufacturer
 supporting customizable extension of computations based on specific applications requirements

CONTROL HMI
A touch screen HMI industrial tablet is provided as part
of the system for controlling the parameters and
maintaining the operation of the system. The
application provided with the HMI display is Java Based
application and customers can run it on their
notebooks if needed.

Title BAR
Preset Selector

General
Navigation
Measurement
Visualization Preset Parameters

Display and
control

OPTIONS

SOFTWARE OPTIONS

ABB RWS
This is a modern interface for ABB robots since RW6 which allows transfer of data trough variables accessible for
RAPID applications. Blue devices support full RWS connectivity and built in BLUE devices time synchronization
module can provide accurate information based on time interpolation.

ABB SERIAL

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Abb serial is a special robot connection driver intended for connection with old ABB robot systems s4c+ supporting
corrector functions in RAPID. A simple interpreter for the serial protocol is collecting data from a Blue system and
is providing correction data to robot interpolation cycle. The BLUE device operates as slave and responds to
requests of the robot master. The protocol supports time synchronisation with the robot.

ABB LTAPP RTP

Abb Laser Tracking Application protocol is known protocol by ABB. It is part of Arc and Arc sensor option of ABB
robots. The BLUE ABB LTAPP RTP driver implements the protocol on the site of BLUE systems and provide correction
and measurements data to the robot. Data includes tracking points and measurements specific for the used
tracking template. This include GAP, MISMATCH, AREA, ANGLE OF THE NORMAL.

ABB LTAPP TCP

ABB LTAPP TCP is the modern ethernet variant of Abb Laser Tracking Application protocol. It provides some
extensions over the serial version. BLUE series supports completely the LTAPP protocol. BLUE device is responding
as slave in that protocol.

ABB LTPROTO
The latest version of Arc sensor compatible protocol. Support similar data like LTAPP but serialised trough Google
Protocol Buffers. Tend to provide a bit better performance than LTAPP TCP. BLUE devices are slave in that protocol.

ABB EGM
Externally Guided Motion is the most modern protocol of ABB. It provides very efficient communication interface
for transmitting data from the robot to peripheral devices as well as to accept data from peripheral devices at a
rate of 250Hz. The protocol is bidirectional and does not fit model Master/Slave. The robot and the peripheral
device are equal parties in the communication. BLUE series supports fully EGM in path correction mode.

KUKA KRL
Variable exchange based protocol from KUKA ROBOTS. It provides data in KRL accessible form which can be used
for seam finding, tracking and adaptive welding at moderate speed. In KRL mode the BLUE series uses
OpenShowVar for communicating with the Robot. BLUE systems are operating as master in that communication.

KUKA RSI
RSI – the Robot Sensor Interface provide real time path correction protocol for external sensors. The BLUE RSI
driver It is suitable for all laser tracker sensor based tasks. The sensor is responding as slave to RSI requests.

YASKAWA GSI
GSI is a variable based protocol of Motoman-Yaskawa. It operates with YRC1000 and DX200 robots. BLUE devices
are operating as master in the communication and provide to the robot measurements for TP and all other
measured values. BLUE devices are master in that protocol.

YASKAWA SBMOTO

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SBMOTO is a Moto Plus compatible application which is part of the BLUE option SBMOTO. The application
communicates with BLUE controllers and obtains correction and positioning information. The measurements are
stored in data variables. Control is done trough another set of variables. SBMOTO maintain as well a SKILL cycle
for sending the corrections in interpolation core of the robot. BLUE devices are master in that protocol.

YASKAWA SBMOTO LIGHT

SBMOTO LIGHT is a variant of SBMOTO which supports only variable transfer. The measurement results and control
model are the same like in SBMOTO with exception of the path correction. BLUE devices are master in that protocol.

YASKAWA MOTOEYE
MOTOEYE is a known Yaskawa Moto plus application it is used for the most popular laser tracking sensors. BLUE
series devices support MotoEYE LT protocol and correction and measurement data can be obtained by the robot.
The BLUE devices are slave in that protocol.

CALIBRATION

CAMERA TO ROBOT CALIBRATION

Due to different mounting options and possibilities the data obtained by the BLUE sensors are not in the coordinate
systems of the robot. Usually most robots provide possibility to calibrate i.e. to find the relation between the sensor
and a designated robot coordinate system. On the other hand it may be not very handy to use the robot calibration
function in some cases. For that reason the BLUE devices support an internal calibration function delivering
coordinate system relations between ROBOT and SENSOR. The results can be used for robot adjustment where
possible or configure the internal sensor transformation in the BLUE device.

ON THE FIELD SENSOR OPTICAL CALIBRATION TOOL

After long use of the camera in case of serios vibrations or shocks it is possible that internal precision of the camera
is not the same as originally. For this case and for use by service teams BLUE series support special device and
appropriate software for internal optical calibration of the sensor.

MOUNTING CLAMPS
Two clamps are available on request. An universal clamp which can
be moved up/down and around on the torch and the camera can
be placed in different vertical positions and 3DOF clamp which
allows in addition to select the angle between the torch and the
laser beam. A customer mounting option is as well possible. The
main thinks to consider when deciding about mounting.

 Mounting should be done in a way that the camera moving

together with the torch does not conflict with parts of the workpiece.
 The workpiece should be in the viewing area of the camera in
production position
 The laser beam should be at about 50mm behind the torch

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OTHER TOOLS

INDUSTRIAL CHILLER
The blue system devices used for welding environment need to have a cooling. We offer industrial chillers from
300W to 800W with active or passive cooling.

AIR CONNECTION SUBSYSTEM

Compressed air is used in Blue Systems for implementation of the air knife system which protects the sensors from
welding smoke sparks etc. This option is usually present in industrial environment but needs some additional steps
to be used by Blue device. The air has to be dry and oil free with pressure between 1 and 3 atm. As Blue devices
are optical systems cleanness of the used air is important to be achieved.

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