Index Pick and Place Machine
Table of Contents
I am building a PNP robot to make assembling my own PCBs easier! The design is open source and was kickstarted by Stephen Hawes.
Its also a great opportunity to learn a lot about carthesian robots, SMD assembly in general, machine vision pipelines / processing, automation and a whole lot more.
Join the discord server to discuss the development of the PNP and connect with others working on the design!
Overview
When Stephen posted his first video I was instantly captivated by the idea of having the capability to assemble my own boards.
The timing wasn't bad either, in early 2020 the pandemic forced me to stay at home, giving me more time to work on the robot.
Hardware
All of the 3D printed parts along with assembly documentation are available on the GitHub repository.
I was really impressed by the concept and could not wait to get started building my own PNP. As with any project, many small and sometimes large issues have to be ironed out at first. This meant that I had to 3D-print almost every part after a few months to get the latest improvements.
Currently (as of Nov. 2021) the Rev. 3 of the PCB is mostly done and I will soon be able to assemble it.
Revision 2 of the mainboard.
Software
The robot is controlled by OpenPNP.
Images and videos
Here are some additional images and a video of the project.
