When Victor Frankenstein, the mad scientist in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, went to put together his creature, he used a pretty simple “product development” equation: body + brains + electricity = a new form of life.

While the resulting creature, a terrifying monster pieced together with human parts, isn’t something to be looked back on fondly, Renishaw’s newest metrology machine, the Equator 300 gauging system, lends itself to the mythos.

Like Frankestein’s creature, this monster machine is an amalgamation of existing technology to create a new product that Renishaw engineers hope will become a flexible, hybrid measurement solution for shop floors across industries.

Let there be life. 

The Body

The Equator gauge is designed to be an alternative to traditional dedicated gauging. Dave Emmett, business manager for CMM products with Renishaw, says Equator is more versatile than custom gauges because it can be reprogrammed for different, complex parts, but more transportable and simple to use than Coordinate Measuring Machines (CMMs).

“If you had a CMM that was a problem, you’d either call in a service guy or you’d have your on-site service guy look at it. If you wanted a replacement unit it would be very difficult to swap it out,” explains Emmett. “With Equator, you basically lift it out of the box, put it on the table, and off you go.”

Equator is also more inexpensive than other gauging options. At a product launch event back in March, one Renishaw executive casually characterized the Equator as “practically disposable,” pointing out that the price point of $26K made it a much more likely option for small companies that can’t afford the enormous cost of other gauge systems.

Equator’s most striking visual element is the scaleable and adaptable “parallel kinematic” structure, which has been in the Renishaw product family for some time as part of a compact dental milling machine.

“There are tens of thousands of these dental tripod machines out in the world today,” says Emmett. “You have a tried and tested mechanism. We’ve proven [the structure] out through that number of machines, and learned a bit from it as well.”

The gold scales on each of the four drive legs have been a Renishaw product sold on the open market since about the mid-1980s. The linear encoders drive three struts connected to spherical pivots. These pivots help produce drive straightness and maintain tension and compression when taking measurements.

The measurement stylus used to collect points is Renishaw’s SP25 CMM probe and stylus changing rack, which was previously used in other CMM systems. In the future, Emmett says Renishaw hopes to repackage Equator with the TP20, a touch trigger sister product to the SP25.

The Brain

Equator is a comparative gauging technology in which accuracy comes from a comparative measurement, a technique that harkens back to older metrology technology. However, Emmett says that even machines like a CMM – machines users think are absolute measurement devices – are necessarily comparative back to some standard.

“What we’re doing is taking that comparative technology and we’re making it overtly apparent in the Equator,” Emmett continues. “We’re saying it is a comparator. It doesn’t have any accuracy.”

To calibrate Equator, a production part is measured on a calibrated CMM or other machine with a known accuracy, then the information is transferred to Equator. When the calibration file is loaded into the Equator software, measurements in the system refer back to the mastered part for accuracy regardless of the conditions on the shop floor.

The Equator controller comes with two different levels of software – MODUS Organizer, for shop floor operation, or MODUS Equator, for programmers. MODUS Organizer, which has a user interface reminiscent of Apple’s Mac OS, offers just a few options for shop floor operators. MODUS Equator allows programmers to develop and run part programs on the Equator with a suite of 3D metrology functions and a full display of measurement routines.

Over Equator’s development process, Emmett says most of the work has been in adjusting and tweaking the software to make sure the measurement are accurate and robust. 

“We’ve had seven years worth of developing the hardware and understanding the mathematic algorithms that are put in the depths of the software,” he explains. 

The Electricity

Equator took about eight years to move from concept to final product, but most of the time — especially within the last year — was spent improving the software side of the equation.

“It’s very easy to produce something in the lab that works and does what it’s supposed to do, but when you productionize it you have to develop interfaces and software that everyone understands rather than just the software geek,” says Emmett. The last two years of the process have been dedicated to linking the front-end interface to the mathematical interfaces buried within the software.

Renishaw also prides itself on its control of the manufacturing process, which includes the design, assembly, and component parts that go into new products. The company has its own in-house electronics line, a quality Emmett says is atypical. 

In the case of Equator, having control over the manufacturing process meant that the company could respond quickly to concerns brought up by early customer tests, tweaking the bearings, controller layout, and PC case within the last part of the product development cycle.

“Having the internal capability comes down to the rapid prototyping and the rapid turn around of changes,” says Emmett. “It helps us to get to market sooner.”

New Life

Before Equator was introduced and sold to the general public, Renishaw worked with a number of companies in the aerospace, automotive, and medical industries to measure jet engine rotor blades, fuel injectors, and hip joints. Equator has also helped measure femoral stems, compressor parts, bearings, and the propeller shaft for a racing boat.

In every case, Equator served as a gauging tool in applications where a single part needs to be constantly measured to ensure quality across a production line.

However, Emmett and others at Renishaw believe Equator has the potential to be used in markets they haven’t even thought of yet.

One potential application Renishaw was approached with was for a “metrology in-vehicle” system for an automotive company that supplies to GM, says Emmett. The company wanted on-site inspection and quality control for parts from their suppliers. By loading Equator into a van and driving to the facility, the company could test parts, implement a change, and re-measure parts to ensure accuracy.

“A lot of things have come our way,” says Emmett. “One of the industries we’re keen on is aerospace blades. We have a number of technologies we use, and we feel that we understand the metrology of aerospace blades better than most people do.”

This story originally appeared in PD&D’s 2011 Motion Control & Automation supplement. To read the supplement, click http://bit.ly/miIGPK.