The Air Force Research Laboratory and the Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing Institute won the Defense Manufacturing Technology Achievement Award for leading a development of a cold spray robot used in aerospace equipment refurbishment, AFRL announced Tuesday.
The organizations were recognized at the 2022 Defense Manufacturing Conference held earlier this month in Tampa, Florida.
Dubbed ARRI, the augmented reality-enabled cold spray robot was created at AFRL’s Materials and Manufacturing Directorate. ARRI functions with the Microsoft Hololens virtual reality headset, which helps the human user control where a thermal coating should be applied on an aerospace workpiece undergoing rehabilitation.
In addition to funding from the laboratory, cost sharing agreements were signed with members of the ARM Institute as well as project integrators at the University of Connecticut and Titan Robotics to complete the project.
ARRI was installed in July at Warner Robins Air Logistics Complex, Robins Air Force Base in Georgia. WR-ALC invested $1.6 million to obtain two more ARRI-enabled controllers from Titan Robotics.
“The ARRI robot allows someone with no cold spray experience to be trained in about a day. The system also speeds up the time it takes to spray, reduces fixture costs, and improves capacity,” shared Shane Groves, robotics and automation expert at WR-ALC. He noted that the technology reduced training time by 90 percent and can save $600,000 in annual depot operating costs.
