Good morning!

Today was spent entirely in training.  I arrived at the Fuji Robotics facility in Sanyo Onada City and was first given a tour of the facility, starting from the basic assembly of the materials and ending at our own robots.

My trainer is an electrical engineer with a Masters in hardware and software.  He spent the morning explaining how the robot and control panel will look upon delivery.  We then moved on to the control panel components and hardware.  We went through all the different PC boards and communications wiring.  He explained the difference between the FA-30 and FA-100 boards as well as between the .exe system version file and the .mot and .fal files.

We then got into the physical set up of the robot.  I couldn’t stand it anymore…..I finally got my hands on the robot!  With proper instruction and care, I started with setting the dip switches on the boards of a new panel, and was in heaven at this point.  Then, we went through the proper way to run the wires of the robot, 3 phase, ground connections, and so on.  I was able to manually move the robot with the new and improved teaching pendent.  I was also able to set up a manual layout and try it in auto when I was finished.  I managed not to break anything, and the layout I had made turned out rather well.  After the set up, we reviewed the sequences once again to make sure they were buried somewhere in my head.

Towards the end of the day, we went over box position adjustments.  All of the numbers started running wild in my head, and it became very difficult to keep track of them.  Tomorrow we start with software downloads, and then I get to set up some more pickup/pallet positions.

It has been a very productive day, thanks to a great trainer and a fantastic product!
Speak with you all tomorrow!

I recently had the opportunity to volunteer for the United Methodist Committee on Relief to assist families near Galveston, Texas, nine months after hurricane Ike ravaged the area.

Our team was comprised of a group of 45 adults including college and high school students from the Richmond area. We stayed at Crockett United Methodist Church, which is not functioning at present and could not accommodate all of our shower and personal hygiene needs. A local hospital provided some much needed shower facilities, for which we were all very appreciative.

My team was sent to help Archie, Nina and their daughter, Laura, fix up their home. The family had been living in a FEMA trailer since June 13, 2008, as their home had so much water damage from the hurricane. I’m sure when we stepped out of the van, they wondered what we could accomplish.   As the week went by, we were able to tear out the rotting floor boards and replace them, clean up the debris and trash from the property, and finished two-thirds of sheet rocking the ceiling. We also cleanup the family’s yard by pulling weeds, cutting down dead trees, and mowing the lawn.

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