The huge importance of small automated guided vehicles

Automating your logistics processes is no longer a “nice to have,” but a “must have,” even for small- to mid-sized companies. So what solutions should these companies turn to to stay competitive? They need affordable automated guided vehicle (AGV) system solutions that can be rapidly deployed. Like the HERBIE AGV system from Carrybots.

We’re currently seeing a strong push towards the automation of logistics processes. Companies in a wide variety of fields, like electronics, injection molding, and even hospitals, are starting to automate their material flow. Small automated vehicles that can perform transport tasks simply and cost-effectively are becoming increasingly important in this area.

The German manufacturer Carrybots has a vision: It would like to make high performance automation accessible to as many companies as possible and pave the way for them into the age of digital transformation.

“Our aim is to make the entry into transport automation as simple and cost-effective as possible,” said Marcel Meckes, Managing Director at Carrybots. To keep the barrier to entry as low as possible, Carrybots developed a small, modular-designed vehicle named HERBIE.

Maximum flexibility with HERBIE

HERBIE is an AGV system for the company-internal transport of small loads. At the heart of HERBIE is a base module that contains all the required sensor technology and actuator engineering. Thanks to its modular design, four aspects of the base module can be tailored:

1. Top module: Various top modules can be combined. The simplest variant is a manual load-carrying unit where the goods are manually received and passed on. Currently, the most popular module is the roller conveyor AGV where the goods are fully automatically transferred by means of a suitable conveying technology. Custom solutions can, however, also be implemented.
2. Height: The height of the top modules can be customized depending on the requirements of the stations that HERBIE will be servicing.
3. Charging system: HERBIE is optionally available with a swappable rechargeable battery system or a fully automatic inductive charging system. This enables an optimal utilization of the vehicles and the available charging peripherals.
4. Software: The intuitive mobile web app offers not only an overview of the entire system, but can also display individual vehicles so that any errors can be quickly and easily localized and eliminated.

HERBIE offers great scope for customization, making it an affordable entry level solution with maximum flexibility when requirements grow.

HERBIE offers great design freedom with maximum flexibility.Innovative safety solution using SICK

As an automated guided vehicle system, HERBIE moves about independently and shares the space with humans. Because of this, it’s important that neither the AGV itself nor its load poses a hazard to people. “The issue of safety was our highest priority from the outset,” says Meckes.

The objective was to find an innovative safety solution that would accommodate the requirements of small line-guided vehicles and the risk they pose, but without incurring productivity losses due to reducing the speed or load. To meet this challenge, Carrybots worked hand in hand with two partners early in the design phase: the company Gerhard Schubert GmbH as the end customer, and SICK as the technology expert. Meckes adds: “We have found SICK to be an experienced and competent development partner who not only possesses the correct industry-specific knowledge, but also creates a compromise-free, integrated safety concept for our HERBIE.”

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