Department of Automatic Control and Robotics

At the beginning of this semester, preparations for the virtual reality station were completed. This week, the first laboratory sections of AiR III, as a part of the Robotics course, had the opportunity to receive training on the safety and operation of industrial robots in a virtual reality environment. Simtech, an industrial automation company, has developed and provided to Silesian University of Technology an application containing training modules and an interactive pendant integrated with its virtual model. Wearing VR goggles, the student is inside a virtual room containing a robotic cell station and learns such topics as:

- Basics of interacting with the VR environment

- Demonstrations of the elements that make up the robotic cell

- Assimilating the safety rules of the robotic cell

- Mastering the movement of an industrial robot

- Creating programs to enable the robot to work in production mode

All this happens in an environment where physical damage is not possible. Such training prepares students for further activities and projects at the other physical workstations in rooms 436 and 429, minimizing the risk of a malfunction or accident.

To run the workstation, a computing server purchased for the Social Robots Research Team was used to provide adequate computing power to support a set of VR goggles: HTC VIVE Pro with wireless attachment. Developed and supplied by Simtech, the pendand is positioned in VR space thanks to an additional tracker.

We also hope that the laboratory stand will be further developed for projects, engineering or master's theses.

We invite those willing to try out the capabilities of the VR or to establish cooperation, to contact Dr. Tomasz Grzejszczak.

We also encourage to read the offer and a detailed description of the training application on the Simtech website:

http://simtech.gliwice.pl/nasza-oferta/wirtualna-rzeczywistosc,101