Applied Robotics and IVR

Founded in 1973, IVR is known internationally as a manufacturer of valves for water, gas, and industrial valves. After several years of activity and constant dedication to innovation, IVR has earned the trust of the customers in over 60 countries worldwide. 

In 2001, IVR made major investments to build a new, modern factory, equipped with the most sophisticated and efficient machinery. Thanks to decades of experience and the attention to customer requirements, the team of engineers within the IVR Research and Development department, has developed new product lines including valves for heating, thermostatic heads, and metering modules.

Due to the particular importance of environmental innovation and ecology, IVR ensures every stage of the production process is environmentally friendly and utilizes non-polluting materials.

Challenge:

The assembling of O-rings into valves has traditionally been a manual operation. The repetitive task causes issues with consistency, quality, downtime, and various inefficiencies including product rework.

Solution:

With the aim of optimizing the assembling process, IVR decided to upgrade the O-ring assembly stations with automatic devices to reduce downtime, improve cycle times of the various phases, and guarantee a higher quality standard along with greater efficiency.

The OPR Gripper (O-ring Gripper) with integrated fingers was installed on new automated assembly machines, bringing repeatability and accuracy to the operation.

Benefits:

The installed machinery has led to an increase in productivity due to a more consistent cycle time and a drastic reduction of quality rejects.

In addition, downtime has been significantly decreased, resulting in a higher efficiency, and increased throughput

“IVR has been collaborating with Effecto Group and Applied Robotics for several years. Once again, we have experienced the know-how and quality of their 
products. The maintenance time has been lowered more than expected.”

-Gianluca Zaniroli, Production Manager