PLC - Pick and Place

This experiment, designed and built by a Lehigh undergraduate mechanical engineering student, Mr. Dan Banowetz, is a PLC-based industrial-like setup. Programming of a programmable logic controller or PLC to perform a specified pick-and-place task is required. The students write a ladder-logic program and install it into an Allen-Bradley PLC to move five blocks from a rotary table to a nearby tray by sequentially operating four pneumatic cylinders and a pneumatic gripper. Various constraints and starting configurations complicate the task and increase the number of rungs required to successfully complete the assignment. The PLC experiment provides the students with yet another opportunity to develop their abilities to pick up a manual and teach themselves to utilize unfamiliar tools to meet engineering needs.

Control techniques studied:

• Boolean logic
• Ladder-logic industrial PLC programming