Emeritus professor Jim Saker, president of the Institute of the Motor Industry, wonders whethe the rapid advancement of technology might turn the exciting prospects of recent cars right into a flat experience on a par with white goods.
From the times of the town crier to the exaggerated click bait on social media headlines have at all times been designed to attract attention. Recently one post that stuck out for me was within the Financial Times. It simply read ‘Robots Only Half as Efficient as Humans says Leading Chinese Producer.’
I might have ignored it but for the image underneath which was of UBTech’s humanoid robots working on an assembly line for the Chinese automotive manufacturer Zeekr.
The undeniable fact that the quote had come from the chief brand officer on the Shenzhen-based robot manufacturer was interesting, because it was identifying the present limitation to their very own product’s performance.
Despite the he shortcomings, he identifies that automotive manufacturers are still racing to employ humanoid robots primarily because they’re anxious that rivals will beat them, especially in the shape of Tesla if it achieves Musk’s ambition to have a full fully automated factory.
Back in 1979, Fiat ran a groundbreaking advert on TV stating that the Strada was hand built by robots. At the tip of the 70s this claim was based on presenting vehicles that had been assembled on a production line with less human involvement and by inference less errors or faulty workmanship.
To be fair these robots were more like robotic arms versus the humanoid robots which might be being developed today. Nevertheless, the message shouldn’t be that dissimilar in that the idea that the machine makes less mistakes and in consequence the product can be higher.
The issue is that the humanoid robots present a more complex set of challenges than static arms or conveyor belts, as they require independent power supplies and, as with the human body, have more complex moving parts.
The apparent other shortfall comes from when, in their very own expectation, the humanoid robot needs any type of advanced decision making, whether AI generated or not.
There remains to be some option to go before the humanoid robot can do what a standard human being can achieve in relation to automotive manufacturing.
Nevertheless, UBTech is on the lookout for its Walker robots to operate at 80% of human performance by 2027, which they imagine could also be sufficient as robots needn’t take breaks.
The idea is that this can make industrial sense, but this has not been tested as a lot of the humanoid robot deployments have been in Chinese government sponsored research centres.
It’s undoubtedly the longer term, but I do feel a way of sadness that the automotive is becoming the equivalent of a white good that has little or no craftsmanship involved in its making.
One in every of the privileges I actually have is to be on the committee of the Fellowship of the Motor Industry, a bunch that appears to offer social meetings for people who find themselves or have been involved within the industry. There are often some visits to heritage automotive collections as a part of the programme.
I’m unsure that in the longer term there can be an enormous demand to have a look at old cars which have come off a purely robotic production line.
Writer: Professor Jim Saker
This Article First Appeared At www.am-online.com
