Cobot supply chain map: who makes each part, and where
The Office of Strategic Capital lends in areas that include robots, batteries and sensors, and reviews a borrower's suppliers for foreign influence. Most magnets and many reducers, cells and cameras come from one country, so a humanoid built from the usual suppliers has makers owned from there at several joints.
The Verdex physical AI map shows the companies at every step of this chain, where their plants are, and how each stands under the rules that apply to the sector. Each step below opens its own page: what happens at that step, who does it, and where.
Materials
- Nd/Pr metal: Neodymium and praseodymium metal, the main rare-earth input to the magnet alloy.
- Dysprosium and terbium: Heavy rare earths for coercivity at rotor temperature, put in by grain-boundary diffusion (or alloyed in on older grades).
- Gear steel: Alloy steel bar and forgings machined into the flexspline, circular spline and gear trains.
- Bearing steel: Through-hardening bearing steel (100Cr6 = SAE 52100 = SUJ2 class) for bearing rings and the reducer's output bearing.
- Encoder sensor IC: Hall or magnetoresistive absolute position sensor IC, two per joint.
- Power switches: Si MOSFETs today, GaN entering: six switches per three-phase joint inverter.
Motors and drives
- NdFeB alloy powder: Melting and strip casting of Nd-Fe-B alloy, 200 to 400 um flakes; hydrogen decrepitation to under 2 mm; jet milling to 2 to 5 um. Output: aligned fine powder.
- Sintered NdFeB magnet: Align in field and press; sinter 1000 to 1100 C; two-stage anneal 850 to 950 C and 400 to 600 C; machine; grain-boundary diffusion of Dy or Tb for coercivity; nickel or epoxy coat; magnetize. Output: sintered NdFeB segments or ring, grade N42SH to N45UH class for joint rotors.
- Frameless PM motor: Electrical-steel lamination stamping and stacking; copper winding with high fill factor; rotor ring with surface magnets; no housing or bearing (the joint supplies them). Output: frameless PMSM, internal rotor, 48 V bus, 50 to 115 mm outer diameter.
- Precision reducer: Harmonic: flexspline, circular spline and wave generator machined from steel, teeth cut, heat treated, assembled with an output crossed-roller bearing; planetary: two-stage gear train; cycloidal: eccentric cam and pin ring. Output: reducer unit, 30:1 to 160:1 harmonic or 2-stage planetary.
- Position encoders: Magnetic absolute sensor IC (Hall or magnetoresistive) on a PCB facing a magnet ring; one on the motor shaft for commutation, one on the joint output for true angle. Output: two encoders per joint (dual encoder).
- Motor driver: Three-phase inverter (3 half-bridges = 6 switches) + gate driver + MCU on a round PCB inside the joint; 15 to 55 V bus. Output: joint drive board.
- Torque sensor: A sensor body machined from high-strength aluminium, strain gauges fixed to it, and the electronics that read them; built into a joint to read the torque at its output, or fitted at the tool flange to read force and torque on six axes. Output: joint torque sensor (one per axis on the Doosan M1013) or one six-axis force and torque sensor at the tool flange (UR10e).
- Cobot joint: The frameless motor, the harmonic reducer, the two encoders, the drive board, a friction brake and, where the maker fits one, the torque sensor built into one hollow housing, with the cables through the middle. Output: one joint unit, replaced whole in service; six per arm in three sizes on the UR10e.
Controller
- Robot controller: A CPU unit holding the CPU board and the robot interface board, with a servo control board, a safety circuit board and a general-purpose I/O board, fed by a control power supply unit. Output: robot controller electronics: six axes, three external axes possible (YRC1000); 6 or 7 controlled axes and 16 MB of memory (Kawasaki F60, F01, F02).
- Teach pendant: A handheld programming unit in reinforced plastics: a 5.7-inch colour touch LCD, axis and operation keys, a mode selector, an emergency stop button and a three-position enable switch, on a cable to the cabinet. Output: teach pendant, 0.730 kg, 152 x 299 x 53 mm, IP54 (YRC1000).
- Control box: A powder-coated steel box fitted with the control board, a power supply, and an energy eater with its fan; one cable runs to the arm. Output: control box, 12 kg, IP44, on 100 to 240 VAC (UR10e).
Frame and body
- Frame and links: Structural parts of the torso, limbs and joint housings in aircraft-grade aluminium, titanium alloy and high-strength engineering plastics. Output: frame and links.
- Cable harness: Cables routed inside every joint (full joint hollow electrical routing). Output: harness through the joints.
Robot
- Cobot assembly: Six joint units joined by aluminium links and wired through their hollow middles, then tested with the control box and the teach pendant: one collaborative robot arm.