Robot feed systems are flexible systems for the separation and orderly feeding of small parts in bulk form with the aid of an image-processing-guided robot arm. The bulk material is fed from a bunker in a defined quantity to a flat conveyor system and thereby partially separated in the plane and still unoriented. An image processing system detects parts that have been separated in the correct position and transmits their position and rotation to a robot. The robot picks up parts that are in the correct position and feeds them to the next application. Parts that are not in the correct position are ignored and, for example, reoriented with turning devices or mechanical jogging movements and returned to the pick-up position.

The bulk parts are fed from a storage hopper in a defined quantity to a conveyor system and thereby partially separated in the plane. The parts are oriented randomly. The parts are now conveyed into the pick-up area detected by the camera. The image processing system detects the position of the individual parts and transmits the position data and rotational positions of the parts lying on the correct side to the robot controller. Based on this information, the robot can grip the part independently of the rotational position and feed it to the next process. The parts lying on the wrong support surface are ignored. 
After the correctly positioned parts have been picked up, the remaining parts in the pick-up zone are reoriented, e.g. when using an oscillating surface conveyor, by means of pulse-like vertical oscillations. After several repetitions, parts that are still not correctly oriented are returned to the storage container. In the following, the process of part output or reorientation, image acquisition, determining the position of the correctly positioned parts, transmitting data and picking up the parts is repeated.