Real-life application Fast processing of roses in the Netherlands Automation with VTUX In the Netherlands, the land of cut and potted flowers, the machine building experts at Aventec are setting new standards. Speed and precision in processing rose cuttings have been significantly increased with modern, decentralized Festo automation technology. When looking at potted roses, few people think of highly automated processes. But with quantities in the millions, short planting times are a must. The Dutch company Aventec, founded by John van de Ven, opens the door to extremely fast yet sensitive automation in horticulture. With a new design that was originally planned as an automation upgrade at a breeding company, Van de Ven was able to increase the output of a complete machine with four cutting stations to up to 5,200 cuttings per hour. The system was equipped with modern servo technology, controlled by the Festo automation platform CPX-E. The perfect pattern The Aventec system trims the rose cuttings to size and plants them in pots in a matter of seconds. At the start of the line, the rose twigs are first hooked into a transport system by hand; all subsequent steps are fully automated. Once in the processing cells, the cuttings are positioned in front of an image processing system and rotated 180 degrees to create a 3D scan. The machine software then determines the optimum cutting pattern for the cultivated plants; this is carried out extremely quickly and precisely by a multi-axis robot. Finally, the robot inserts the cuttings into pots filled with soil after which the potted roses begin their journey into the greenhouse. To find out how the turning and cutting processes could be realized with components from Festo, Van de Ven and his team sent rose twigs and their holders to the Festo development center in Delft. A week later, they received a video from the Festo team with the results. Fully automated filigree work: The new machine from Aventec cuts and plants up to 5,200 rose cuttings per hour using Festo components.
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