These Award-Winning Robots Can Do the Coolest Car Paint Jobs With Just One Pass

This new car painting technology is so amazing that it recently won the prestigious Robotics Award 2021, which acknowledges innovation in automation processes. And this is not the first prize that’s been awarded to Pixelpaint, a technology developed by Swiss-based ABB a couple of years ago and recognized as a groundbreaking innovation in the automotive industry.

A cell that uses 2 robots to apply the paint on the target area – this is Pixelpaint. But the “trick” is that it incorporates a high DPI painting inkjet head that prints paint directly on the surface, using a printing nozzle head, instead of spraying the paint with a standard atomizer. The result? 100% transfer efficiency and no more over-spraying, which, if you didn’t know, is one the biggest problems with car painting. With standard procedures, only 70 to 80% of the paint actually gets on the car surface, with the rest being wasted. And that is bad for the environment and costly for car manufacturers.

The other great thing these 2 robots do is turn the craziest two-tone, matte finishes or customized paint schemes, into reality. No more difficult and extensive paint processes where the car needs to go through the painting line twice, because it has to be masked before applying the second color layer.

Thanks to the RobotStudio programming software for two-tone and decorative painting applications, Pixelpaint can deliver a highly individualized finish, much faster and less expensive. Masking and de-masking, which take a lot of time, are eliminated altogether, and this doesn’t limit in any way design options. On the contrary, imagination can now run free.

And, with the current (and most likely future) demand for unique and customized design, the Pixelpaint robots will be of great help.