KUKA

Revolution’s KUKA driver serves the LBR iiwa — KUKA’s seven-axis sensitive arm, with joint torque sensors in every axis. Seven axes rather than six is the point of the machine in a lab cell: the redundant axis lets the arm reach the same pose through a different elbow configuration, so it can work into a shelf or between two instruments where a six-axis arm would have to be moved. The driver is built around the LBR iiwa 7 R800 and drives a UK Robotics microplate gripper mounted on the flange.

At a glance

Axes	Seven
Payload	7 kg (LBR iiwa 7 R800)
Reach	800 mm (LBR iiwa 7 R800)
Weight	Approx. 23.9 kg
Protection class	IP 54
Controller	KUKA Sunrise Cabinet
Revolution control	Plate transfers, scheduled through Revolution’s transfer system

Specifications

KUKA publishes the following for the LBR iiwa 7 R800, the variant this driver targets — see “At a glance” above for payload, reach, weight, protection class and controller. KUKA also sells a 14 kg / 820 mm variant, the LBR iiwa 14 R820, which this driver does not target.

Positioning repeatability	±0.15/0.1 mm
Mounting position	Floor, ceiling, wall
Optional version	CR (suitable for clean rooms)

KUKA publishes the repeatability figure for the LBR iiwa as “±0.15/0.1 mm” and we quote it as published. It is an order of magnitude looser than a precision six-axis industrial arm, which is the normal trade for a torque-sensing collaborative wrist — worth knowing before you rely on the arm for a tight-clearance entrance rather than a plate nest with lead-ins.

Reach of 800 mm is the number that decides the cell. An LBR iiwa serves a compact cluster of instruments around one base position; it does not span a bench. Note also that the arm itself weighs around 23.9 kg, which is a bench-mounting question, not a footnote.

Axis data

Axis	Range	Axis	Range
A1	±170°	A5	±170°
A2	+120°	A6	±120°
A3	±170°	A7	±175°
A4	+120°

KUKA publishes the media flange hole pattern as conforming to DIN ISO 9409-1-50-7-M6, which is what a custom gripper bolts to.

KUKA publishes a separate LBR Med range (LBR Med 7 R800 and 14 R820) which complies with IEC 60601-1. That is a different product from the LBR iiwa this driver targets, and the two should not be conflated when specifying a cell.

Safety

KUKA states the LBR iiwa is “the world’s first series-produced sensitive, and therefore HRC-compatible, robot”, that it has joint torque sensors in all seven axes, and that thanks to those sensors it “can detect contact immediately and reduces its level of force and speed instantly”. KUKA publishes an axis-specific torque accuracy of ±2% of the maximum torque.

That is a real capability, and it is the reason this arm is chosen for work alongside people. It is still not a clearance for your installation: a risk assessment of your own cell is required. With a 7 kg rated payload and a gripper carrying labware, the hazard is as much what the arm is holding as the arm itself, and the labware, the instrument openings and the operator’s access are yours to assess. KUKA does not, in the material we could verify, publish a statement that the LBR iiwa may be operated without guarding in an arbitrary cell.

How Revolution uses it

The LBR iiwa is a mover, and movers are not driven by device operations. Revolution schedules plate transfers and the mover executes them through the transfer system, in the same way as the Thermo Orbitor, the PF400 and the Stäubli arms. There is no “move plate” operation to call from a method — you describe where labware needs to be, and the scheduler works out the moves.

The driver exposes no device operations at all: everything it does, it does because the scheduler asked for a transfer. Teaching is handled by the driver’s own teaching tab in the Revolution device manager rather than by scheduled operations.

Integration

Revolution connects to the robot over TCP/IP, and to the gripper separately over a serial port. The gripper is not the robot’s — the driver drives a UK Robotics microplate gripper (or an AllMotion stepper gripper) on its own COM port, which means the gripper is a piece of the integration you commission in its own right.

Prerequisites

• The arm must be commissioned with KUKA’s own tooling and taught its positions before Revolution schedules transfers through it. Position teaching is instrument-side work; a mover that has not been taught a position cannot be scheduled to it.
• Every instrument the arm serves must be inside the 800 mm reach from the base position, and inside the published axis ranges.
• Labware weight, plus the gripper, must be within the 7 kg rated payload.
• The robot must be reachable on the network from the Revolution host, and the gripper’s serial port available on the same machine.

Device configuration

Property	Purpose
Robot Host/IPAddress	Address of the robot controller
Gripper COM Port	Serial port settings for the microplate gripper
Gripper Open Clearance	How far the gripper opens clear of the labware

Gripper Open Clearance is the setting that gets revisited in a real cell: too little and the fingers catch the labware or the nest on approach, too much and the fingers foul a tight instrument entrance.

If you need more of this instrument driven from a schedule, get in touch — the driver is extended on demand.