So, you've just stuck something new onto the end of the KUKA and you want to know how to tell the robot and the robot software where they end of the tool is. This is called tool calibration and can usually be done in just a few minutes.
- In this example, I have attached a marker holder to the end of one of the KUKA robots. The pen is protruding at an angle.
- Turn on the KUKA and login as Administrator (guide here)
- From the main menu, go to Start Up > Calibrate > Tool > XYZ 4 Point
- The following screen will appear
- You can change the tool number in the first box to change which tool you are calibrating. Our KUKA Robots can each store 16 different tools. Make sure you are not overwriting another researcher's tool. Tool 16 is a general-purpose tool that you can overwrite if you just need to quickly get the coordinates of a new tool to store in an external piece of software (like KUKAPython).
- Place a calibration point somewhere on a reference surface. Usually, we will place the metal spike on the drawing table to do this. We just need to establish a fixed point in space.
