Instron

I worked as an Automation Intern at Instron from January 2025 - September 2025. It served as my second co-op experience while at Northeastern University. You've likely heard of Instron if you come from a mechanical engineering background, as they make industry standard machines for materials testing. Instron serves a variety of industries ranging from raw material manufacturers to R&D labs. Some of these companies test hundreds of material samples everyday, making an automated Instron machine a worthwhile investment. I worked on the Engineered Solutions Group (ESG) Automation team to develop a wide range of automation products for customer orders to interface with Instron machinery. Below are some of the projects I worked on while I was on this team.

By far my largest project was the development of the CT6, a brand new addition to the standard line of Instron Automation products. The CT6 was ideated as an automation system for Instron's standard product line of autoinjector testing systems. An early version of the CT6 was created previously for syringe testing, but I was given the opportunity to completely rebuild the system from the ground up, given my previous experience with cobots from my internship with Igus that the rest of the team lacked. I was given complete ownership of the mechanical design, and was in charge of part procurement, prototyping and testing the system, and communicating and hosting design reviews with the product manager to ensure the product's success.

I decided to design the system to be a self-contained "automation add-on cart" using a FANUC CRX-5ia Cobot. This reduced system footprint, allowed customers with existing autoinjector systems to be able to implement automation without needing to purchase another system, and allowed for the system to be used manually by detaching the cart. 

Here's a mockup I made out of 80/20 I found lying around.

The next challenge of the system was the most important: getting it to actually pick up the things it needed to pick up. Issues came up quick - the strokes of most grippers were not enough to accommodate the range of widths that we needed to cover, and grippers with larger strokes were expensive and strong enough to pulverize my head. Also, every autoinjector had wacky geometries, meaning a parallel gripper would need special fingers to accommodate each new type of autoinjector

However, each autoinjector shared a common trait - they were all required to have a flat face with a window to showcase the liquid inside. So, I designed an adjustable vacuum gripper to grab this portion of the autoinjector. This gripper uses two venturi values to generate suction at the gripper, and is manually adjustable via a slot to grip different autoinjectors of different lengths. Each suction cup is attached to a spring compensator to give compliance to avoid crushing the autoinjector and the tray.

Here's a cool little drawing I did to get the gripper manufactured. I decided to have it machined out of Delrin to reduce weight on the end of the cobot arm and to ensure it was wipedown compliant for cleanroom use. 

You may have noticed the big claw looking thing on the other side of the gripper. When testing the autoinjector, liquid comes out and is emptied into a beaker, which needed to be emptied or replaced. Since the beaker sits on a sensitive scale, emptying it proved to be a delicate operation. As a result, replacing the beaker proved to be the easiest option - hence the claw. This claw is static, and passively grabs and replaces the beaker by sliding under its pour lip and lifting it up. Here's a cool little shelf I made with induction proximity sensors to detect if a beaker has been removed or placed onto the shelf.

Here's some videos of it actually in action:

There were a lot of other parts that I don't have photos of, so here's a brief overview of other components of the system I worked on:

• Finished cart design, complete with removal bottom panels for ease of service access and drop down doors to minimize overall footprint

• Created a custom sheet metal electronics enclosure and worked with the safety team to ensure it passed Instron safety standards

• Created a tray clamping system to accommodate customer provided trays of various geometries, utilizing manual linear actuator clamps

• Created an attachment interface to lock the cart to the main autoinjector testing cell

• Created shelving for scrap bin for autoinjector cap removal routine

• Programmed the robot to validate movement trajectories

I worked to redesign Instron's AT3 gantry system cell's enclosure. I worked with the assembly and manufacturing team to identify pain points in the assembly process, and made the appropriate changes to the documentation. I then communicated these changes with the enclosure vendor, and implemented them into all future AT3 systems. Some photos of my new design are below.

For the last 2 months of my internship I pivoted to work on the assembly team to accommodate my summer class schedule. I mainly worked on a Dual Frame AT6 system, which features a Mitsubishi robot and a two Instron frames. I worked to do most of the wiring and assembly work on the system, and designed some mounting plates, some of the main enclosure, and a custom electronics retrofit enclosure with a shelf to upgrade the electronics of an older model Instron frame to be compatible with automation. 

Given the nature of automation systems, I worked on lots of miscellaneous smaller projects for various customers, new and exisiting. These include, but are not limited to:

• 5 Complete Automation System Quotes with Enclosures

  • Re-conceptualized CT6 vacuum gripper to pick small round specimens, resulting in system purchase

• 120+ Technical GD&T Compliant Drawings

• 45+ MCO and ECOs

• Spec'd 5 Pneumatic Manifold I/O Communication Units

• Reduced Pad Printer Design Footprint

• Designed Wipedown Compliant PET-G Door Enclosure

• Designed Specimen Grips with Sheet Metal Guide Plates