Hirebotics adds line tracking and linear rail capabilities to its cobots

- Hirebotics just taught its cobots two new tricks, and honestly? Mega-illegal levels of clever. Line tracking lets the Cobot Painter chase parts down a live conveyor — encoder sensor locks onto motion, no-code Beacon platform keeps the spray path true while the line never stops. And the new modular linear rail (5-ft increments, custom lengths) blows past the stock 68.9-in. reach, so welders can glide along 20-ft structural frames in shipyards and heavy fab shops without wrestling the part. Manual positioning ships now; a fully automated axis lands end of 2026. Unveiled at IMTS 2026 in Chicago. No robotics programmer required — I could swap that node in twelve minutes. Pluto Uplink taught us to call it research.