Foreword. This Test Protocol is new in the VRS 2026 edition and is the first of the twelve sector demonstration protocols. It extends VRS-GEN-203, the intrinsic demonstration protocol, with the steps the Industrial sector criteria of VRS-IND-201 require and the intrinsic steps do not already witness. It never repeats or alters an intrinsic step: where an Industrial criterion is fully witnessed by an intrinsic step, this Protocol says so and the criterion is scored from that step’s mark. The Industrial steps are the ones the sector’s anchor regimes actually test — protective stops at the limits of the declared envelope rather than at nominal conditions, detection at the declared field, lighting and approach-geometry boundaries, and collaborative contact per reachable body region — and they absorb the witnessed content of the two earlier Industrial evidence protocols, VRS-IND-101 and VRS-IND-102, which remain the method and apparatus references for stopping-performance measurement and the body-region taxonomy. Steps run between Parts E and F of VRS-GEN-203, in the same session, on the same feed, into the same export. Standards carry no step identifiers; every step here names the VRS-IND-201 subclause that requires it. As a protocol it is versioned vX.Y.Z (VRS-GEN-004 §5.4). Requirements use “shall”.
Introduction
Industrial robots are the best-anchored sector in the library: ISO 3691-4:2023 for driverless industrial trucks, ISO 10218-1:2025 and ISO 10218-2:2025 for manipulators and their applications, and the collaborative-contact limit values that ISO 10218-2:2025 absorbed from ISO/TS 15066:2016. Those regimes share a discipline this Protocol borrows: a safety function is tested at the edge of what the manufacturer declares — maximum speed, maximum payload, maximum slope, worst floor, the smallest object the sensors are claimed to see, the darkest light they are claimed to work in — and a result at one configuration says nothing about another. The intrinsic protocol witnesses that each declared safety function exists and acts; this Protocol witnesses that it still acts where the declaration says it will.
The steps are few because the intrinsic protocol already carries most of the industrial story. What remains is envelope-limit repetition, detection at the declared conditions, collaborative contact done properly per body region in the tooled and loaded configuration, the question of who may reset, and throughput measured under load rather than as a best-case burst.
1 Scope
This Protocol specifies the Industrial-sector demonstration steps by which the criteria of VRS-IND-201 Clause 6 are demonstrated at the Certified tier, for every application class of VRS-IND-201 §7.3 (mobile, manipulator, legged-other). It applies to every Certified Industrial assessment, by every Certified route of VRS-GEN-003 §6.9.
It specifies: how this Protocol relates to VRS-GEN-203 (Clause 4); the envelope the manufacturer declares before the session and against which every apparatus is sized (Clause 5); the steps (Clause 6); and a worked example (Clause 7). Annex A maps every VRS-IND-201 criterion to its intrinsic steps, its sector steps, or neither.
It does not: repeat any session requirement, step, marking rule or record rule of VRS-GEN-203, all of which apply unchanged; define any criterion, point, ceiling or ladder (VRS-IND-201); define the Industrial information pack (VRS-GEN-013); or reproduce the measurement methodology of ISO 13855:2024 or the body-region limit values of ISO 10218-2:2025, which it cites through VRS-IND-101 and VRS-IND-102. Destructive contact, contact with a person and long-duration duty are excluded by construction.
2 Normative references
- VRS-GEN-203, Demonstration Protocol — Intrinsic — session requirements (Clause 4), step rules (Clause 5), marks and scores (Clause 7), Session Record (Clause 8), all of which apply to this Protocol.
- VRS-IND-201, Industrial — Application Rating Protocol — the criteria whose Certified rows this Protocol serves; application classes (§7.3).
- VRS-IND-001, Industrial — Sector Standard — the declared envelope and class fields.
- VRS-IND-101, Industrial — Detection and Safe-Stop Evidence Protocol — stopping-performance methodology and apparatus.
- VRS-IND-102, Industrial — Collaborative-Application Contact Evidence Protocol — body-region taxonomy, contact types and configuration rule.
- VRS-GEN-101, Safety — the intrinsic safety criteria the Industrial pool contributes to.
- VRS-GEN-003, Governance Charter and Independence — Certified routes and route parity (§6.9).
3 Terms and definitions
Terms defined in VRS-GEN-001 and VRS-GEN-203 apply. In addition:
3.1 envelope limit — the maximum (or worst) value of a declared operating parameter — speed, payload, slope, floor or travel surface, ambient illuminance, minimum detectable object — as stated in the information pack for the assessed application class.
3.2 application class — mobile, manipulator or legged-other, per VRS-IND-201 §7.3; a model may be assessed in more than one class, in which case class-specific steps run once per class.
3.3 switching field — a configured protective-field set that the robot selects according to speed, zone or task; a robot may have several.
3.4 ambient-light boundary — the declared lowest (and, where declared, highest) illuminance at which the declared detection performance holds.
3.5 reachable body-region class — a body-region class of the anchor regime’s taxonomy (VRS-IND-102 §4.3) that the assessed application, in its tooled and loaded configuration, can contact; which classes are reachable is a declared field.
3.6 protective separation distance — the declared minimum distance between robot and an approaching object at which the speed-and-separation function guarantees a stop before contact.
3.7 authorised reset — the declared role, device or position from which a protective stop may be reset; any other reset attempt is unauthorised.
3.8 reference floor — the manufacturer’s declared nominal travel surface, distinct from the declared worst floor (3.1).
4 Relationship to the intrinsic protocol
4.1 This Protocol shall be run only as part of a session under VRS-GEN-203. Every requirement of VRS-GEN-203 Clause 4 (one camera, session code, pre-supplied script, live feed, native export, stock-standard unit, apparatus per claim, nothing on a person, version proof) applies to every step here without repetition or exception.
4.2 Position in the session. The steps of Clause 6 shall run after VRS-GEN-203 Part E and before VRS-GEN-203 Part F, so that one continuous recording and one export cover both protocols. The endurance sample opened in VRS-GEN-203 Part C continues to run through this Protocol.
4.3 Step identifiers. Steps shall carry identifiers of the form IND-110.nn; they are Session Record
step identifiers under the same rules as VRS-GEN-203 §5.1 and shall never be reused.
4.4 Required by. Every step shall name the VRS-IND-201 subclause(s) whose Certified row it serves. VRS-IND-201 carries no reference back to this Protocol.
4.5 Classes and declared subjects. Each step lists the application classes it applies to. A step whose class is not in the assessed envelope shall not be run. A step whose subject the manufacturer has not declared — a collaborative mode, an optical sensing path, a slope capability — shall be marked not declared and has no effect on any score (VRS-GEN-203 §3.10). At least one step of Part 1 and one of Part 2 shall be run for every Industrial Certified assessment.
4.6 Bound. The sum of step bounds for one class shall not exceed 120 min. Marks, failure, declined steps, continuation sessions and the Session Record follow VRS-GEN-203 Clauses 5, 7 and 8.
4.7 Criteria witnessed by intrinsic steps. Where an Industrial criterion’s Certified row is already witnessed by one or more intrinsic steps, Annex A names them and the criterion is scored from those marks together with any sector steps listed. VRS-IND-201 §6.1 (anchor-regime conformity) has no step of its own: its Certified row is confirmed by the marks of the envelope-limit and detection steps of Parts 1 to 3, which are the anchor regimes’ own validation tests witnessed live.
4.8 Admissibility of a mark. A step’s mark shall be inadmissible, and the step shall be marked not achieved, where the apparatus dimension, mass, slope or illuminance it depends on was not shown on camera, or where the configuration demonstrated differs from the assessed one (a bare arm for a tooled application, an unladen run for a laden limit). The observer shall record the ground.
4.9 Absorption of the earlier evidence protocols. The witnessed content formerly scored under VRS-IND-101 (detection and safe-stop at the envelope limits) and VRS-IND-102 (collaborative contact per body region) is carried by Parts 1 to 3 of this Protocol. Those two documents remain the method and apparatus references cited here; they award no points of their own.
5 The declared envelope
5.1 Before the session the manufacturer shall have declared, in the information pack and per assessed application class: maximum speed (m/s) on the reference floor, on the declared worst floor and on the declared maximum slope; maximum payload (kg); maximum slope (degrees or %); the worst floor or travel surface; the minimum detectable object size (mm) and minimum object height (mm); the worst approach direction; the ambient-light boundary (lux); each configured protective-field set and its boundary distances (m); the declared stopping distance (m) for each of the conditions in Part 1; whether a collaborative mode is declared and, if so, which of power-and-force limiting and speed-and-separation monitoring, the tool and workpiece of the assessed configuration, the reachable body-region classes, and the declared protective separation distance and approach speed; the authorised reset means; and the representative task with its declared throughput and cycle count.
5.2 Every apparatus in Clause 6 shall be sized from those declarations and no other source (VRS-GEN-203 §4.7). A parameter not declared makes the steps that depend on it not declared (4.5); a manufacturer that declares a smaller envelope demonstrates a smaller envelope and is scored against it under VRS-IND-201.
5.3 The declared envelope shall match the one recorded for the rating (VRS-IND-001 §4.4, VRS-GEN-009); a step demonstrated at a value other than the declared one shall be inadmissible (4.8).
6 The steps
Columns: ID — Session Record step identifier · Step — outcome to witness · Classes — application classes the step applies to (4.5) · Witness — means (VRS-GEN-203 §3.13) · Apparatus — manufacturer-supplied, at declared value · Bound — minutes · Required by — VRS-IND-201 subclause(s) served.
6.1 Part 1 — Protective stops at the envelope limits
Each stop is measured against marks set at the manufacturer’s declared stopping distance for that condition, following the stopping-performance methodology that VRS-IND-101 cites (ISO 13855:2024). Limits, not nominal conditions.
| ID | Step | Classes | Witness | Apparatus | Bound | Required by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IND-110.01 | Protective stop at declared maximum speed. Unladen, at the declared maximum speed on the reference floor, a test obstacle of the declared minimum detectable size enters the protective field; the robot stops before contact and within the floor marks set at the declared stopping distance; the feed shows the stop state and its trigger. | mobile · legged-other | CAM+FEED+APP | Test obstacle of the declared minimum detectable size; floor marks at the declared stopping distance | 8 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.2; §6.1 |
| IND-110.02 | Protective stop at declared maximum payload. As the previous step, carrying the declared maximum payload (mass shown on camera); for a manipulator, a safeguard stop at the declared maximum tool-centre-point speed with the declared maximum payload, the stopping position shown against a marked reference. | all | CAM+FEED+APP | Load of the declared maximum mass; floor or reference marks at the declared stopping distance | 8 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.2; §6.1 |
| IND-110.03 | Protective stop on declared maximum slope. Laden at the declared maximum payload, descending and then ascending the declared maximum slope at the declared maximum speed for that slope, a protective stop is triggered; the robot stops within marks placed on the ramp at the declared stopping distance and holds without rolling back. | mobile · legged-other | CAM+FEED+APP | Ramp at the declared maximum slope with the slope shown on camera; marks at the declared stopping distance | 10 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.2; §6.1 |
| IND-110.04 | Protective stop on declared worst floor. Laden, at the declared maximum speed for that surface, on a sample of the declared worst floor or travel surface (wet, polished, grating, gravel as declared), a protective stop is triggered and the robot stops within the marks set at the declared stopping distance for that surface. | mobile · legged-other | CAM+FEED+APP | Sample of the declared worst floor large enough for the stopping distance; marks | 8 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.2; §6.1 |
6.2 Part 2 — Detection at the declared conditions
Detection is witnessed at the conditions the declared envelope names: each configured field, the declared ambient-light boundary, the declared worst approach geometry and minimum object height.
| ID | Step | Classes | Witness | Apparatus | Bound | Required by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IND-110.05 | Switching-field transitions. For each configured protective-field set, an obstacle placed at that field’s boundary is detected when the field is the active one and not while a smaller field is active; the feed shows the active field set change with speed or zone. | mobile | CAM+FEED+APP | Obstacle; boundary marks for each configured field | 8 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.3; §6.1 |
| IND-110.06 | Detection at the declared ambient-light boundary. At the declared lowest ambient illuminance (and the declared highest, where declared), the declared-size obstacle entering the protective field at the declared maximum speed is detected and the robot stops before contact; illuminance is shown on the manufacturer’s own light meter on camera. | all | CAM+FEED+APP | Lighting condition at the declared boundary; the manufacturer’s light meter | 10 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.3; §6.5; §6.1 — Run where the declared sensing is optical |
| IND-110.07 | Worst-case approach geometry. An obstacle of the declared minimum height approaches from the declared worst direction (side or diagonal) at the declared maximum speed; the robot stops before contact; a second pass with the obstacle stationary in the path at the minimum height. | mobile · legged-other | CAM+FEED+APP | Low-profile obstacle at the declared minimum height; side approach path marked | 8 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.3; §6.1 |
6.3 Part 3 — Collaborative contact and separation
Run only where the manufacturer declares a collaborative mode. Body-region classes and contact types follow the anchor regime’s taxonomy as set out in VRS-IND-102 §4.3; every contact is with a compliant target, never a person.
| ID | Step | Classes | Witness | Apparatus | Bound | Required by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IND-110.08 | Quasi-static contact per declared reachable body-region class. In the assessed tooled and loaded configuration at the declared collaborative speed, the robot clamps a compliant target positioned at the height of each declared reachable body-region class; the manufacturer’s force and pressure readings are shown on camera against the anchor limit for that region and contact type. | manipulator · mobile | CAM+FEED+APP | Compliant target with the manufacturer’s force/pressure instrument; the declared tool and workpiece; region heights marked — never a person | 12 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.4; §6.1 — Run where power-and-force limiting is declared |
| IND-110.09 | Transient contact per declared reachable body-region class. In the same configuration, a free-space impact into the compliant target at the declared maximum collaborative speed for each declared reachable region; peak force and pressure shown against the anchor limit for transient contact; regions where clamping is not permitted are shown to be unreachable or eliminated by design. | manipulator · mobile | CAM+FEED+APP | As the previous step | 12 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.4; §6.1 — Run where power-and-force limiting is declared |
| IND-110.10 | Protective separation distance. An obstacle on a trolley approaches along a marked path at the declared approach speed; the robot reduces speed and stops so that the separation never falls below the declared protective separation distance, including the stopping contribution of the monitored-stop function; the feed shows the separation-monitoring state. | manipulator · mobile | CAM+FEED+APP | Obstacle on a trolley; path marked at the declared separation distances | 10 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.4; §6.1 — Run where speed-and-separation monitoring is declared |
6.4 Part 4 — Reset authority
Extends the intrinsic restart-interlock step by testing who may reset, not only that a reset is required.
| ID | Step | Classes | Witness | Apparatus | Bound | Required by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IND-110.11 | Unauthorised reset refused. After a protective stop, a reset is attempted without the declared authority (from an operator role, without the key or enabling device, or from a location other than the declared reset position) and is refused; the declared authorised reset then succeeds; both events appear on the feed. | all | CAM+FEED | The declared reset means | 5 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.6 |
6.5 Part 5 — Throughput under industrial duty
Extends the intrinsic cycle-time step by running the task loaded, for long enough to expose duty-cycle behaviour rather than a best-case burst.
| ID | Step | Classes | Witness | Apparatus | Bound | Required by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IND-110.12 | Sustained throughput at declared maximum payload. The declared representative task is run at the declared maximum payload for the declared cycle count (not fewer than twenty) or 20 min, whichever comes first; the cycle count is taken from the feed and the time from the video and compared with the declared throughput. | all | CAM+FEED+APP | Task set-up as declared; load of the declared maximum mass | 20 min | Required by VRS-IND-201 §6.7 |
6.6 Timing budget. All twelve steps sum to 119 min. Per class, with every applicable step declared: mobile 119 min (85 min without a collaborative mode) · manipulator 77 min (43 min without a collaborative mode) · legged-other 77 min. Every class is within the 120 min bound of 4.6; a model assessed in two classes runs the class-specific steps once per class and the shared steps once.
7 Worked example (informative)
A manufacturer of a hypothetical autonomous forklift-class mobile robot (class: mobile, no collaborative mode) declares: 2.0 m/s maximum speed on the reference floor, 1.2 m/s on the worst floor (wet sealed concrete) and 1.0 m/s on the maximum slope of 6 %; 1 200 kg maximum payload; a minimum detectable object of 70 mm diameter at 200 mm height from the side; an ambient-light boundary of 5 lux; two protective-field sets switching at 0.8 m/s with boundaries at 1.2 m and 2.6 m; declared stopping distances of 1.1 m, 1.4 m and 1.6 m for the reference floor, worst floor and slope; reset authorised from the supervisor role on the HMI only; a representative task of 18 pallet moves per hour at full load.
After VRS-GEN-203 Part E closes at 12:40 the sector steps begin. IND-110.01: unladen at 2.0 m/s, the 70 mm cylinder enters the field and the robot stops 0.9 m short of the mark at 1.1 m (achieved). IND-110.02: with a 1 200 kg pallet shown on the manufacturer’s floor scale, stop at 1.05 m (achieved). IND-110.03: on the 6 % ramp, marked and shown with an inclinometer on camera, descending stop within the 1.6 m mark and no roll-back; ascending stop and hold (achieved). IND-110.04: on the wetted concrete panel at 1.2 m/s, stop at 1.3 m against a 1.4 m mark (achieved). IND-110.05: at 0.6 m/s the obstacle at 2.0 m is ignored and at 1.1 m detected; at 1.5 m/s the obstacle at 2.0 m is detected; the feed shows the field-set change (achieved). IND-110.06: hall lights off, 4 lux on the manufacturer’s meter on camera, detection and stop at 2.0 m/s (achieved). IND-110.07: the 200 mm-high obstacle from the side at 2.0 m/s, stop before contact; stationary low obstacle detected (achieved with note: stop at 1.15 m, marginally past the 1.1 m mark, recorded for the reviewer). IND-110.08 to IND-110.10: not declared. IND-110.11: reset attempted from the operator login, refused; supervisor login, reset accepted; both on the feed (achieved). IND-110.12: loaded pallet moves for 20 min, 7 cycles from the feed counter against a declared 18 per hour (achieved). Sector time 71 min; VRS-GEN-203 Part F follows.
The reviewer scores VRS-IND-201 §6.2 from IND-110.01 to IND-110.04 together with GEN-203.12; §6.3 from IND-110.05 to IND-110.07 together with GEN-203.09, reading the note on IND-110.07 against the §6.3 ladder; §6.1 is confirmed by those marks; §6.4 is not declared and is removed from the pool for this class under VRS-IND-201 §7.3; §6.6 from GEN-203.08 and IND-110.11; §6.7 from GEN-203.24 and IND-110.12. No number in this example is a requirement; every apparatus value came from the manufacturer’s own declaration.
Annex A (normative) — Criterion coverage
Every criterion of VRS-IND-201 Clause 6 appears once with the intrinsic steps (VRS-GEN-203) and the sector steps (this Protocol) that witness it, or the statement that it has none.
| Criterion | Subclause | Witnessed by |
|---|---|---|
| IND-1 Anchor-regime conformity | VRS-IND-201 §6.1 | no step of its own — confirmed by the marks of IND-110.01, IND-110.02, IND-110.03, IND-110.04, IND-110.05, IND-110.06, IND-110.07, IND-110.08, IND-110.09, IND-110.10 (Clause 4.7) |
| IND-2 Protective stop at envelope limits | VRS-IND-201 §6.2 | intrinsic GEN-203.12; sector IND-110.01, IND-110.02, IND-110.03, IND-110.04 |
| IND-3 Human/obstacle detection at declared conditions | VRS-IND-201 §6.3 | intrinsic GEN-203.09; sector IND-110.05, IND-110.06, IND-110.07 |
| IND-4 Collaborative operation controls | VRS-IND-201 §6.4 | intrinsic GEN-203.10, GEN-203.11; sector IND-110.08, IND-110.09, IND-110.10 |
| IND-5 Degraded-sensing behaviour | VRS-IND-201 §6.5 | intrinsic GEN-203.14; sector IND-110.06 |
| IND-6 Restart and interlock discipline | VRS-IND-201 §6.6 | intrinsic GEN-203.08; sector IND-110.11 |
| IND-7 Industrial duty-cycle throughput | VRS-IND-201 §6.7 | intrinsic GEN-203.24; sector IND-110.12 |
| IND-8 Fault recovery and repair in industrial duty | VRS-IND-201 §6.8 | intrinsic GEN-203.28, GEN-203.29, GEN-203.30 |
| IND-9 Fleet network exposure controls | VRS-IND-201 §6.9 | intrinsic GEN-203.33, GEN-203.35, GEN-203.36 |
| IND-10 Industrial-context field record | VRS-IND-201 §6.10 | no step — scored at the Certified tier from the Verified evidence (the criterion’s Certified row reads “No demonstration step”) |
Bibliography
- ISO 3691-4:2023, Industrial trucks — Safety requirements and verification — Part 4: Driverless industrial trucks and their systems.
- ISO 10218-1:2025, Robotics — Safety requirements — Part 1: Industrial robots.
- ISO 10218-2:2025, Robotics — Safety requirements — Part 2: Industrial robot applications and robot cells (collaborative-contact limit values, formerly ISO/TS 15066:2016).
- ISO/TS 15066:2016, Robots and robotic devices — Collaborative robots.
- ISO 13855:2024, Safety of machinery — Positioning of safeguards with respect to the approach of the human body (stopping-performance methodology cited via VRS-IND-101).
- ISO 13849-1:2023, Safety of machinery — Safety-related parts of control systems — Part 1: General principles for design.
- IEC 62061:2021, Safety of machinery — Functional safety of safety-related control systems.
- ANSI/ITSDF B56.5-2019, Safety Standard for Driverless, Automatic Guided Industrial Vehicles and Automated Functions of Manned Industrial Vehicles.
- ANSI/A3 R15.08-1-2020, Safety Requirements for Industrial Mobile Robots — Part 1.
Change history
| Date | Version | Status | Change | Authority |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-09-16 | 1.0.0 (draft) | Draft | Created for the VRS 2026 edition (rewrite Batch D; first sector demonstration protocol). Twelve steps in five Parts extending VRS-GEN-203 for the Industrial criteria of VRS-IND-201: envelope-limit protective stops, detection at declared conditions, collaborative contact per reachable body-region class, reset authority, throughput under load. Absorbs the witnessed content of VRS-IND-101 and VRS-IND-102 (which remain method and apparatus references). Annex A covers all ten Industrial criteria. | Rewrite instructions §6 (VRS-XXX-110); demonstrability catalogue §H Industrial emphasis; CEO ruling 2026-09-15 that standards carry no catalogue identifiers |