JPH10226423A - Article feeder and article attraction hand used therein - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an article feeder for taking works out of pallets in a shortened cycle time, and an article attraction hand used in the feeder. SOLUTION: An article feeder involves a work-number detector means for detecting the number of works attracted by an electromagnet 13, and a memory means for storing the number of attracted works for every area in a pallet during the preceding guide of the electromagnet on the basis of information from the detector means. The feeder reads information out of the memory means and accordingly selects areas where two or more works were attracted during the preceding guide to newly guide a hand 30 provided with the electromagnet.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an article supply system for taking out a work randomly placed in a pallet and supplying the work to an aligning machine or the like. The present invention relates to an article suction hand to be used.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, in order to save labor and improve production efficiency, an automobile supply line has been provided with an article supply device which takes out a work from a pallet which is randomly placed and supplies the work to an aligning machine. Have been.

[0003] As an apparatus for supplying this kind of articles, an apparatus for adsorbing a work using an electromagnet (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 63-26763,
For example, as shown in FIG. 5, the pallet 4 is divided into small areas, the electromagnets are sequentially guided to areas 1 to n by an area selection signal, and this is repeated.

When a large number of works are loaded into the pallet 4, the operation is performed as described with reference to FIG. 5 at first, and when the number of works is reduced, the bottom of the pallet 4 is exposed as shown in FIG. Others have been proposed.

[0005]

However, in the method shown in FIG. 5, when the number of works in the pallet is small, the probability of taking out the works is extremely reduced. Therefore, such an article supply apparatus is introduced into a production line having a short cycle time. Then, there is a problem that the cycle time required for taking out the workpiece exceeds the cycle time of the production line, and a line stop occurs.

If the work is sucked by the method shown in FIG. 6 when the number of works in the pallet is reduced, the probability that the work can be sucked surely increases. However, since a series of operating speeds for exposing the bottom of the pallet cannot be increased, the cycle time required for taking out the work becomes longer, possibly exceeding the cycle time of the production line.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned problems of the prior art, and has as its object to provide an article supply apparatus capable of shortening a work takeout cycle time and an article suction hand used for the apparatus. And

[0008]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an article supply apparatus comprising: a pallet into which a plurality of magnetic articles are placed; In an article supply device for guiding a provided hand to the area to suck the work and supply the work to a target position, a work number detecting means for detecting the number of works sucked by the electromagnet; Storage means for storing, for each area, the number of works sucked at the time of previous guidance based on information from the work number detection means; reading information stored in the storage means; Control means for selecting at least two areas and guiding the hand.

In the article supply apparatus according to the first aspect, when many works remain in the pallet, the hands are sequentially guided to each area, and are suctioned by the electromagnet and supplied to a target position. . At this time, the number of sucked works is detected for each area by the work number detecting means, and is stored in the storage means for each area.

When the number of works previously suctioned in a certain area is 0 or 1, no work remains even if the hand is guided to the area next time. Will not be able to.

According to the present invention, from the above viewpoint, when guiding the hand next time, the information stored in the storage means is read out, and the area where the number of works sucked at the previous guidance is two or more is selected. Guide the hand there. That is,
The area where the number of works sucked during the previous guidance is 0 or 1 is jumped. In this case, since the work is always present in the guided area (at least one), the work suction probability is significantly improved, and the cycle time can be shortened. Also, if this process is repeated, the area to which only one object was picked up in the previous time jumps, so that there is always a work in the similarly guided area.

In the article supply apparatus according to the first aspect, the specific structure of the work number detecting means for detecting the number of the works attracted to the electromagnet is not particularly limited. , The work number detecting means,
The number of works is detected based on the weight of the work attracted to the electromagnet. If the weight of the work is used without using a visual device such as a camera, the number of suctions can be easily detected.

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an article-sucking hand according to a third aspect of the present invention, wherein the hand body extends in a substantially vertical direction, and has a lower end provided with an electromagnet; A bracket that supports the hand body, and an elastic body that is provided between the bracket and the hand body and applies an elastic force in a substantially vertical upward direction to the hand body so that the hand body can move in the direction. A sensor provided on the bracket for detecting a movement position of the hand body.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, when the workpiece is attracted to the electromagnet, the hand body moves vertically downward against the elastic force of the elastic body. Since the amount of movement is correlated with the number of sucked works, the number of works can be easily detected by detecting the movement position of the hand body with a sensor.

[0015]

According to the article supply apparatus of the first aspect,
Since the area where the number of works sucked at the previous guidance is 0 or 1 is jumped, the work suction probability is significantly improved, and the cycle time can be shortened. Therefore, it can be introduced to a production line with a short cycle time.

Further, since the remaining state of the work in the pallet can be grasped, there is no work remaining on the pallet until the end. In addition, since the magnetic force of the electromagnet can be increased to some extent, even if the moving speed of the hand is increased, the work does not drop.

According to the article supply device of the second aspect, since the weight of the work is used, the number of suctions can be easily detected without using a visual device such as a camera, and the failure rate is reduced and the cost is reduced. Down can be planned.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, the movement position of the hand main body is detected by the sensor by utilizing the fact that the movement amount of the hand main body is correlated with the number of sucked works. Number can be detected. Further, since a simple structure is sufficient, the failure rate can be reduced and the cost can be reduced.

[0019]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. 1 and 2 are front views showing an embodiment of an article suction device used in the article supply apparatus of the present invention, and FIG. 3 is an overall perspective view showing an embodiment of the article supply apparatus of the present invention.

As shown in FIG. 3, the article supply apparatus according to the present embodiment can be applied to, for example, a work for taking out a work from a pallet. The work is supplied to the alignment device 6 mounted on the table 5. A large number of similar workpieces are randomly placed on the pallet 4, and the workpieces are made of a magnetic material such as a steel plate pressed part.

The hand 30 having the electromagnet 13 attached to the tip is attached to the three-axis loader 1 as shown in FIG. 3, and the hand 30 is moved by the X-axis loader 1x, the Y-axis loader 1y, and the Z-axis loader 1z. Pallet 4 and alignment device 6
You can move to the area. This hand 30
Is executed by a command signal from the control device 2 built in the control panel / operation panel 7.

The suction hand 30 used in the present embodiment
As shown in FIG. 1, a hand body 14 extending in a substantially vertical direction and having an electromagnet 13 at a lower end, and a bracket for supporting the hand body 14 so that the hand body 14 can be moved in a substantially vertical direction. 15, a spring (elastic body) 11 provided between the bracket 15 and the hand body 14 for applying a substantially vertical upward elastic force to the hand body 14, and a moving position of the hand body 14 provided on the bracket 15. Is provided with three proximity sensors 8, 9, and 10.

The hand main body 14 is inserted into the bracket 15 and is fixed to the bracket 15 via the bush 12. The bush 12 allows the hand main body 14 to move substantially in the vertical direction. Thereby, the electromagnet 13
When the work is attracted to the hand body 14 as shown in FIG.
Moves down. The moving amount is determined by the number of works.

The bracket 15 is used to fix the hand 30 to the Z-axis loader 1z shown in FIG. 3, and simultaneously fixes the three proximity sensors 8, 9, and 10. The spring 11 returns the hand body 14 to the top dead center when no work is attracted to the electromagnet 13 attached to the lower end of the hand body 14. When the work is attracted to the electromagnet, Due to its weight, the hand body 14 overcomes the elastic force of the spring 11 and moves downward.

The three proximity sensors 8, 9 and 10 are provided to detect the number of works attracted to the electromagnet 13, and the proximity sensor 8 at the upper part is provided when the electromagnet 13 is not attracted. The proximity sensor 9 detects when the electromagnet 13 is attracting one work, and the lower proximity sensor 10 detects when the electromagnet 13 is attracting two or more works. Actually, the detection signal is output based on the position of the flange 14a at the upper end of the hand body 14. This configuration constitutes the work number detecting means of the present invention.

The output signals from the three proximity sensors 8, 9, 10 are sent to the control device 2 shown in FIG. 3 and processed there. That is, the control means of the present invention is programmed in the control device 2. Further, the storage device of the present invention, that is, a memory, is provided in the control device 2, and stores the determined number of works for each area.

Next, the operation will be described. FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing an information processing procedure executed in the control means.
First, the control means controls the pallet 4 on which the work is loaded.
Is divided into a plurality of areas (the areas are referred to as 1 to n), and the three-axis loader 1 is operated to move the hand 30 sequentially to each area. This is sequentially repeated (step 1). Step 1 represents the (m-2) th operation.

In the next (m-1) -th order, the hand 30 is moved to each of the areas 1 to n to suck the work and supply it to the aligning device 6 in the same manner as described above (step 2). At this time, the output signals of the proximity sensors 8, 9, and 10 are fetched, and the number of works sucked for each area is stored in the storage means (step 3). An example of the format of the stored data is shown in step 3 of FIG.

When all areas 1 to n are picked up for work in step 4, the operation proceeds to the next m-th order operation.
At this time, the coordinate data stored in the previous operation is called (step 5), and the number of magnetized areas is checked (step 6). As a result, when the number of magnetizations is two or more, the hand 30 is guided to the area (step 7), but when the number of magnetizations is zero or one, the hand 30 is not guided to the area (step 7). Step 8). In the area induced because the number of magnetized pieces is two or more, the number of attracted works is stored in the storage means in the same manner as the operation in step 3 (step 9). An example of the format of the stored data is shown in step 9 of FIG.

When all the areas selected in step 7 are picked up (step 10), step 9
Recall the coordinate data stored in (1)
1) Check the number of magnetized areas in each area (Step 1)
2). As a result, when the number of magnetized pieces is two or more, the hand 30 is guided to the area (step 13). When the number of magnetized pieces is zero or one, the hand 30 is included in the area.
0 is not induced (step 14).

When all the areas selected in step 13 have been picked up for work (step 15), an instruction to replace the pallet 4 is issued, and the process proceeds to the next article supply operation (step 16).

As described above, according to the article supply apparatus of the present embodiment, even if the number of works in the pallet 4 decreases, the position of the work remaining in the pallet can be determined. The cycle time required for supply does not increase even if the amount of water decreases. Also, there is no work remaining in the pallet 4. In terms of the device configuration, since expensive and precision machines such as cameras are not used, the failure probability is low and the cost is low.

The embodiments described above are described for the purpose of facilitating the understanding of the present invention, but are not described for limiting the present invention. Therefore, each element disclosed in the above embodiment is intended to include all design changes and equivalents belonging to the technical scope of the present invention.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a front view showing an embodiment of a suction hand according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a front view showing an embodiment of the suction hand of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view showing an embodiment of the article supply device of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart illustrating the operation of the article supply device of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view for explaining a conventional article supply device.

FIG. 6 is a perspective view for explaining a conventional article supply device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... 3-axis loader 2 ... Control device (control means, storage means) 4 ... Pallet 6 ... Alignment device (target position) 30 ... Hand 8, 9, 10 ... Proximity sensor 11 ... Spring (elastic body) 13 ... Electromagnet 14 ... Hand body 15 ... Bracket

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A pallet loaded with a plurality of magnetic articles is divided into a plurality of areas, a hand provided with an electromagnet is guided to the area, the work is sucked, and the work is supplied to a target position. A work number detecting means for detecting the number of works sucked by the electromagnet; and storing the number of works sucked at the previous guidance for each area based on information from the work number detecting means. A storage unit, reading information stored in the storage unit, selecting an area in which the number of works sucked at the time of previous guidance is two or more,
An article supply device, comprising: control means for guiding the hand. 2. The article supply device according to claim 1, wherein said work number detecting means detects the number of works based on a weight of the work attracted to said electromagnet. 3. A hand body extending in a substantially vertical direction and having an electromagnet at a lower end, and a hand body being movable in a substantially vertical direction.
A bracket that supports the hand body, an elastic body that is provided between the bracket and the hand body, and that applies an elastic force in a substantially vertical upward direction to the hand body; An article suction hand comprising a sensor for detecting a movement position.