JPH05229425A - Unmanned carrier car - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To make it possible to run even on a depressed ground by installing casters to the front and the rear, respectively, of a car body, and attaching one of these casters to a swing arm, and elastically supporting the swing arm rockably in vertical direction to the car body. CONSTITUTION:When an unmanned carrier car 1 runs on the depressed place of ground GL, a first swing arm 13 rocks up and down with a pin 14 as a fulcrum, and presses wheels 3a and 3b against the ground, so it never turns out that the wheels 3a and 3b idle and become unable to run as before. Moreover, even in case that it runs on such place that the ground inclines in car width direction, it turns out that first and third swing arms 15 and 17 incline, corresponding to the inclination of the ground GL, so the inclination of the car body can be prevented.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to an automated guided vehicle.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, as shown in FIG. 6, an automated guided vehicle c may be used when carrying an object b to be carried placed on a pallet a. The automatic guided vehicle c has a loading platform d that can be moved up and down at the rear part of the vehicle body. The unmanned guided vehicle c is moved under the pallet a to lift up the transported object b and then travel along the guideway e. It has become. In such a vehicle, it is common to install one drive wheel f on the front part of the vehicle body as shown in FIG. 5 and install a plurality of pairs of left and right driven wheels g on the rear part of the vehicle body. Then, the driving wheel f is swung to the left and right to make a turn.

However, such an automatic guided vehicle c has a drawback that the minimum turning radius is large (0.8 to 0.9 times the total length) and a large traveling space is required. Therefore, the applicant first installs a pair of left and right drive wheels h in the central portion of the vehicle body as shown in FIG. 4, and an unmanned guided vehicle j in which a pair of left and right casters i is installed in the front and rear portions of the vehicle body first. Proposed. When the left and right drive wheels h are reversed, the automated guided vehicle j makes a turn (a so-called spin turn) around a midpoint between the drive wheels.

[0004]

However, when such an automatic guided vehicle j travels in a place where the ground is depressed,
As shown in FIG. 4, the drive wheel h floats from the ground and spins around, thus making it impossible to drive.

The present invention is intended to solve such a problem, and an object thereof is to provide an automatic guided vehicle which can travel even when the ground is depressed.

[0006]

According to the present invention for solving the above-mentioned problems, right and left independent drive type wheels are installed in a central part of a vehicle body, and casters are installed in front and rear parts of the vehicle body, respectively. One of the casters is attached to a swing arm, and the swing arm is elastically supported on the vehicle body so as to be vertically swingable.

[0007]

1 and 2 show an automatic guided vehicle according to the present invention. The automatic guided vehicle 1 has a pair of motors 2a and 2b mounted on the left and right sides of the front part of the vehicle body. A pair of left and right wheels 3a and 3b are installed in the center of the vehicle body.
Reference characters a and 3b are connected to motors 2a and 2b via drive shafts 4a and 4b, respectively. A pair of left and right casters 5a, 5b are installed on the front part of the vehicle body,
In addition, a pair of left and right casters 6a, 6b is also provided at the rear of the vehicle body.
Is installed. The rear casters 6a and 6b are attached to both ends of a swing arm (third swing arm) 7, and the center of the arm 7 is pivotally connected to the vehicle body by a pin 8. That is, the left and right casters 6a and 6b swing up and down with the pin 8 as a fulcrum.

FIG. 3 shows a suspension mechanism for the front casters 5a and 5b. Two cross members 10, 11 are provided between the left and right body frames 9a, 9b,
A pair of left and right brackets 12 are fixed to the upper surface of the rear cross member 11 (see FIG. 2). The bracket 1
A rear end of a swing arm (first swing arm) 13 arranged in the front-rear direction is pivotally connected to 2 by a pin 14. Further, at the front end of the swing arm 13, the center of a swing arm (second swing arm) 15 arranged in the width direction of the vehicle body is pivotally connected by a pin 16, and both ends of the swing arm 15 have front portions. Casters 5a and 5b are attached. The swing arm 13 is biased downward by a pair of springs 17, 17 arranged on the left and right sides of the swing arm 13. The urging mechanism includes a front cross member 10
And one end of the rod 18 is connected to the bracket 18 through a ball joint 19, the rod 18 is passed through the bracket portion 13a of the swing arm 13, and the spring 17 is provided with spring retainers 20 at both ends thereof and is passed through the rod 18. The nut 21 is screwed into the rod 18 and the spring 1
It has a compressed structure of 7. A guide sensor 22 for detecting a magnetic tape installed on the ground GL is provided on the lower surface of the swing arm 13, and the clearance with the ground GL is set to about 25 mm. When loading luggage, the front casters 5a and 5b are 0 to 3 mm above the ground GL.
When lifted (see Fig. 1) and no luggage is loaded,
It is preferable to adjust the urging force of the spring 17 so that the rear casters 6a and 6b are lifted 3 to 6 mm above the ground GL. The front end of the loading platform 23 is directly coupled to the actuator 24, and the rear end of the loading platform 23 is linked to the actuator 24 via the lift-up mechanism 25 so that the loading platform 23 can be moved up and down.

Now, when the automated guided vehicle 1 travels in a recessed portion of the ground GL, the first swing arm 13 swings up and down with the pin 14 as a fulcrum and pushes the wheels 3a and 3b against the ground GL. There is no possibility that the wheels 3a and 3b run idle and cannot run as in the conventional case.

Further, even when the vehicle runs on the ground GL which is tilted in the width direction of the vehicle body, the first and third swing arms 15 and 7 are tilted corresponding to the tilt of the ground GL. Tilt of the vehicle body can be prevented.

Since the guide sensor 22 is installed on the first swing arm 13, the front caster 5
If a and 5b are in contact with the ground, the clearance with the ground will hardly change.

[0012]

According to the present invention, the wheels installed in the center of the vehicle body have a good ground contact property, so that the vehicle can travel even when the ground is depressed.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an automatic guided vehicle of the present invention, which is taken along the line AA in FIG.
It is sectional drawing by a line.

FIG. 2 is a plan view of the automatic guided vehicle.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view showing a suspension mechanism of the automated guided vehicle.

FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating a problem of a conventional automated guided vehicle.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view showing a conventional automated guided vehicle.

FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing a usage mode of the automatic guided vehicle.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Automated guided vehicle 2 Motor 3 Wheel 5 Front caster 6 Rear caster 7 Third swing arm 8 pin 9 Body frame 10,11 Cross member 12 Bracket 13 First swing arm 14 pin 15 Second swing arm 16 pin 17 Spring 18 Rod 19 Ball joint 20 Spring retainer 21 Nut 22 Guide sensor 23 Loading platform

Claims (1)

[Claims] Claims: 1. Left and right independent drive type wheels are installed in the center of the vehicle body, casters are installed in the front and rear portions of the vehicle body, and one of these casters is attached to a swing arm, while the swing arm is attached. An automated guided vehicle characterized in that the vehicle is elastically supported in a vertically swingable manner on the vehicle body.