JPS61219537A - Part mounting device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To enable accurate and reliable detection of a mounting position without using a high sensitive visual sensor, by a method wherein paint is coated on a part mounting position to clear contrast to the surrounding of the position. CONSTITUTION:A coating device 40, coating paint on a mounting position B, is located along the conveying direction of a body A so that a mounting position B for the part of the body A becomes clear. A visual sensor (television camera) 30, detecting a mounting position, on which paint is coated by the coating device 40, is provided. Mounting units 7 and 10, which support mounting parts 6 and 9 at a mounting station 4, have a fastening tool, by which the parts are mounted to the body A, and enables regulation of a position, are provided. As noted above, a paint is coated on the part mounting position B, so that contrast to the surrounding part of the position becomes clear, and this eliminates the use of an especially high sensitive and expensive visual sensor 30. and enables accurate and reliable detection of the mounting position B.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention (Industrial Application Field) The present invention relates to a parts assembling device used, for example, on an automobile assembly line, and in particular, to a part assembling device that uses a visual sensor to align the part to be assembled with respect to the part to be assembled. The present invention relates to a component assembly apparatus configured to perform the assembly process.

(Conventional technology) In recent years, automation of various operations has been promoted in automobile manufacturing plants, but this mainly focuses on welding lines and painting lines for car bodies. The reality is that it is still not fully automated due to the difficulty in aligning the assembly parts (5) and the assembly parts (5).

To deal with this, for example, as shown in Japanese Utility Model Application Publication No. 58-169987, a television camera is used to align the parts to be assembled and the parts to be assembled, thereby automating the assembly work. It is conceivable to make it possible. That is, an assembly position detection station for detecting the assembly position of the part on the car body is provided upstream of an assembly station where the parts are assembled onto the car body that is sent by tact, and the station detects the assembly position of the part on the car body using a television camera. The assembly position is detected, and the positions of the assembly parts and fasteners set at the assembly station are adjusted in accordance with the detected position. According to such a method, when the vehicle body is transported to the assembly station, the positions of the vehicle body, the parts, and the fasteners match, and therefore the parts can be automatically assembled to the vehicle body by the fasteners. becomes possible.

However, in the case where a nut is welded in advance to the part assembly position, the detection of the part assembly position of the vehicle body by the above-mentioned television camera is difficult due to the brightness of the screw hole of this nut and the area around the screw hole. This is done by the television camera recognizing the difference. In other words, the position of the screw hole is detected by the difference in brightness between the screw hole that is in the shadow and the area around the screw hole that is illuminated by light, but this installation position is located on the underside of the vehicle body. In such cases, the above-mentioned difference in brightness is small, and therefore it may be difficult to recognize this difference with a television camera. When such a situation occurs, the part assembly position on the car body is not detected accurately, which causes an error in the position adjustment of the part set at the above-mentioned assembly station, and the parts and the car body are not connected to each other during the assembly work. This may lead to problems such as assembly errors. Further, in order to prevent such a situation, it is possible to use a highly sensitive television camera that can distinguish even small brightness differences, but in this case, there are problems such as high cost and an increase in the size of the camera.

(Object of the Invention) The present invention addresses the above-mentioned problems regarding parts assembling devices installed in automobile assembly lines, particularly parts assembling devices using visual sensors such as television cameras. ,
It is an object of the present invention to accurately and reliably detect a component assembly position provided on a component to be assembled, such as a vehicle body, without using a particularly highly sensitive visual sensor.

(Structure of the Invention) In order to achieve the above object, the present invention is characterized by the following structure.

In other words, in a parts assembly device that detects a part assembly position on a part to be assembled, such as a car body, and adjusts the position of the part to be assembled according to this assembly position, the transport direction of the part to be assembled is along the parts set (t (ffl
a coating device that applies paint to the assembly position so that the shape of the assembly becomes clear; a visual sensor that detects the assembly position to which the paint has been applied by the coating device; and a visual sensor that supports and supports the assembly part. and an assembly unit that has a fastener for assembling it to the part to be assembled and whose position can be adjusted, and the assembly is performed according to the assembly position in the part to be assembled detected by a visual sensor. Equipped with a control device to adjust the position of the unit.

(Effects of the Invention) According to the above configuration, before the work of detecting the part assembly position in the part to be assembled using the visual sensor, paint is applied to the part assembly position and the surrounding area of the part is painted. Since the contrast between the two parts is sharp, the assembly position can be accurately and reliably detected without using a particularly sensitive visual sensor, that is, by using an inexpensive visual sensor. As a result, the assembly unit that supports the assembly parts and has the fasteners is always correctly positioned, and the assembly parts and fasteners are always aligned with the assembled parts with high precision. , thereby preventing assembly errors between the assembly component and the component to be assembled.

(Example) Embodiments of the present invention will be described below based on the drawings.

This embodiment relates to a case where the parts assembling apparatus according to the present invention is applied to an automobile assembly line, particularly to a process of assembling an engine and a suspension to a body.

As shown in FIG. 1, an automobile assembly line 1 includes, from the upstream side, a painting station 2, a position detection station 3,
The body A, which has an assembly station 4 and is suspended on the power and free conveyor 5, is connected to the painting station 2.
, the position detection station 3 and the assembly station 4 in sequence.

6- The assembly station 4 includes a first transfer device w8 that supplies the rear suspension 6 to the first assembly unit 7, and a front assembly 9 consisting of the front suspension 9a, engine 9b, etc. to the second assembly unit 10. It has a second transfer device 11 for supplying.

The first transfer device @8 is composed of upper and lower roller conveyors 12 and 13, and an elevating conveyor 14 installed at the end of these conveyors 12 and 13. Transfer plate 15 by 12
and the rear one-piece pension 6 placed on the plate 15 are supplied to the first silk attachment unit 7, and the second transfer device 11 also supplies the transfer plate 1 in the same way. -16 and the Freon 1 to assembly 9 placed on the plate 16 are assembled into the second assembly unit 10.
It is now being supplied to

Further, the first assembly unit 17 includes a fixing member 18 fixed to the floor 17, an intermediate member 19 provided on the fixing member 18, and an intermediate member 19 provided above the intermediate member on both sides. It has an assembly stand 21 on which a bolt runner 20 is attached. The intermediate member 19 is fitted into the fixed member 18, and is movable by a motor 22 attached to the fixed member 18 in the X direction, that is, in a direction perpendicular to the direction in which the body A is conveyed in a tact, In addition, the above assembly table 21
is attached to one intermediate member 19, and is driven by a motor 23 attached to the intermediate member 19 in the y direction, that is, the body A
are movable in the direction of tact conveyance, and the assembly table 21 is thereby movable in the X and V2 directions. Similarly, the second assembly unit 10 also includes a fixing member 24, an intermediate member 25, and bolt runners 26 on both sides.
26 is attached, and the assembly table 27 is movable in the x and y directions by two motors 28 and 29.

Further, a television camera 30 is installed at the position detection station 3 using a support member 31 so as to view the body A temporarily stopped at the station 3 from below,
A predetermined position on the lower surface of body A is imaged in both directions.

As shown in FIG. 2, a position signal a is sent from this camera 30 to a control device 32, and from this control device 32, the position signal a is sent to the first position signal a at the assembly station 4. Each motor 22, 23.28°29 of the second assembly unit 7.10
A control signal @b is sent to the drive device 33 that controls the.

Furthermore, the coating station 2 is equipped with a coating device 40 as shown in FIGS. 1 and 3. This coating device 40 includes an air cylinder 4 fixed to a support member 41.
2, a paint injection nozzle 43 held movably up and down by the cylinder 42, and a tank 44 in which paint is stored, and is supplied from the tank 44 to the paint injection nozzle 43 via a paint supply hose 45. The paint is sprayed from the tip of the nozzle 43 by air supplied through an air supply hose 46. and,
The paint spray nozzle 43 in the coating device 40 and the television camera 30 are located below a predetermined component assembly position B provided on the body A when the body A stops at the coating station 2 and the position detection station 3, respectively. It is arranged to be located.

Next, the operation of the above embodiment will be explained.

First, at the assembly station 4 of the assembly line 1, the rear suspension 6, which has been transferred together with the transfer plate 15 by the first transfer device 8, is set at a predetermined position on the assembly table 21 in the first assembly unit 7. However,
At this time, each fastening part (bolt insertion hole) of the rear suspension 6 set on the assembly table 21 is connected to the bolt runner 20.
is precisely positioned on the central axis of the bolt drive shaft 20a. Also, the second transfer device 11 transfers the transfer plate 16
The front assembly 9 that has been transferred together is similarly set on the assembly table 27 in the second assembly unit 10 with high precision. On the other hand, at the painting station 2 upstream of the assembly station 4, paint is applied around a predetermined component assembly position B on the body A when the body A is temporarily stopped. Specifically, this coating operation is performed as follows. That is, when the body A stops at the painting stage 2, the air cylinder 42 in the coating device 40 is activated to move the paint injection nozzle 43 upward, and at the same time, the air supply hose 46 from the compressor (not shown) is activated.
Air is supplied to the nozzle 43 through the nozzle 43, and the force of the jet of air causes the paint supplied from the tank 44 to the nozzle 43 via the bow 45 to be jetted upward. In this case, the conveyance of the body A is stopped when the part assembly position B1, that is, the position of the nut D welded to the floor panel A' is located approximately directly above the paint spray nozzle 43 as shown in FIG. Therefore, the paint sprayed upward from the nozzle 43 is applied to the lower surface of the welded nut D on the floor panel A'. At this time, as shown in Fig. 2, the paint is not applied to the hole A n of the floor panel A' corresponding to the screw hole D' of the nut D, and the paint film F is formed only around the hole A n. hand,
The difference in brightness between the hole A n and the surrounding area becomes significant.

When the coating work is completed in this way, the body A is tact-transported from the coating station 2 to the position detection station 3, where the above-mentioned component assembly position B is detected by the television camera 30. In this case, at this assembly position B, the difference in brightness between the hole A H of the floor panel A' corresponding to the screw hole D' of the nut D and the surrounding area is significant, so The assembly position B can be detected accurately and reliably without using a television camera.

Here, the detection of the assembly position B is specifically performed by measuring the X direction and the deviation R in the X direction of the assembly position B from the center of the imaging surface of the television camera 30.

Then, the X-direction and the amount of deviation in the X-direction are input as a position signal a to the control device 32, and after predetermined processing is performed within the device 32, it is sent as a signal to the motor drive device 33, Further, from this motor drive device 33, drive signals indicating the rotation direction and rotation angle of the motor according to the X direction and the amount of deviation in the X direction are sent to the first and second assembly units 7 and 10 shown in FIG. Each motor in 22゜23.28.2
9 respectively. As a result, the first. The assembly bases 21.27 in the second assembly unit 7.10 respectively include the rear suspension 6, the front assembly 9 and the bolt runner 2.
0 and 26, the component assembly position B is moved in the X direction and V direction by an amount corresponding to the deviation amount in the X direction and the X direction. Therefore, when the body A is conveyed to the assembly station 4 and stopped, the assembly position B (the nut D welded to the floor panel A') in the body A is
position), the corresponding fastening part of the assembly part (in the illustrated example, the bolt insertion hole C of the cross member in the front assembly 9), and the bolt drive shaft 26a of the bolt runner 26 coincide. At this time, the other fastening parts in the front assembly 9 and the fastening parts of the rear suspension 6 and the corresponding fastening parts on the body A side all match.

Therefore, each bolt runner 20.26°26 port 1~
On the central axis of the drive shaft will be located all the corresponding fastenings of the front assembly 9 and the rear suspension 6 with the body A, such that the front assembly 9 and the rear suspension 6 by the respective bolt runners 20, 26, 26 The fastening work to the body A can be performed satisfactorily and reliably.

In this way, in this assembly line 1, prior to the assembly work at the assembly station 4, the coating work is performed to increase the difference in brightness between the predetermined parts assembly position and the surrounding area in the body A. Since the assembly position is detected after that, the position can be detected accurately and reliably, and as a result, mistakes in assembling parts to the body A can be prevented.

Note that the application of the paint to the parts assembly position in the body is not limited to spraying using the paint spray nozzle 43 as described above, but may be performed by painting, stamping, or the like. Further, if the poles 1 to 1 are protruded from the assembly position of the body, paint is applied to the tip surfaces thereof.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

The drawings show an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing an automobile assembly line to which the parts assembling device according to the present invention is applied, and FIGS. 2.3 and 3 show assembly positions on the line. It is a side view which shows a detection process and a coating process, respectively. A... Part to be assembled (body), B... Part assembly position, 6.9... Parts to be assembled (rear suspension, front assembly), 7.10... Assembly unit, 30 ...
Visual sensor (TV camera), 40... Coating device.

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) A parts assembling device that detects a part assembly position on a to-be-assembled part and adjusts the position of the assembling part in correspondence with this assembling position, which transports the to-be-assembled part. A coating device that applies paint to the part assembly position so that the shape of the part assembly position on the assembled part becomes clear along the direction, and a coating device that applies paint to the part assembly position on the part to be assembled, and A visual sensor for detecting a component assembly position, and an assembly unit that supports the component to be assembled and has a fastener for assembling the component to the component to be assembled and whose position can be adjusted are arranged, and 1. A component assembling device, comprising: a control device that adjusts the position of the assembling unit according to a component assembling position in the to-be-assembled component detected by a visual sensor.