EP0611363B1 - Bobbin-changing device - Google Patents

Abstract

PCT No. PCT/EP92/02539 Sec. 371 Date Jun. 17, 1994 Sec. 102(e) Date Jun. 17, 1994 PCT Filed Nov. 5, 1992 PCT Pub. No. WO93/09052 PCT Pub. Date May 13, 1993An automatic bobbin-changing device (10) for a winding machine with a vertical winding axis, the device having a bobbin carrier (12) which can rotate about a vertical axis (13) and which can adopt two bobbin-holding positions staggered at an angle of about 180 DEG . The bobbin carrier (12) has a total of four gripper arms (25, 26, 27, 28) which work together in pairs to grip a bobbin (1, 2). On each gripper arm (25, 26, 27, 28) is a bobbin-support surface (29) which, during the bobbin-changing operation, is positioned under the bobbin lower-flange (1b, 2b). The bobbin is changed by lifting the bobbin carrier (12) by means of a lifting mechanism (52, 54, 55) in such a way that the bobbin (1) on the winding machine is lifted off its mounting, the bobbin carrier (12) subsequently being rotated through 180 DEG and lowered again.

Description

The present invention relates to a device for changing bobbins in a winding machine which receives a bobbin with a substantially vertical axis.

Winding machines of the type in question are used to wind up or unwind all types of strand material. Strand-like goods are, above all, products such as wire, wire bundles, strands, all of which may or may not be covered, glass fibers and the like.

The strand-like material is wound or unwound on spools after manufacture and usually also in the course of the further machining or processing operations, the spools mostly consisting of metal. Due to the constantly increasing production speed of wire-producing and processing systems, the filling and emptying times of these coils are becoming shorter and shorter, even with large coil dimensions. It is therefore necessary for the rational operational sequence in such a system that the filled or emptied coils are changed relatively quickly against an empty coil or filled coil.

With the German patent P 31 37 990 C2 a mobile automatic bobbin changing device has become known, which among other things. can be used to change bobbins on bobbins with a vertical bobbin axis. This known bobbin changing device has a centrally rotatably mounted support arm, at the opposite ends of which a bobbin can be coupled. The support arm is further provided with devices for rotating the coils coupled to its ends. To change a bobbin on a winder that e.g. To wind up the wire, the bobbin changing device moves to the winder, an empty bobbin being arranged on one side of the support arm and rotating at the same speed as the winding bobbin located in the winder. The bobbin changing device is brought into position on the winder and connected to the largely filled bobbin located in the winder, so that this bobbin is now driven by the bobbin changing device. The support arm is then rotated by 180 °, the wire being cut and taped to the filled coil at the same time. As soon as the empty bobbin has assumed the position of the filled bobbin in the winder, the wire entering the bobbin winder is placed on the bobbin and further wound there.

Although this bobbin changing device works very satisfactorily, problems arise due to the constant increase in production speed. The bobbin changing device of the known type takes a certain time to be brought into the corresponding position after the bobbin changing request signal has been triggered by a bobbin winder. Furthermore, it takes a certain time until the bobbin changing device moves the filled bobbin to a corresponding magazine and a new empty bobbin has recorded so that another bobbin change can be carried out. The use of such a mobile bobbin changing device therefore proves to be problematic when the filling times of the bobbins are reduced and therefore the number of bobbin changes to be carried out increases.

DE-A-33 05 991 a device for gripping and holding a sleeve has become known. The sleeve is in particular a cylindrical sleeve which is wound with yarn in such a way that the yarn has frustoconical end sections. The sleeve is held with two opposing gripping elements, which have a cylindrical region that holds the sleeve in a clamped manner, and a frustoconically opening region, on which the frustoconical end portions of the yarn rest in order to absorb tilting forces. The device is provided for attaching and removing such sleeves to a textile machine. A use of the device beyond the textile machine sector is not disclosed in the document.

The present invention has for its object to provide a bobbin changing device which, despite its simple structure, enables a bobbin change to be carried out quickly and reliably on a winding machine with a vertical winding axis.

This object is achieved by the subject matter of claim 1.

Preferred developments of the invention are the subject of the dependent claims.

The bobbin changing device according to the invention has a bobbin support device which can be rotated about a vertical axis and on which four gripping arms are arranged so as to be rotatable. The (inner) ends of the gripper arms are about axes rotatably arranged, which are close to this vertical axis. A drive device is provided with which these gripping arms can be pivoted about their respective axes of rotation, at least the movement of two gripping arms being coupled to one another. At the other (outer) end of each gripper arm, at least one coil support is provided. The bobbin support device with the four gripping arms can be raised in a substantially vertical direction by means of a lifting device. The dimensions and swivel angle of the gripper arms and the coil supports are dimensioned such that the gripper arms each have a coil vertical axis can take, with the lower flange of the coil rests on the coil supports.

This design enables a particularly quick and reliable spool change, as will be explained in the following. For the sake of simplicity, the bobbin located in the winding machine is referred to as a full bobbin, and the other bobbin, which is to be replaced with this bobbin, is referred to as an empty bobbin. Of course, the bobbin changing device according to the invention also works in reverse, i.e. if the winding machine is a drain device and the exchange of an empty bobbin takes place with a filled bobbin.

The empty spool is brought into a position by a handling device or a conveying device in which it can be gripped by two of the gripping arms which are assigned to one another in motion. As soon as the bobbin in the winding machine is full, this bobbin is also gripped by two of the gripper arms. It should be noted that the two coils can be gripped simultaneously or in succession.

When both spools are gripped, the lifting device is actuated, whereby the spool supports come into contact with the lower flanges of the spools. The bobbins are raised, the full bobbin located in the winding machine being removed from the drive cone or the centering. If the winding machine also has an upper quill to engage the central bore of the bobbin from above, the quill is moved back out of the bobbin beforehand. A rotating device is then actuated and the coil support device is pivoted through 180 °, as a result of which the empty coil and full coil exchange positions. The lifting device is lowered, so that the empty spool rests on the drive cone of the winding machine, and the possibly existing quill is inserted into the central bore. The gripper arms are then moved away from the coils. Then can take place on winding or unwinding the strand-like material on or from the newly inserted bobbin.

In order to be able to use the bobbin changing device also in continuous processing processes, it is preferably combined with an intermediate store, on which a certain amount of the strand-like material can be temporarily stored.

Experiments have shown that with the bobbin changing device according to the invention, bobbin changing times which are clearly less than one minute can be achieved. This short spool change time has significant advantages for practical operation. If the respective production process is interrupted by the bobbin change, this interruption takes only a very short time and therefore does not have a significant effect on the operating sequence. If, on the other hand, a buffer is used during the interruption of the winding process due to the bobbin change, so as not to interrupt the production process, this memory can be dimensioned correspondingly small and therefore inexpensive.

The bobbin changing device also has the advantage that it has a simpler design than the bobbin changing devices known in the prior art, so that it can be manufactured inexpensively. As a result, it is also possible in the case of larger systems to assign a corresponding individual bobbin changing device to each winding machine.

Another significant advantage of this bobbin changing device over other known bobbin changing devices is the fact that no special devices have to be provided in the winding machine for the operation of the bobbin changing device. For the bobbin changing machine to function, it is sufficient that there is a gap under the lower flange of the bobbin in which the bobbin supports can be inserted. Special devices for lifting the bobbins, for releasing or moving out the bobbins do not have to be attached to the winding machine.

Another advantage is that the gripper arms can be designed to have a large swivel range. As a result, the gripper arms can move far away from the coils, so that the transport of the coils to and from the coil change position can be carried out without any problems.

Fig. 1:

Eine Draufsicht auf ein Ausführungsbeispiel der erfindungsgemäßen Spulenwechselvorrichtung;

Fig. 2:

eine Seitenansicht des Ausführungsbeispiels gemäß Fig. 1.

Further advantages, features and possible uses of the present invention result from the following description of an exemplary embodiment in connection with the drawing. This shows in a schematic way:

Fig. 1:

A plan view of an embodiment of the bobbin changing device according to the invention;

Fig. 2:

2 shows a side view of the exemplary embodiment according to FIG. 1.

The described embodiment is used in connection with a winding machine on which wire is wound and in which the coil assumes a vertical position during the winding process. 2 it is assumed that the Coil 1 is a filled coil that is to be exchanged for the empty coil 2. Each of the coils has an upper flange 1a, 2a and a lower flange 1b, 2b. The two flanges are connected to the winding core 1c, 2c, a cylindrical winding core being shown in the exemplary embodiment. Instead of the cylindrical winding core, a conical winding core can also be used, in which case the smaller diameter of the conical winding core is then preferably at the bottom, ie on the lower flanges 1b, 2b.

The bobbin changing device, designated overall by 10, has a bobbin support device 12 which can be pivoted about a (fictitious), essentially vertical axis 13. The swivel range of the embodiment is dimensioned such that the coil support device can rotate about 185 ° about this axis 13. A first upper plate 16, which is round in the exemplary embodiment, and a likewise round lower plate 18 are arranged at a distance from one another concentrically to this axis 13. Four pivot pins 21 are fastened in these plates 16, 18, as can be seen in particular in the sectional illustration according to FIG. 2. On each of the four pivot pins 21, a bearing sleeve 23 is provided with a corresponding bore, the bearing preferably being carried out with roller bearings (not shown in FIGS. 1, 2). Four gripping arms 25, 26, 27 and 28 are fastened to these bearing sleeves 23. A plate-shaped support 29 is arranged on the end of each gripper arm opposite the bearing sleeve, as can be seen in particular from the illustration in FIG. 1 (dashed line there). The support 29 is connected to jaws 30, which have a circular segment-shaped recess 31 for receiving the coil flange.

In the embodiment shown, two gripping arms, namely the gripping arms 25 and 26 and the gripping arms 27 and 28, act together to hold the coils 1 and 2. This interaction is effected by gears 34, which are each arranged concentrically to the pivot pin 21 and the bearing sleeve 23 adjacent to the lower plate, and the diameter of which is dimensioned such that the corresponding gears 34 of the interacting gripping arms mesh with one another. Since the interacting gripper arms are thereby kinematically coupled to one another, a pneumatically or hydraulically acting piston-cylinder unit 36 or 38 is sufficient to move the gripper arms towards and away from one another. The piston stroke of the piston-cylinder unit 36 or 38 can be dimensioned such that the gripping arms can open so far that practically an angle of approximately 180 ° is formed between the interacting gripping arms 25, 26 and 27, 28 . This, most open position of the gripping arms is shown in dashed lines in FIG. 1.

It should be noted at this point that it is also possible to arrange the pivot pins 21 and the gear wheels 34 and to dimension them such that all four gear wheels 34 mesh with one another and thus all four gripping arms are kinematically coupled to one another. This has the advantage that only one piston-cylinder unit is required to actuate the gripping arms. However, this has the disadvantage that the bobbin changing device can then only change bobbins that have the same diameter.

If there is a possibility that, for example, to meet the requirements of different customers, a coil change from a coil 1 with a large diameter against a coil 2 with a smaller diameter, the version with two piston-cylinder units 36, 38 and only two movement-linked gripping arms should be preferred.

The bobbin support device is received by a base body 45 which, as can be seen in FIG. 2, is preferably fastened directly to the foundation 50 or the corresponding machine frame of the bobbin winder with fastening devices 48. A plate 52 is arranged at a distance from the base body 45 and can be raised and lowered by means of piston-cylinder units 54, 55, the pistons of which are visible in the view according to FIG. 1. The piston-cylinder units are confirmed hydraulically or pneumatically.

A support body 60 is rotatably held in the plate 52, this axis of rotation forming the pivot axis 13 of the bobbin changing device. The support body 60 is supported in a known manner by roller bearings or the like. and is therefore not shown in the figures.

The rotary movement of the coil support device is effected in the exemplary embodiment by a rotary cylinder 62. The rotary cylinder 62, which is actuated hydraulically or pneumatically, has a fixed part which is fixedly connected to the base body 45 and a rotatable part which is connected to the support body 60. The rotary cylinder 62 internally has a reciprocating piston, this reciprocating piston being connected to a threaded spindle in such a way that the reciprocating movement of the piston is converted into a rotation of the movable part with respect to the fixed part. Since a pressure fluid is required anyway for the actuation of the piston-cylinder units 36, 38, the use of such a rotary cylinder is one Particularly inexpensive and simple design option to effect the rotary movement of the coil support device.

Instead of such a rotary cylinder, other suitable devices can also be used. In particular, it is possible to arrange a swivel ring provided with a toothing on the coil support device concentrically to the axis 13, which is rotated via a pinion and a geared motor.

The bobbin changing device has a control device, which is not shown in the figures. This control device is connected to one or more sensors which e.g. detect whether the coil 1 is filled, whether the coil 2 is in the correct position and the like. The control device can issue control commands which cause the piston-cylinder units 36, 38, 54, 55 and the rotary cylinder 62 to be actuated. The control device can also be integrated into a higher-level control device which serves to control larger parts of the production process.

The function of this device is as follows:

While the spool 1 is being wound, the spool 2 is brought into a position by a handling or conveying device (not shown) in such a way that it can be gripped by the gripping arms 25, 26. This positioning of the coil is not hindered by the wide opening angle of these two gripping arms.

In the embodiment according to FIGS. 1 and 2, as soon as the coil 2 is positioned, the piston-cylinder unit 36 are actuated to move the (opened) gripping arms 25, 26 towards one another. This closing movement of the gripping arms is continued until these supports 29 engage under the lower coil flange 2b and the jaws 30 rest against the coil flange. It should be noted that the coil 2 is to be positioned so that it is possible to reach under the coil flange through the support 29.

As soon as the bobbin 1 is fully wound, the strand-like material entering the winding machine is cut and the end of the strand-like material is glued to the bobbin 1. This cutting and gluing can be done during the bobbin change.

When the control device has received a signal that the coil 1 is filled, a signal is output which causes the piston-cylinder unit 38 to be actuated. The gripping arms 27 and 28 are moved towards one another until the supports 29 also engage under the lower flange 1b and the flange lies against the jaws 30.

As mentioned, the gripping arms can also be closed simultaneously.

After both coils have been gripped, the piston-cylinder units 54, 55 are actuated and the coil support device is raised. The coil 1 detaches from the centering or from the receiving cone. As soon as the coil 1 is free, which may be detected or checked by a corresponding sensor, the rotary cylinder 62 is actuated and the coil support device is pivoted through 180 °. The correct position can be taken by stops or by appropriate sensors be ensured. The coil 1 and coil 2 have now swapped their position in the illustration according to FIGS. 1 and 2. Then the piston-cylinder units 54, 55 are actuated again and the bobbin support device is lowered, as a result of which the empty bobbin is received by the centering or the receiving cone of the bobbin winder. The free wire end is then connected in a suitable manner to the empty spool and the winding process is continued.

In order not to interrupt the production process, the winding machine is preferably preceded by a storage device in which the strand-like material is temporarily stored during the winding change. This arrangement has the advantage that a continuous production process is not interrupted by the spool change.

In connection with the bobbin changing device according to the invention, a bobbin winder is preferably used, in which the bobbin rotates during the winding or unwinding process. According to another preferred embodiment, the bobbin changing device can also be used with a bobbin winder in which the bobbin stands still during winding and the winding takes place by means of a laying device rotating around the bobbin. Furthermore, it is possible to use the bobbin changing device according to the invention in connection with a take-off device, in which the take-off takes place overhead or by means of an unwinding flyer.

Claims (10)

1. Automatic bobbin-changing device (10) for winding machines with a vertical winding axis, in which bobbins (1, 2) are wound, which comprise a winding core (1c, 2c) as well as a lower flange (1b, 2b) and which is provided for winding and unwinding rod-like material, such as wire, wire coils, strands, glass fibres and the like, the bobbin-changing device comprising a bobbin-carrying device (12) able to rotate about a vertical axis (13) and which is vertically adjustable by means of a lifting device (54, 55), which device (12) comprises a first bobbin-holding position for holding a first bobbin (1), as well as a second bobbin-holding position for holding a second bobbin (2), this second bobbin-holding position being staggered by approximately 180° with respect to the first bobbin-holding position, characterised in that the bobbin-carrying device (12) comprises a first gripping arm (20), a second gripping arm (26), a third gripping arm (27) and a fourth gripping arm (28) each with a first inner end, which is mounted to rotate in the vicinity of this vertical axis, the axis of rotation of each gripping arm being parallel to this vertical axis, that located at the outer end of each gripping arm (25, 26, 27, 28) is at least one bobbin support (29), that a driving device (36, 38) is provided, which brings about a rotary movement of these gripping arms about these axes of rotation, that the first and the second gripping arm (25, 26) are connected to each other by way of a coupling device (34) so that they hold the first bobbin with these bobbin supports (29) in this first bobbin-holding position, that the third and fourth gripping arm (27, 28) are connected to each other by way of a coupling device (34) so that they hold this second bobbin (2) with these bobbin supports (29) in the second bobbin-holding position, that a control device is provided, which controls the bobbin-changing device, this control device, these gripping arms, this lifting device and this driving device being provided so that this first bobbin is gripped, in that the first and the second gripping arm (25, 26) is moved with respect to the first bobbin so that the bobbin support (29) engages below the lower flange (1b) of the bobbin (1), that the second bobbin is gripped, in that the third gripping arm and the fourth gripping arm (27, 28) is moved with respect to the second bobbin so that the bobbin support (29) engages below the lower flange (2b) of the second bobbin (2), and that for carrying out the bobbin change, the bobbin-carrying device (12) with the four gripping arms altogether is lifted by the lifting device (54, 55), tilted about the latter by approximately 180° and lowered.
2. Device according to Claim 1, characterised in that each gripping arm (25, 26, 27, 28) is non-rotatably connected to a pinion (34), which is arranged so that it meshes with the corresponding pinion of the gripping arm associated kinematically with this gripping arm.
3. Device according to Claim 2, characterised in that these two gripping arms (25, 26; 27, 28) associated kinematically with each other are connected to each other by a double-acting piston/cylinder unit (36; 38) so that upon actuation of the piston/cylinder unit, the two gripping arms can be moved away from each other and towards each other.
4. Device according to Claim 1, characterised in that all four gripping arms are kinematically connected to each other.
5. Device according to Claim 4, characterised in that the kinematic connection of the gripping arms is brought about by four gear wheels, which are each arranged concentrically with respect to the axis of rotation of the gripping arms and are non-rotatably connected to the latter, the gear wheels of adjacent gripping arms meshing with each other.
6. Device according to Claim 4 or 5, characterised in that a double-acting piston/cylinder unit is provided, which is connected to two gripping arms, in order to bring about a tilting movement of all four gripping arms.
7. Device according to at least one of Claims 1 to 6, characterised in that the bobbin supports (29) are respectively connected to a jaw (30), which bears against the outer diameter of the bobbin flange (1b, 2b), when the support is positioned below the bobbin flange.
8. Device according to at least one of Claims 1 to 7, characterised in that the lifting movement is brought about by two piston/cylinder units (54, 55), which are arranged symmetrically with respect to this vertical axis.
9. Device according to at least one of Claims 1 to 8, characterised in that the rotation of the bobbin-carrying device (12) about this vertical axis (13) is brought about by a rotary cylinder (62).
10. Device according to at least one of Claims 1 to 9, characterised in that the tilting angle of the gripping arms is dimensioned such that the opening angle between two kinematically associated gripping arms (25, 26; 27, 28) amounts to approximately 180°.

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