GB1127951A - Improvements in or relating to vehicle guidance devices - Google Patents

Abstract

1,127,951. Route setting; controlling vehicles; motor fare carriages. F. JUNGHEINRICH. 6 Sept., 1965, No. 38025/65. Headings B7H and B7N. In a transporting arrangement in which industrial trucks 1 which can be manually controlled by means of a tiller arm 7 are automatically guided by a wheel 11 which engages in a fixed groove track 12, means are provided on the vehicle, responsive to the detection of a track side marker 25 at diversion points 27 on the track, for guiding the wheel 11 into a branch track 24. Each truck 1 is self propelled and in the arrangement shown the single driven wheel 3 pivots about a vertical axis 5 for steering purposes. The tiller arm 7 is raised for automatic control and the arm 10 carrying the guide wheel 10 is swung upwards to the dotted line position for manual control. The markers and sensing elements may be co-operating magnetic elements or they may be raised members, Figs. 13, 16 (not shown), or a trough member, Fig. 14 (not shown), and the movement imparted by these members to a sensing element on the vehicle operates a switching circuit. In the arrangement shown in Fig. 15, the marker is a conducting plate positioned adjacent the track 114 and the sensing element includes a pair of brushes 136, 137 which complete the switching circuit. The sensing elements are lowered to a position in which they can co-operate with the markers under the control of a programmer on the vehicle which in turn can be controlled by the distance travelled by the vehicle. A number of means are disclosed for guiding the wheel 11 into a branch track all of which urge the wheel towards the side of the track from which the diverging track branches. In Fig. 6 (not shown), a member on the vehicle is rotated to bring a wheel into contact with an outside edge of the track, thereby to urge the wheel 11 towards that edge. A magnetically operated arrangement is shown in Figs. 8 and 9 (not shown) and an hydraulically operated arrangement is shown in Fig. 10 (not shown). In the arrangement shown in Fig. 12, operation of the switching circuit by a sensing element actuates a drive motor 101 and a clutch 100, whereby the motor housing which is vertically pivoted at 5 is rotated to move the wheel 11 to the required side of the track. The arm 10 can be formed in two parts hinged together so that if the wheel 11 strikes an obstruction the arm collapses and operates a switch which shuts off the vehicle drive and applies a brake.