JP2000281203A - Adjustable shelf width type automated warehouse - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To enable reset of a self width by constituting arms supporting stocks detachable. SOLUTION: In this warehouse, at least two lines of rotation chains 1 driven in a vertical direction are arranged in parallel at designated intervals and plural jigs 2 to mount arms are arranged on the chains 1 at regular intervals, and not less than one pair of arms 3 mounted on the detachable jigs 2 are constituted as used for selves to store plate stocks. Also, the warehouse is provided with a vertical location measurement device attached on a rotation shaft of the rotation chain 1, a control device to control a vertical movement amount of the rotation chain 1 based on travel of the rotation chain 1 from a standard position provided by the vertical location measurement device, and a calculation device to estimate distribution of goods' thickness based on a production plan and to determines how the self width should be set for whole automated warehouse based on the estimated value and to calculate an optimum shelf location data. A vertical movement of the rotation chain 1 is controlled based on shelf location data of the calculation device and desired shelf width is maintained.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an automatic warehouse for storing vertically arranged flat articles having various thicknesses on a pallet such as veneer, such as exterior wall material parts of a house.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As shown in FIG. 3, a plurality of shelves arranged in a vertical direction for storing a flat product 10 having various thicknesses arranged on a pallet 11 such as veneer. Conventionally, in an automatic warehouse including a shelf having a space and a device for taking in and out the stored items 4 into and out of the shelf, a brace supporting the stored items 4 is conventionally fixed to a vertical support by welding. , The shelf width was also fixed.

[0003]

Since the width of the shelf is fixed, the width of the shelf has been designed according to the article 10 having the largest thickness. However, the thickness of the article 10 varies greatly depending on the type of the article. In the shelves storing the small articles 10, the wasted space becomes large, resulting in the storage efficiency of the entire automatic warehouse being greatly impaired. In addition, article 10
The breed composition changes significantly each time a new model house is announced about every year, but it is difficult to predict the size, so use as described above with poor storage efficiency Or, the sum of the thicknesses of the article 10 and the pallet 11 becomes larger than the maximum value of the shelf width, and there is a problem that the articles cannot be stored in the automatic warehouse. Estimate the thickness distribution of the article 10 in the near future based on the production plan, judge how to set the shelf width in the entire automated warehouse,
If the width of the shelf can be changed based on this, the storage efficiency of the automatic warehouse can be greatly improved.

[0004] It is an object of the present invention to improve the storage efficiency of an automatic warehouse by making the arms supporting the stored items 4 detachable and enabling the shelf width to be reset. Is to improve the workability of the arm attachment / detachment work at the time of resetting the shelf width.

[0005]

FIG. 1 and FIG. 2 are schematic diagrams of a variable-shelf-width automatic warehouse, and FIG. 4 is a system configuration diagram of a variable-shelf-width automatic warehouse. In the automatic warehouse, at least two or more rotary chains 1 that are driven in the vertical direction are arranged side by side at predetermined intervals, and a jig 2 for mounting the arms 3 is attached to the chains 1 at regular intervals. Plural pairs of arms 3 attached to the detachable jig 2 are provided as a plurality of shelves for storing the flat articles 10 and the pallets 11.

The sprocket 9 of the rotary chain 1
A lifting / lowering position measuring device attached to the rotating shaft 19, and a control means 14 for controlling a lifting / lowering amount of the rotary chain 1 based on a moving amount of the rotary chain 1 with respect to a reference position obtained from the lifting / lowering position measuring device; An arithmetic unit 12 that estimates the thickness distribution of articles based on the production plan, determines how to set the shelf width in the entire automatic warehouse based on the estimated amount, and calculates optimal shelf width data, Based on the shelf position data generated by the arithmetic unit 12, the amount of elevation of the rotary chain 1 is controlled so that a desired shelf width is obtained.

[0007]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS In an automatic warehouse, at least two or more rotary chains 1 which can be moved up and down by a rotary chain drive motor 17 are vertically arranged at predetermined intervals. In this embodiment, four rotary chains 1-1 to 1-1 are used.
4 are juxtaposed. A plurality of detachable jigs 2 each having a structure that can be fixed by inserting a brace 3 into the rotary chain 1 are arranged at regular intervals. Jig 2-1 located at the same height
When the arms 3-1 to 3-4 are inserted into .about.2-4, these arms 3-1 to 3-4 function as shelves for storing the flat article storage items 4. Therefore, the shelf width can be freely changed by appropriately selecting the jig 2 into which the arm 3 is inserted.

An elevating position measuring device is attached to the rotation width 19 of the sprocket 9 of the rotary chain 1, and the amount of vertical movement of the rotary chain 1 is controlled based on the amount of movement of the rotary chain 1 with respect to a reference position obtained therefrom. The rotary chain controller 14 can raise (forward) and lower (reverse) the rotary chain 1 at an arbitrary pitch. Also, based on the production plan of the factory, estimate the thickness distribution of articles in the near future, determine how to set the shelf width in the entire automated warehouse based on the estimated amount, and calculate the optimal shelf width data. By providing the computer 12 for calculation and connecting the computer 12 to the rotary chain control device 14, the optimum setting of the shelf width can be performed.

A carriage 5 of the automatic warehouse is suspended from a ceiling of the automatic warehouse by a wire rope 7, and the wire rope 7 is wound around a drum 8 driven by a carriage elevating motor 15 also arranged on the ceiling. Drum 8
A vertical position measuring device is attached to the rotary shaft 18 so that the vertical position of the carriage 5 can be grasped. A loading / unloading device 6 is provided on the carriage 5 for loading and unloading flat articles 10 arranged on a pallet 11 to and from a shelf, and is driven by a loading / unloading device drive motor 16 also mounted on the carriage 5. Is done.
In addition, an entrance and an exit are provided at specific shelves of the automatic warehouse.

At the time of normal operation, the computer 12 generates an entry / exit instruction for the automatic warehouse based on the vertical height of each arm 3 in the current shelf width data. When storing the storage items 4, the shelves are allocated so that the storage items 4 having a small thickness are stored in a shelf having a small width and the storage items 4 having a large thickness are stored in a shelf having a large width, thereby maximizing storage efficiency. Plan.

The carriage control device 13 processes the entry / exit instruction transmitted from the computer 12. When receiving the storage instruction, the carriage 5 moves up and down to the position of the entrance, takes in the storage items 4 at the entrance onto the carriage 5, and then moves up and down to the shelf position of the storage destination. The upper storage item 4 is put on the shelf. When receiving the take-out instruction, the carriage 5 moves up and down to the shelf position of the take-out source, takes in the stored items 4 on the shelf onto the carriage 5, and then moves up and down to the position of the exit port. Of the stored items 4 to the exit. However, the elevation stop position included in the entry / exit instruction is used as a coordinate value as a guide, and the actual control of the access device is that the detector installed on the carriage is attached to the arm bar. This is performed based on the ascending and descending position coordinates at which the position detection dog is detected.

[0012] The storage efficiency of the automatic warehouse is greatly deteriorated due to a large change in the type of the flat article 10, or
When it is considered that an article 10 that cannot be stored in the automatic warehouse may occur, the thickness distribution of the article 10 in the near future is estimated based on the production plan, and based on the estimated amount, how the shelf width in the entire automatic warehouse is determined. Is determined, and the shelf width is changed based on this. The change of the shelf width of the automatic warehouse, that is, the work of mounting and removing the arm 3 is performed during a non-operation time period. The work of removing the arms 3 is performed after all the stored items 4 in the automatic warehouse have been paid out.

The instruction relating to attachment / detachment of the arm 3 transmitted from the computer 12 is processed by the rotary chain controller 14. Arms 3 are 1, 2, 2,
The position of the arm 3 is represented by a height (mm) from the ground. At the time of the instruction regarding the attachment / detachment of the arm 3, shelf height position data for the number of shelves in the automatic warehouse are transmitted together. Table 1 shows an example of shelf position data in an automatic warehouse having 90 shelves.

[0014]

[Table 1]

FIG. 5 shows a flowchart of the operation of attaching the crosspiece. When attaching the arm 3 to the automatic warehouse, the computer 12 transmits new shelf position data determined by the computer 12 together with an instruction to start attaching the arm 3. The rotary chain control device 14 that has received this first returns the rotary chain 1 to the reference position, and then blinks the completion lamp to urge the worker to attach the arm. When the operator attaches the arm 3 to the jig 2 at a certain height from the ground, the operator presses the completion button.

By pressing the completion button, the rotary chain controller 14 turns off the completion button,
Two numerical values are read sequentially from the end of the shelf position data to calculate the difference, and the rotary chain 1 is raised (normally rotated) by the difference. When the ascending (forward rotation) operation of the rotary chain 1 is completed, the completion lamp blinks again to prompt the user to attach the next arm. The rotary chain controller 14 repeats this operation until there is no shelf position data. If there is no shelf position data, the rotary chain controller 14
Turns on the completion button to indicate that the mounting work of the arm 3 has been completed. After confirming that all operations have actually been completed, the operator presses the completion button.

FIG. 6 shows a flowchart of the operation for removing the arms. When removing the arm 3 from the automatic warehouse, the computer 12 transmits the current shelf position data stored in the computer 12 together with an instruction to start removing the arm 3. The rotary chain control device 14 that has received this reads two numerical values sequentially from the top of the shelf position data, calculates the difference, and lowers (reverses) the rotary chain 1 by the difference. When the lowering (reversing) operation of the rotary chain 1 is completed, the rotary chain controller 1
4 flashes the completion lamp to urge the operator to remove the arm. When the operator removes the arm 3 from the jig 2 located at a certain height from the ground, the operator presses the completion button.

By pressing the completion button, the rotary chain controller 14 turns off the completion button,
The next shelf position data is read, and the next lowering (reversing) operation is performed. The rotary chain controller 14 repeats this operation until there is no shelf position data. When there is no shelf position data, the rotary chain controller 14 turns on the completion button, and indicates that the work of removing the arm 3 has been completed. After confirming that all operations have actually been completed, the operator presses the completion button.

[0019]

As described above, according to the present invention, even if the type composition of the flat article 10 changes, the optimum shelf width can be reset for the change, so that the storage space of the automatic warehouse can be set. Can be used more efficiently. Further, since the worker can attach and detach the arm 3 while staying on the ground, the workability of attaching and detaching the arm 3 can be improved.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic side view of an automatic warehouse with variable shelf width,

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of a shelf portion of a variable-width automatic warehouse,

FIG. 3 is a schematic view of a flat storage object,

FIG. 4 is a system configuration diagram of a variable width automatic warehouse.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of an arm mounting work,

FIG. 6 is a flowchart of an arm removing operation.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1,1-1,1-2,1-3,1-4 Rotary chain 2,2-1,2-2,2-3,2-4 Jig 3,3-1,3-2,3 -3,3-4 arm 4 flat storage 5 carriage 6 loading and unloading device (push-pull type) 7 wire rope 8 drum 9 sprocket 10 flat article 11 pallet (such as veneer) 12 arithmetic unit (computer) 13 carriage control unit 14 Rotary chain control device 15 Carriage lifting / lowering motor 16 Loading / unloading device drive motor 17 Rotary chain drive motor 18 Rotary shaft of drum 8 19 Rotary shaft of sprocket 9

 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continued on the front page F term (reference) 3F022 EE02 FF35 KK01 MM01 MM11 MM17 NN05

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. An automatic warehouse comprising a shelf having a plurality of shelves arranged in a vertical direction, and a device for taking in and out of the shelves, and a vertically movable carriage, which is driven vertically. At least two or more rotary chains are arranged side by side at a predetermined interval, and a plurality of jigs for mounting a crosspiece are arranged on the chain at regular intervals. An automatic warehouse with variable shelf width, wherein a pair of attached arms are configured as shelves for storing flat articles. 2. A lifting / lowering position measuring device attached to a rotating shaft of a rotary chain, and a lifting / lowering amount of the rotary chain is controlled based on a movement amount of the rotary chain with respect to a reference position obtained from the lifting / lowering position measuring device. From a control unit and an arithmetic unit that estimates a thickness distribution of articles based on a production plan, determines how to set a shelf width in the entire automatic warehouse based on the estimated amount, and calculates optimal shelf width data. 2. A variable-width automatic warehouse according to claim 1, wherein the height of the rotary chain is controlled based on the width data of the arithmetic unit so as to obtain a desired width. .