JP2001033356A - Method and device for inspecting wire harness - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To securely detect even the defect in connection that the contact pressure is low although an electric connection is made. SOLUTION: By this inspecting method, connector parts 18 to 20 of a wire harness 17 to be inspected which have the connector parts 18 to 20 at both the ends are connected to connector parts 14 to 16 of wire harnesses 12 and 13 for continuity inspection and while a current is supplied to the wire harness 17 to be inspected through the wire harnesses 12 and 13, vibration or a shock is applied to the wire harness 17 to be inspected; and a continuity/momentary break detecting circuit 22 detects whether or not the current has a momentary break, thereby inspecting a defect in the connection of the wire harness 17.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method and an apparatus for inspecting a wire harness having connector portions formed at both ends, and more particularly to an inspection method and an apparatus for a wire harness which reliably detects a contact failure of the connector portion.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a wire harness for connecting electrical parts of an automobile or the like, a connection failure may occur due to deformation of a connection terminal of a connector. For example, as shown in FIG.
If the female terminal 1 of the connector is not deformed, the female terminal 1
Since the male terminal 4 is brought into contact with the predetermined contact pressure between the spring piece 2 and the guide piece 3, the above-described connection failure does not occur. However, as shown in FIG. 9B, for example, if there is any deformation in the spring piece 2 of the female terminal 1 of the connector portion, a gap δ is formed between the spring piece 2 and the guide piece 3 and the male terminal 4. Even if the gap is not formed or the gap is not formed, the contact pressure of the female terminal 1 with respect to the male terminal 4 becomes insufficient, and a contact failure such as an instantaneous interruption of the connector portion occurs. This is an example of poor contact, and there is also poor contact due to poor crimping of the terminal and the wire.

[0003] With regard to such a contact failure of the wire harness, conventionally, in a state where the wire harness to be inspected and the wire harness for continuity inspection are connected, a current is supplied to the wire harness to be inspected via the wire harness for continuity inspection. Then, the inspection is performed by observing the conduction state.

[0004]

However, the above-described conventional method for inspecting a wire harness is effective when the female terminal is largely deformed and the contact with the male terminal is completely cut off. In the case where the deformation of the terminal is small, conduction is maintained only by a small contact pressure, so that a poor contact cannot be reliably detected. The same can be said for the crimping failure of the terminals.

The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and is a method of inspecting a wire harness which is electrically connected but can reliably detect a connection failure such as a low contact pressure. And an apparatus.

[0006]

According to a wire harness inspection method of the present invention, the connector portion of a wire harness to be inspected having connector portions at both ends is connected to a connector portion of a wire harness for continuity inspection, and the continuity test is performed. By applying a vibration or an impact to the wire harness to be inspected in a state where a current flows through the wire harness to be inspected via the wire harness for use, and detecting the presence or absence of an instantaneous interruption of the current at that time, the It is characterized by inspecting a connection failure of the inspection wire harness.

Further, according to the wire harness inspection apparatus of the present invention, there is provided a supporting means for supporting a wire harness to be inspected having connectors at both ends, and a wire harness for continuity inspection connected to the connector of the wire harness to be inspected. When,
A current supply means for supplying a current to the wire harness to be inspected via the wire harness for continuity inspection; and a vibration or impact applied to the wire harness to be inspected while the current is supplied to the wire harness to be inspected by the current supply means. And a conduction / interruption detecting means for detecting the presence or absence of an instantaneous interruption of the current when the vibration or impact is applied to the wire harness to be inspected.

According to the present invention, by applying a vibration or an impact to the wire harness to be inspected in a state where a current is flowing through the wire harness to be inspected, it is detected whether or not there is an instantaneous interruption of the current at that time. Because we are trying to inspect the wiring harness for connection failure, it is electrically connected,
Poor connection such as when the contact pressure is low can be reliably detected.

The vibration / shock applying means includes:
The loudspeaker may include a speaker that emits a sound wave to the wire harness to be inspected, and a signal generating unit that supplies a signal of a predetermined frequency to the speaker. In this case, if the signal generating means sweeps the frequency of the signal supplied to the speaker, the frequency of the sound wave output from the speaker becomes a resonance frequency specific to the connector and other parts of the wire harness to be inspected. , Respectively, whereby an effective vibration can be applied to each part of the wire harness, and a contact failure can be detected more reliably.

[0010]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a wire harness inspection device according to one embodiment of the present invention. On the inspection table 11, connectors 14, 15, 16 of the continuity inspection wire harnesses 12, 13 are fixed by fixing means (not shown). In the wiring harness 17 to be inspected, the connector portions 18, 19, and 20 have respective connector portions 14, 1 of the wiring harnesses 12, 13, for continuity inspection.
5 and 16 are set on the inspection table 11. A current is supplied to the wire harness 17 to be inspected by the current source 21 via the wire harness 12 for continuity inspection. This current is monitored by the continuity / instantaneous interruption detecting device 22 via the continuity inspection wire harness 13. On the other hand, the speaker 23 is arranged in a contact state or a non-contact state toward the inspection table 11, and the speaker 23 is connected to the signal generator 24.
Is supplied with a signal. The speaker 23 and the signal generator 24 constitute a vibration / shock application unit. In addition,
The leg 25 of the inspection table 11 is formed of a hard member or an elastic body that can obtain the vibration of the inspection table 11 corresponding to the natural frequency of, for example, the connector portions 18 to 20 of the wire harness 17 to be inspected.

With such a configuration, a predetermined frequency is supplied from the signal generator 24 to the speaker 23 while the current is supplied from the current source 21 to the wire harness 17 to be inspected via the wire harness 12 for continuity inspection. Is supplied from the speaker 23 to the wire harness 17 to be inspected via the inspection table 11. Due to this vibration, if there is a contact failure in the connector sections 18 to 20 or other parts, so-called chattering, which repeatedly repeats conduction and non-conduction in that part, occurs. Conduction / interruption detection device 22
However, this chattering can be detected, and a reliable conduction failure inspection can be performed.

In order to detect an instantaneous interruption of the current due to insufficient contact pressure, the conduction / interruption detecting device 22 includes, for example, FIG.
, An RS flip-flop circuit 33 in which the outputs of the gate circuits 31 and 32 are fed back to the other input can be used. After the RS flip-flop circuit 33 is reset by the reset signal, an input signal that is cut off at the momentary interruption of the current is input as a set input signal. As a result, even if there is a momentary interruption of current even instantaneously,
The momentary interruption signal is activated and fixed. Note that the conduction / interruption detection device 22 can detect not only the instantaneous interruption of the current but also the complete non-conduction as before.

FIG. 3 illustrates a one-shot circuit 42 for outputting a pulse of a constant width when the RS flip-flop circuit 41 rises as shown in FIG. The output of the one-shot circuit 42 is counted by a counter 43 and a display 44
Is displayed. The output of the one-shot circuit 42 is delayed by a delay circuit 45 and provided as a reset signal of the RS flip-flop circuit 41. According to this configuration, the number of instantaneous interruptions is counted by the counter 43, so that the degree of connection failure can be known from the count value.

The signal generator 24 shown in FIG. 1 preferably outputs a signal whose frequency is swept. In this case, as shown in FIG. 4, a signal is supplied to the speaker 23 so as to pass through a resonance frequency f0 unique to the wire harness 17 to be inspected, the inspection table 11, and the like.
Efficient vibration can be applied to the wire harness 17 to be inspected.

As shown in FIG. 5, resonance plates 51, 52 and 53 having different resonance frequencies are mounted on portions of the inspection table 11 to which the connector portions 14 to 16 are connected, respectively. May be fixed to the resonance plates 51 to 53, respectively, and the signal generator 24 may sweep the output signal frequency. In this case, as shown in FIG. 6, each of the resonance plates 51, 52, 53 resonates sequentially, so that the vibration frequency and the conduction / interruption detection device 2
From the instantaneous interruption detection timing in 2, it is possible to detect which of the connectors has a poor contact.

In the above embodiment, the speaker 23 and the signal generator 24 using sound waves are used as the vibration / shock applying means. For example, as shown in FIG. A shock applying device 61 for applying a single shock wave and a signal generating device 62 for supplying a single signal to the shock applying device 61 are provided, and a single or intermittent shock is applied to the inspection table 11 by the shock applying device 61. Thus, instantaneous interruption detection may be performed. in this case,
The distances L1, L2, L3 from the impact application point P by the impact application device 61 to the connector sections 14, 15, 16 are made different. As a result, as shown in FIG. 8, there is a difference in the time from the impact application timing to the instantaneous interruption timing in each of the connector units 14 to 16. By detecting this time difference, any of the connector units 18 to It is possible to detect whether the instantaneous interruption has occurred due to a poor contact at 19.

[0017]

As described above, according to the present invention, vibration or impact is applied to a wire harness to be inspected while a current is flowing through the wire harness to be inspected to determine whether or not there is a momentary interruption of the current at that time. By detecting, the connection failure of the wire harness to be tested is inspected, so that it is electrically connected, but the connection failure such as when the contact pressure is low can also be reliably detected. It works.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a wire harness inspection device according to one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a circuit diagram of a main part of a conduction / interruption detection device in the device.

FIG. 3 is a circuit diagram showing another example of the conduction / interruption detection device.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a relationship between an output frequency of a signal generation device and a resonance frequency of a wire harness in the device.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing a configuration of a wire harness inspection device according to another embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing the resonance frequency of each unit for explaining the operation of the device.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a configuration of a wire harness inspection device according to still another embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 8 is a timing chart for explaining the operation of the same device.

FIG. 9 is a cross-sectional view illustrating a configuration of a main part of a connector portion of the wire harness to be inspected.

[Explanation of symbols]

1: Female terminal, 4: Male terminal, 11: Inspection table, 12, 1
3. Wire harness for continuity inspection, 14-16, 18-2
0 ... connector part, 17 ... wire harness to be inspected, 21 ...
Current source, 22: conduction / interruption detection device, 23: speaker,
24, 62 ... signal generator, 51 to 53 ... resonance plate, 61
... Shock applying device.

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A connector of a wire harness to be inspected having connector portions at both ends is connected to a connector of a wire harness for continuity inspection, and a current flows through the wire harness to be inspected via the wire harness for continuity inspection. In this state, by applying a vibration or an impact to the wire harness to be inspected, and detecting the presence or absence of an instantaneous interruption of the current at that time, to inspect the connection failure of the wire harness to be inspected, Harness inspection method. 2. A support means for supporting a wire harness to be inspected having connector portions at both ends, a wire harness for continuity inspection connected to a connector portion of the wire harness to be inspected, and a wire harness for continuity inspection. Current supply means for supplying a current to the wire harness to be inspected; vibration / shock applying means for applying a vibration or shock to the wire harness to be inspected in a state where a current is supplied to the wire harness to be inspected by the current supply means. A wire harness inspection device, comprising: a conduction / interruption detection means for detecting the presence or absence of an instantaneous interruption of the current when a vibration or an impact is applied to the inspected wire harness. 3. The vibration / shock applying unit includes a speaker that emits a sound wave to the wire harness to be inspected, and a signal generating unit that supplies a signal of a predetermined frequency to the speaker. The wire harness inspection device according to the above. 4. The wire harness inspection apparatus according to claim 3, wherein said signal generating means sweeps a frequency of a signal supplied to said speaker.