JP2010091382A - Collision-testing device - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a collision-testing device, capable of reproducing in a simulating manner drop of a robot arm having a comparatively heavy load with a simple constitution, and of performing easily a high-accuracy collision test. <P>SOLUTION: This device includes a rocking arm 10 rockably connected to the upper side of a base 15; a weight member 12 held by the rocking arm; a skin member 11 for a test formed of the same material species as a skin member, coating the robot arm and detachably and movably held by the rocking arm along the longitudinal direction of the rocking arm; a fixing means for releasably fixing the skin member 11 for the test to a prescribed position along the rocking arm 10; a drop-starting means 27 for tilting and dropping the rocking arm 10; a support table 13 for supporting a colliding object 14, at a position where the skin member 11 for the test collides, when the rocking arm 10 is tilted and dropped; and an impact-load measuring means 37 for measuring the impact load applied to the colliding object 14. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a collision test apparatus that simulates a collision of a robot arm that is tilted and dropped by its own weight with a joint weight of an industrial articulated robot being released from a posture maintenance state by a joint axis, and which is tilted by its own weight as a fulcrum. .

  In general, an industrial articulated robot includes a robot arm 2 extending from a base 1 as shown in FIG. The robot arm 2 includes a plurality of arm portions 3 and 4 that are connected by a plurality of joint shafts 5 and 6 and can be bent through the joint shafts 5 and 6. In addition, the arms 3 and 4 are bent and stretched by controlling a driving source such as a motor incorporated in the joint shafts 5 and 6, and the posture of the robot arm 2 is maintained in a predetermined posture. .

  By the way, when the signal for controlling the drive source of the robot arm 2 is inadvertently interrupted due to a power failure or the like, the posture maintenance state of the robot arm 2 is released, and the robot arm 2 is caused by its own weight with the joint shaft 6 as a fulcrum, for example. There is a risk of tilting and falling. If there are other devices at this drop position, or if one person has entered the lower side of the robot arm 2, the other devices may be damaged by the collision of the robot arm 2, or the robot arm 2 There is also a risk that will come into contact with people. Therefore, in order to prevent other devices from being damaged due to the dropping of the robot arm 2 and to improve safety for humans, a synthetic resin skin member 7 is attached to the arm portions 3 and 4.

  However, at present, no evaluation is made on how much the skin member 7 attached to the arm portions 3 and 4 has an effect on improving safety. For this reason, it is desired to perform a test that simulates the situation when the robot arm 2 tilting and dropping due to its own weight comes into contact with other devices or people.

  Conventionally, as this type of test equipment, an arm supported on the upper end of a support column upright on a base via a rotating shaft and a test head provided at the tip of this arm is used to make the arm swing. Is known to cause the test head to collide with the surface to be collided (see Patent Document 1 below). In this device, the test head is raised to an arbitrary height so that the support column and the arm are at an arbitrary angle, and the test head that is freely dropped from this height is caused to collide with the collision target surface. Further, the arm is configured to be extendable and retractable, and a test at different accelerations can be performed by changing the length of the arm.

In the case of an industrial articulated robot, as shown in FIG. 1, even if the weight of the robot arm 2 is known in advance, any position in the length direction of each arm part 3 and 4 is in contact with other devices and people. It depends on the position of other devices and people. For this reason, when reproducing the tilting drop of the robot arm 2 of the industrial articulated robot using the conventional test apparatus, it is conceivable to change the collision position by changing the length of the arm. Since the test head has a load at the time of dropping, the load position also changes when the length of the arm is changed, and the tilting drop of the robot arm 2 cannot be accurately reproduced. Further, since the weight of the robot arm 2 is relatively large, it is necessary to increase the weight of the test head, and only a relatively large drive source is required to raise the test head to a predetermined height position. In addition, since it is necessary to control the height position of the test head with high accuracy, the apparatus configuration becomes large and the cost increases.
JP 2003-156422 A

  In view of the above points, the present invention provides a collision test apparatus that can simulate the fall of a robot arm having a relatively large load while having a simple configuration and can easily perform a high-precision collision test. This is the issue.

  In order to solve such a problem, the present invention simulates a collision of a robot arm that is tilted and dropped by its own weight with the joint axis of the industrial articulated robot being released from the posture maintenance state by the joint axis and falling on its own axis. A collision test apparatus that reproduces the oscillating force, the oscillating arm standing on the base with the lower end pivotably connected via the oscillating shaft, and the oscillating arm detachably held by the oscillating arm. A weight member that can be changed, and a test skin member that is formed of the same material type as the skin member that covers the robot arm, is detachably attached to the swing arm, and is movable along the length of the swing arm A fixing means for releasably fixing the test skin member to a predetermined position along the swing arm, a drop starting means for tilting and dropping the swing arm from a standing state, and the swing arm tilting and dropping Shi A support base for supporting the object to be collided at a position where the test skin member collides, and an impact load measuring means for measuring an impact load applied to the object to be collided when the test skin member collides. It is characterized by providing.

  According to the present invention, the test skin member is fixed at a predetermined height position by the fixing means with the swinging arm in an upright state, and the support table is positioned at a position corresponding to the collision position of the test skin member. Support the impacted body. Since the test skin member can be moved along the swing arm by releasing the fixing by the fixing means, the position of the test skin member can be adjusted without changing the position of the weight member held by the swing arm. Can be changed. Thereby, the skin member for a test can be made to correspond to the desired position of the skin member attached to the robot arm, and the skin member of the robot arm can be simulated at a plurality of positions as the structure is simple.

  Further, since the weight of the weight member can be changed, the weight of the swing arm can be changed in accordance with the weight of the robot arm. The swing arm holds the weight member and is tilted and dropped from the standing state by the fall starting means, so that the posture maintaining state by the joint axis of the industrial articulated robot is released, and the joint axis is used as a fulcrum by its own weight. The movement of the tilting and falling robot arm can be reproduced.

  The test skin member held by the swinging arm that has been tilted and dropped collides with the collision target supported by the support base in a state where the tilting and dropping of the robot arm has been reliably reproduced as described above. The impact load can be accurately measured by the load measuring means.

  Further, in the present invention, if the collided object is a model having standard human body characteristics, it is possible to simulate a state in which the robot arm tilts and falls and the skin member contacts the person. This is extremely advantageous in evaluating the safety of the skin member.

  An embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is an explanatory view showing an example of an industrial articulated robot, FIG. 2 is an explanatory view showing a schematic configuration of an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 3 is a side view showing a partially broken swing arm in the present embodiment. FIG. 4 is a front view explanatory view showing a part of the swing arm in the present embodiment, FIG. 5 is an explanatory view showing the main part of the support base in the present embodiment, and FIG. 6 is in the present embodiment. FIG. 7 is a graph showing the relationship between the thickness of the test skin member and the impact load in a predetermined contact area measured by the measurement process, and FIG. It is a graph which shows the relationship between an impact load and a contact area.

  The collision test apparatus of this embodiment simulates an industrial articulated robot as shown in FIG. As shown in FIG. 1, the industrial articulated robot includes a base portion 1 and a robot arm 2 that is supported by the base portion 1 and has a working tool or the like connected to the tip. The robot arm 2 includes a first arm unit 3 and a second arm unit 4. The first arm part 3 and the second arm part 4 are connected via a first joint shaft 5 so as to be able to bend and extend. The base portion 1 supports and supports the second arm portion 4 through the second joint shaft 6 so as to be swingable. A drive source such as a motor (not shown) is attached to each joint shaft 5 and 6. The robot arm 2 is bent and stretched by controlling the drive source and maintained in a predetermined posture. Further, by attaching a synthetic resin skin member 7 to at least the first arm portion 3 and the second arm portion 4 of the robot arm 2, the safety when the robot arm 2 comes into contact with other portions is improved. Is possible.

  For example, when the signal for controlling the drive source of the second joint shaft 6 is inadvertently interrupted due to a power failure or the like, the robot arm 2 is released from the posture maintenance state and has its own weight with the second joint shaft 6 as a fulcrum. There is a risk of falling by tilting. The collision test apparatus according to the present embodiment reproduces the robot arm 2 tilting and dropping due to its own weight, and the situation when a person contacts the robot arm 2 via the skin member 7. That is, as shown in FIG. 2, the collision test apparatus of the present embodiment includes a swing arm 10 that simulates the robot arm 2, and the swing arm 10 tilts and falls in one direction with its lower end as a fulcrum. It has become. The swing arm 10 holds the test skin member 11 on the tilting side, and holds the weight member 12 on the opposite side. Then, the collision object 14 supported on the support 13 is positioned at the dropping position of the test skin member 11 held by the swing arm 10, and the test skin member 11 collides with the collision object 14. It is supposed to let you.

  The configuration of the collision test apparatus will be described in more detail. As shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, the swing arm 10 is swingably provided by a swing shaft 17 that is rotatably supported by the frame 16 of the base 15. The swing shaft 17 is provided on a connecting member 18 integrally connected to the lower end of the swing arm 10 so as not to rotate. As shown in FIG. 3, the connecting position of the swing arm 10 in the connecting member 18 is not directly above the swing shaft 17, but is located at a predetermined distance in one direction. The swing arm 10 is tilted and dropped to the side where the swing shaft 17 is located, and the opposite side of the swing arm 10 is restrained from swinging by a stopper 19 provided on the frame 16 and assumes an upright posture. As shown in FIG. 4, the swing shaft 17 is connected to an encoder 20 for detecting the rotational position.

  As shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, a test skin member 11 is held on the side of the swing arm 10 that tilts and drops. The test skin member 11 is detachably held by a sliding member 22 slidable along a rail portion 21 extending in the longitudinal direction of the swing arm 10. The sliding member 22 is secured so that the head 24 of the bolt 23 is prevented from coming off inside the rail portion 21 and is slidable at a predetermined position by tightening the nut 25. That is, the bolt 23 and the nut 25 constitute the fixing means of the present invention.

  The test skin member 11 imitates the skin member 7 of the robot arm 2 described above, and the contact area with the collision target 14 is set to a predetermined area in advance, and is suitably used for the skin member 7. A plurality of materials are prepared for each kind of material expected to be used. That is, a plurality of test skin members 11 are prepared for each different synthetic resin material, and a plurality of materials having different thickness dimensions are prepared for each material. Preferable synthetic resin materials include styrene elastomers and expanded polypropylene.

  Further, as shown in FIG. 3, the thickness of the sliding member 22 is changed so that the collision surface of the test skin member 11 is correctly moved at the center of the rocking shaft 17. Adjustment is made so that the surface matches the position directly above the axis of the swing shaft 17. This is to prevent only the surface of the test skin member 11 simulating the skin member 7 from protruding from the swing arm 10 as viewed from the robot arm 2 of the industrial articulated robot.

  As shown in FIG. 3, a plurality of weight members 12 that are detachably supported by a weight support member 26 are held on the upper side of the swing arm 10. By increasing / decreasing each weight member 12 supported by the weight support member 26, the weight of the swing arm 10 can be increased / decreased, so that the weight of the robot arm 2 can be adjusted.

  Further, the frame 16 is provided with a drop starting means 27 for tilting and dropping the swing arm 10 from the standing state. The drop starting means 27 is composed of a motor 28 with a gear box (see FIG. 4) and a cam member 30 provided on an output rotary shaft 29 via the gear box of the motor 28. When the cam member 30 is rotated by the motor 28, the swing arm 10 is pushed out from behind, and the swing arm 10 is tilted and dropped by its own weight.

  As shown in FIG. 4, a fixing pin 31 is provided on one side of the swing arm 10 to maintain the swing arm 10 in an upright posture. The fixing pin 31 is inserted into the insertion hole 35 formed in the insertion member 34 of the frame 16 through the insertion hole 33 of the engaging member 32 provided in the swing arm 10, and the swing arm 10. Prevent inadvertent tilting and falling. When tilting and dropping the swing arm 10, the fixing pin 31 is removed prior to operating the cam member 30.

  As shown in FIG. 2, the support base 13 is a flat base that supports the collision target 14. The collided body 14 is a model having standard human body characteristics, and in this embodiment, a part that simulates the human head is used in this model. As shown in FIG. 5, a mounting plate 36 is provided at the mounting position of the colliding body 14, and below the mounting plate 36, as shown in FIG. An impact load measuring means 37 for measuring the applied impact load is provided. The impact load measuring means 37 includes a load cell 38 and a pair of guide rods 39 that guide the mounting plate 36 in a horizontal state on both sides thereof. The collision load measuring means 37 is connected to the monitor M, and records the measured load per unit time, visual display, printout, storage in a portable recording medium, communication to an external storage means, etc. It is possible to do.

  Next, an example of a test using the collision test apparatus having the above configuration will be described. First, the test skin member 11 is attached to the sliding member 22 of the swing arm 10, and the weight member 12 is attached to the weight support member 26 so that the swing arm 10 has a desired weight. Next, the sliding member 22 is slid to fix the test skin member 11 at a desired position. Thereby, the position of the test skin member 11 can be held at a desired position without changing the position of the weight member 12, and the swing arm 10 has a constant weight assuming the actual robot arm 2. 7 can be selected as appropriate. Further, the weight of the swing arm 10 can be changed by increasing or decreasing the weight member 12 without changing the position of the test skin member 11.

  Subsequently, the colliding body 14 (the head of a human model) is placed on the mounting plate 36 of the support base 13, and the support base 13 is further moved so that the colliding body 14 is the test skin member 11. Position it so that it is at the falling position.

Next, the fixing pin 31 is removed, the cam member 30 of the drop starting means 27 is rotated, the swing arm 10 is tilted and dropped, and the test skin member 11 is made to collide with the collision target 14 to give an impact (impact application). Process). At this time, the impact load received by the collision object 14 is measured by the load cell 38 (measurement process). And an impact provision process and a measurement process are repeatedly performed by changing the material type of the skin member 11 for a test. In the present embodiment, first, the impact applying process and the measuring process are repeatedly performed on a plurality of test skin members 11 having different thickness dimensions for one type of synthetic resin material A, and then about another type of synthetic resin material B. The impact applying step and the measuring step are repeatedly performed on the plurality of test skin members 11 having different thickness dimensions. Thereby, the impact load for every thickness dimension in each synthetic resin material A and B can be measured. Then, due to the impact load measured at this time, as shown in the graph of FIG. 7, the thickness dimension (10 mm to about 10 mm to about each material A and B of the test skin member 11 in a predetermined contact area (4000 mm ^{2 in} FIG. 7). 60 mm) and the impact load can be shown.

  Here, furthermore, the safety of the industrial articulated robot can be easily evaluated by using the data showing the relationship between the impact load equivalent to the human fracture and the contact area, as shown in the graph of FIG. be able to. The data shown in the graph of FIG. 8 shows, for example, the impact load until damage corresponding to a fracture occurs on a human head model having a standard strength of a human skull while changing the contact area for each material type. This data was obtained by measurement, and this data collection operation was performed prior to the test in this embodiment. In addition, the human head model which has the standard intensity | strength of a human skull can use what was produced, for example in Sawbones Corporation of the United States. In this data collection operation, a load is applied to the extent that the human head model is not broken, that is, in the elastic region of the human head model, and the strain corresponding to the load of the human head model is applied to the strain gauge. And check for individual differences.

  Since the impact load equivalent to the human fracture in the predetermined contact area is obtained using the graph of FIG. 8, the human fracture is determined based on the relationship between the thickness dimension and the impact load for each of the materials A and B shown in FIG. A combination of a synthetic resin material having a considerable impact load and an employable thickness dimension can be obtained as evaluation data h (evaluation data generation step).

  Then, using the evaluation data h obtained as described above, it is only necessary to confirm the load of the robot arm 2 in the actual industrial articulated robot, the material type of the skin member 7, and the assumed contact area. The safety of the industrial articulated robot can be evaluated very easily. Alternatively, the material type of the skin member 7 attached to the robot arm 2 can be accurately selected only by confirming the load and the assumed contact area of the robot arm 2 of the actual industrial articulated robot.

  In the present embodiment, a model having a standard human body characteristic is used as the collision target. However, when the skin member 7 is selected in order to prevent damage to other devices due to the drop of the robot arm 2. For example, although not shown in the figure, as the object to be collided, a device simulating a housing of equipment may be used.

  The industry here refers to all industries including not only industry but also primary industry, industry and other secondary industries, and tertiary industries.

Explanatory drawing which shows an example of an industrial articulated robot. Explanatory drawing which shows schematic structure of one implementation apparatus of this invention. Side view explanatory drawing which fractures | ruptures and shows the rocking | fluctuating arm in this embodiment partially. Front view explanatory drawing which fractures | ruptures and shows the rocking | fluctuating arm in this embodiment partially. Explanatory drawing which shows the principal part of the support stand in this embodiment. Explanatory drawing which shows the structure of the impact load measurement means in this embodiment. The graph which shows the relationship between every thickness dimension of the skin member for a test in the predetermined contact area measured by the measurement process, and an impact load. The graph which shows the relationship between the impact load equivalent to a human body fracture, and a contact area.

Explanation of symbols

  DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 2 ... Robot arm, 5 and 6 ... Joint axis | shaft, 7 ... Skin member, 10 ... Swing arm, 11 ... Test skin member, 12 ... Weight member, 13 ... Support stand, 14 ... Colliding body, 15 ... Base , 17 ... oscillating shaft, 23 ... bolt (fixing means), 27 ... drop starting means, 37 ... impact load measuring means.

Claims (2)

A collision test apparatus that simulates a collision of a robot arm that is tilted and dropped by its own weight with the joint axis as a fulcrum when the posture maintenance state by the joint axis of the industrial articulated robot is released,
An oscillating arm whose lower end is pivotably connected to the base via an oscillating shaft;
A weight member detachably held on the swing arm and capable of changing weight;
A test skin member formed of the same material type as the skin member covering the robot arm, detachably attached to the swing arm, and held movably along the length of the swing arm;
Fixing means for releasably fixing the test skin member to a predetermined position along the swing arm;
Drop starting means for tilting and dropping the swing arm from an upright state;
A support base for supporting the object to be collided at a position where the test skin member collides when the swing arm is tilted and dropped;
An impact test apparatus comprising: an impact load measuring means for measuring an impact load applied to the collision target when the test skin member collides.   The collision test apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the collision object is a model having a standard body characteristic of a person.

Images