JPH0232095Y2 - - Google Patents

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] The present invention has a number of horizontal circulation paths for article holders arranged in a stacked manner, and each horizontal circulation path has a number of article holders connected in an endless ring shape by an endless chain for driving. This invention relates to a multi-stage rotating rack that supports a table so as to be able to circulate freely.

Conventionally, it has been thought that this type of multi-stage rotating rack is of no use unless the article receiving trays can be circulated and moved separately for each stage, and therefore, an independent drive means is provided for each stage. was. However, if the frequency of picking operations is relatively low and it is not so much that the article receptacles in each stage must be circulated separately, it is possible to have several article receptacles share one driving means. This allows for significant cost reductions without significantly reducing work efficiency.

The present invention has been devised in view of these points, and one embodiment thereof will be described below with reference to the attached illustrative drawings.

First, the overall structure of the rotating rack will be explained based on FIGS. 1 and 2, which show rotating racks equipped with conventional drive means. Reference numeral 1 indicates horizontal circulation paths stacked in multiple stages, and each horizontal circulation At both lengthwise ends of the path 1, an idling gear 2 and a driving gear 4 driven by a motor 3 are respectively supported, and an endless chain 5 is connected between the gears 2 and 4 at both ends. In order to enable the trays 6, on which the trays 6 are suspended and endlessly connected to each other at regular intervals by the endless chain 5, to circulate through the horizontal circulation path 1, a flat supporting inner rail 7 is provided. and a supporting outer rail 8.

The supporting outer rail 8 is arranged in an endless manner including the U-turn portions at both ends of the horizontal circulation path 1, but the supporting inner rail 7 is arranged only in the straight path portion. Therefore, when the tray 6 rotates around the U-turn portions at both ends, it is configured to be supported on the inside by the gear wheels 2 and 4.

As shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, the tray 6
is a rectangular saucer shaped with an open front end located outside the horizontal circulation path 1, and is provided with bearing plates 9 and 10 on the lower side of the bottom plate on the open side and on the outside of the side wall on the opposite side. There is. Reference numeral 11 denotes a supporting outer roller, which is pivotally supported by a horizontal shaft on the front end side bearing plate 9 at the center position in the width direction of the tray 6, and rolls on the supporting outer rail 8.
Reference numeral 12 denotes a pair of inner supporting rollers, which are pivotally supported by horizontal shafts at two symmetrical locations in the width direction of the tray 6 on the outer lower end of the rear end side bearing plate 10, and are mounted on the inner supporting rollers. 7. Rolling on top.

The endless chain 5 has both ends pivotally connected to the upper horizontal bent portion 10a of the bearing plate 10 and the ends of the upper horizontal bent portions 10a of the adjacent trays 6 by a vertical shaft 13. A portion of the tray 6 is composed of an endless chain 5 and a link 5a.
It also serves as a link. a pair of vertical shafts 13 corresponding to link pins of the endless chain 5;
A guide roller 14 for regulating the direction of tray movement is pivotally mounted below the upper horizontal bent portion 10a of the bearing plate. This pair of guide rollers 14
are located directly above the supporting inner roller 12 and close to each other.

15 is a groove-shaped guide rail for regulating the direction of tray movement into which the guide roller 14 is loosely fitted;
Mounting part 1 with dovetail grooves 16 for mounting in two stages, upper and lower
It is formed integrally with the supporting inner rail 7 via 7. The support outer rail 8 also has upper and lower 2
A mounting portion 19 having mounting dovetail grooves 18 on the step is integrally formed. Reference numeral 20 denotes inner support columns erected at appropriate intervals, including the supporting inner rail 7 and the guide rail 15 for regulating the direction of tray movement.
is attached by a nut 21 and bolt 22 that are non-rotatably fitted into the attachment dovetail groove 16 of the attachment portion 17. 23 is the inner support 20
An outer support that is erected to face the
The supporting outer rail 8 is mounted by nuts 24 and bolts 25 that are non-rotatably fitted within the mounting dovetails 18 of the mounting portion 19 thereof.

The rotary rack device configured as described above rotates the endless chain 5 through the drive gear 4 by the corresponding motor 3 to rotate the endless connecting tray 6 in the horizontal circulation path 1 of any stage. , rotate in any direction on the horizontal circulation path 1,
It is possible to call a specific tray 6 to the home position HP, and load and unload a load (such as a container) W onto the called tray 6 either mechanically or manually. At this time, the tray 6 rotating on the horizontal circulation path 1 is supported by the supporting outer rail 8 via one supporting outer roller 11 (a plurality of supporting rollers may be provided in the tray movement direction). At the same time, the inner side is held in a horizontal state by being supported in the tray movement direction by the support inner rail 7 via two support inner rollers 12, and furthermore, there are two movement direction regulating rollers in the tray movement direction. By loosely fitting the guide roller 14 into the groove-shaped guide rail 15 and moving, the guide roller 14 is prevented from meandering left and right with respect to the direction of movement, and moves straight in a constant direction between the U-turn portions at both ends.

Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described based on FIGS. 5 and 6. The horizontal circulation path 1 is divided into a plurality of groups, with two vertically adjacent horizontal circulation paths 1 as one group, The drive gear wheels 4 located at one end of the upper and lower horizontal circulation paths 1 belonging to each group are interlocked and connected to each other by a common vertical rotation shaft 26, and the drive gears 4 are arranged for one drive gear for each group. The vertical rotation shaft 26 is attached to the motor 3 for
A pair of gear wheels 27a, 27b and a transmission chain 2
It is interlocked and connected via 8.

Although each group is divided so as to include two levels of horizontal circulation paths 1, upper and lower, the number of levels of horizontal circulation paths 1 that belong to one group is not limited. Also, not all groups have to be divided so as to include the same number of horizontal circulation paths 1.

Reference numeral 29 denotes a take-up movable frame provided for each horizontal circulation path 1 in each stage, which pivotally supports the free-rotating toothed wheel 2 on which the endless drive chain 5 is suspended, and also supports the supporting outer rail 8. If the endless driving chain 5 is loosened while supporting the U-turn portion 8a, the endless driving chain 5 of each stage can be moved in the direction of the arrow 31 using a pulling and fixing means 30 using a bolt/nut or the like. You can make each part tense separately. 32 enters into the gap from the lateral side to fill the gap that occurs between the U-turn part 8a and the straight part 8b of the supporting outer rail 8 when the movable frame 29 is moved in the direction of the arrow 31. This is a wedge-shaped gap-filling board.

In a conventional rotating rack of this kind, as shown in FIG. 1, a driving motor 3 is disposed in each horizontal circulation path 1 of each stage, so that the trays 6 of each stage can be circulated individually. Was. Therefore, the number of motors and transmission means equal to the number of trays 6 is required, which has the drawback of increasing not only the equipment cost but also the maintenance cost. Moreover, if the height of each stage is so low that the motors of each stage interfere with each other, it is necessary to devise measures such as arranging the motors of each stage alternately on the left and right as shown in Figure 1, which increases costs. That was one of the causes. Further, the drive gear 4, the drive motor 3, the U-turn portion 8a of the supporting outer rail 8, etc. are attached to the take-up movable frame 29.

However, according to the multi-stage rotating rack of the present invention, as shown in the above embodiment, the horizontal circulation path is divided into a plurality of groups smaller than the number of stages, and the driving endless Since the drive gears that drive the chain are interlocked and connected to the drive motor provided for each group, it is possible to control the endless chain for driving a specific stage for loading and unloading goods. If you try to rotate the article tray of the relevant stage to circulate, the endless driving chains of the other stages in the group to which this particular stage belongs will also rotate, and all the stages ( In the embodiment, the article receiving racks in two vertically adjacent stages move in circulation at the same time, but the number of drive devices including drive motors and transmission means is large compared to the number of stages in the entire rotating rack. equipment costs and maintenance costs can be significantly reduced.

Therefore, the multi-stage rotary rack of the present invention can be used extremely effectively when the frequency of picking operations is relatively low and the article receptacles at each stage do not have to be circulated individually. .

In the embodiment, the tray 6 is used as an example of an article receiving stand, but it may be of any structure, such as a container type or a basket type.
In addition, a part of the article receiving stand (tray 6) (bearing plate 1
0) was used as a driving endless chain 5 which also served as a chain link, but a normal endless chain assembled in an endless shape separately from the article holder was used, and the article holders were attached to this at appropriate intervals. Also good.

Furthermore, since it is desirable to provide a take-up device for tensioning the endless drive chain 5 at each stage, the structure can be simplified by providing the take-up device on the free rotating gear 2 side as shown in the embodiment. It's convenient. This is because, when provided on the drive gear 4 side, the vertical rotating shaft 26 is divided into each stage and supported on the take-up movable frame of each stage, and the vertical rotating shafts of each divided stage are connected to each other by a universal joint. It becomes necessary to connect.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figure 1 is a schematic plan view with the front half as a cross-sectional plan view, Figure 2 is a front view, Figure 3 is a longitudinal side view of the main part, Figure 4 is a plan view of the main part, and Figure 5 is the present invention. FIG. 6 is a schematic plan view showing one embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 6 is a front view of the main parts thereof. 1...Horizontal circulation path, 2...Idle gear ring, 3...
Drive motor, 4... Drive gear, 5... Endless drive chain, 6... Tray (goods holder), 7...
... Inner rail for support, 8... Outer rail for support,
8a... U-turn part of the same rail, 8b... Straight part of the same rail, 11... Supporting outer roller, 12...
... Inner roller for support, 14 ... Guide roller for regulating movement direction, 15 ... Guide rail for regulating movement direction, 26 ... Vertical rotation shaft for interlocking drive gear, 27
a, 27b...Transmission tooth ring, 28...Transmission chain, 29...Movable frame for take-up.

Claims (1)

[Scope of utility model registration request] A large number of horizontal circulation paths for article holders are arranged in a stacked manner, and each horizontal circulation path is equipped with a multi-stage rotating rack that supports a number of article holders that are connected in an endless ring shape by an endless drive chain and can be freely circulated. In this method, the horizontal circulation path is divided into a plurality of groups smaller than the number of stages thereof, and each group has one driving gear for driving an endless chain for driving in the horizontal circulation path belonging to each group. A multi-stage rotating rack that is interlocked and connected to a drive motor installed at the same time.