JPH05210892A - Tape presence inspection device for video cassette - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To automatically detect whether a tape is wound or not regardless of the size and color of a reel hub by providing a position detector for detecting a video cassette, one pair of photosensors fitted to the reel hub and a decision processing means. CONSTITUTION:When the video cassette(VC) 1 is moved on a conveyer 2, the tip of the VC 1 is detected by the position detector consisting of a light emitting element 3 and a light receiving element 4, and a trigger signal is outputted from the position detector. Light is emitted from the photosensors 6 and 7 by this trigger signal. The light from the sensors 6 and 7 is incident upon a tape housing part 1c from a window of the VC 1, and when the reel hub la is wound with the tape, reflected light is almost nil, and consequently, outputs from the photosensors 6 and 7 are nil, so that the outputs are not sent out to a control part. Then, when no tape is wound around the reel hub 1a, the light from the photosensors 6 and 7 is reflected by the reel hub 1a, and is sent to the control part.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a recorded video tape or a blank video tape (hereinafter abbreviated as tape).
The present invention relates to a tape presence / absence inspection device for detecting whether or not a tape is wound around a VC in a manufacturing process of a video cassette (hereinafter abbreviated as VC) accommodating the.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a VC manufacturing process, a "VC tape winding inspection" for checking whether or not a tape is wound inside a VC, which is a step immediately before a work for sticking a label indicating a tape title on the surface of the VC. The work is important. However, in the conventional VC manufacturing process, this work is performed by visual inspection by the operator.

[0003]

By the way, the above-mentioned visual inspection by an operator is a major obstacle from the standpoint of promoting the improvement of productivity in VC manufacturing.
Under such circumstances, an automated inspection apparatus is introduced to check whether or not the tape is wound inside the VC without the operator's visual inspection, and to check whether the tape is unwound.
When C flows into the work process, it is desired that the VC does not flow out to the next work process.

Therefore, as a method that can be considered as an automatic inspection device, light is applied toward the tape by utilizing the sensitivity difference of the optical sensor, and when the tape is wound, there is no reflected light, so that the tape is not used. It is determined that it is wound,
If the tape is not wound, there is return light that is reflected by the reel hub, and this is the method of detecting this and determining that the tape is not wound.

By the way, since there are a short time tape and a long time tape in a tape wound around a VC, a VC having a small diameter of a reel hub (abbreviated as SH-VC),
There are two types of VC (abbreviated as LH-VC) having a large reel hub diameter. Therefore, when manufacturing an automatic inspection device using the above-mentioned optical sensor, SH-VC
Two detection means for detection and LH-VC detection are required.

Further, there is a clamp for fixing the start end of the leader tape on the reel hub. Some of the clamps have the same color as the reel hub and some have different colors. Not only those that reflect the light from the optical sensor. Absent. Therefore,
The optical sensor may detect a clamp of a different color (especially black) and erroneously determine that the tape is present.

The present invention is intended to solve the above-mentioned problems, and an object thereof is whether or not the tape is wound regardless of the size of the reel hub and the color of the clamp of the reel hub. It is an object of the invention to provide a tape inspection device for a video cassette capable of automatically detecting

[0008]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The tape cassette inspection apparatus for a video cassette according to the present invention is intended to achieve the above-mentioned object. The means sends a trigger signal when a video cassette moving by a conveyor is detected. A position detector such as a photocoupler, and light emitted obliquely from the front toward the transparent window of the video cassette detected by the position detector, and an interval slightly larger than the clamp width attached to the reel hub of the video cassette. And a determination processing unit that determines whether or not the tape is wound around the reel hub based on the output from the optical sensor.

[0009]

In the tape cassette presence / absence inspection apparatus according to the present invention having the above-described structure, the presence / absence of the tape is detected by the trigger signal from the position detector. Then, the light emitted from the two photosensors is emitted to the reel hub through the transparent window in the tape storage portion of the VC. Here, the reel hub is white, the clamp is optionally colored, for example black, and the tape is black. Therefore, if there is a tape in the VC, the VC
In both H-VC and LH-VC, there is no reflected light of the light emitted simultaneously from the two photosensors, so it can be determined that there is a tape.

However, when the tape is not present on the VC, there is reflected light of the light emitted from the two optical sensors, or even if the clamps are colored, the two optical sensors have a width greater than the clamp width. The light emitted from the two photosensors at the same time does not enter the colored clamp at the same time because they are arranged at a slightly large interval. From this, it is possible to judge that the tape does not exist because any one of the two optical sensors always has reflected light.

As a result, even if the VCs having different reel hub diameters are moved by the conveyor, the reflected light from the VCs of the light emitted from the two photosensors at the same time is received. It is possible to detect the presence or absence of the tape. Therefore, even if the VC includes a VC without a tape, only the VC with the tape can be moved to the next work process.

[0012]

EXAMPLES Examples will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an embodiment of a tape inspection device for a VC according to the present invention. As shown in FIG. 1, the inspection device M is composed of a detection unit M ₁ and a control unit M ₂ . The output is guided to a warning section B such as a buzzer and a defective article discharge section C.

First, the structure of the detection unit 1 in the embodiment of the present invention will be described. 2A and 2B are a plan view and a front view of the detection unit M ₁ , respectively. As shown in the figure, a light emitting element 3 as a position detector and a light receiving element 4 for detecting light from the light emitting element 3 are arranged on both sides of the conveyor 2 for transferring the VC 1 therebetween. Then, two optical sensors 6 and 7 in which a light emitting element and a light receiving element are integrated are attached to a gate-like bar 5 provided on the conveyor 2.

The photosensors 6 and 7 emit parallel light obliquely in the direction in which the VC 1 advances, and the distance between the two photosensors 6 and 7 is such that the reel shaft 1a of the reel hub 1a in the VC 1 is wound. The clamp 1b is provided at a distance slightly larger than the width of the clamp 1b, that is, at a distance of 10 mm to 20 mm.

VC1 moving by the conveyor 2 is
Guide plates 2a attached to both sides of the conveyor 2
And 2b are positioned parallel to the moving direction and are guided with the side on which the tape is wound upstream.

Next, the operation of the detecting section M ₁ in the tape tape inspection apparatus having the above-mentioned structure will be described. When the VC 1 moves on the conveyor 2, first, the light emitting element 3
When the tip of the VC 1 is detected by the position detector including the light receiving element 4 and the light receiving element 4, a trigger signal is output from the position detector. This trigger signal causes the optical sensors 6 and 7 to operate and emit light, or when the optical sensors 6 and 7 constantly emit light, the control unit M ₂ starts operating.

Light from the optical sensors 6 and 7 enters the tape housing 1c through a transparent window of the VC 1, and when the tape is wound around the reel hub 1a, the light from the optical sensors 6 and 7 is black. There is almost no reflected light to the extent that it is slightly reflected by the tape. Therefore, there is no output from the optical sensors 6 and 7, and no output is sent to the control unit M ₂ .

Further, when the tape is not wound around the reel hub 1a, the light from the optical sensors 6 and 7 is reflected by the reel hub 1a and returns to the optical sensors 6 and 7. Therefore, from the optical sensors 6 and 7. Is sent to the control unit M ₂ .

Further, a case where the reel hub 1a is not wound with tape and the clamp 1b of a different color is attached to the reel hub 1a will be described. When the clamp 1b is located at the center of the window of the VC 1 as shown in FIG. 2 (A), the light from the optical sensors 6 and 7 is reflected by the reel hub 1a, and the optical sensors 6 and 7 respectively. Then, an output different from that when the two optical sensors 6 and 7 do not receive the reflected light is sent to the control unit M ₂ .

However, when the clamp 1b is vertically displaced from the central portion, for example, when the clamp 1b is displaced upward, the light from the optical sensor 6 is applied to the clamp 1b and the light from the other optical sensor 7 is emitted. The reel hub 1a is irradiated. As a result, only the optical sensor 7 receives the reflected light, and the optical sensor 6 does not receive the reflected light.
One of the optical sensors 6 and 7 does not receive the reflected light, or outputs an output different from those received by both of them to the control unit M ₂ .

Table 1 shows whether or not there is a return of reflected light when the light emitted from the optical sensors 6 and 7 is applied to the large reel hub 1a (LH-VC) or the small reel hub 1a (SH-VC). It is a judgment table for judging whether the tape is wound or not.

[0022]

[Table 1]

Next, the structure of the control unit M ₂ will be described with reference to FIG. In the figure, 8 and 9 are input / output circuits to which the signals V ₁ and V ₂ from the optical sensors 6 and 7 are input, and 10 and 11 are warning units B when the tape is not wound from the control unit M _2.
And an output circuit for sending an output to the discharge unit C. Reference numeral 12 is a processor (CPU) that performs processing as shown in the flowchart of FIG.
It is a determination processing unit that performs determination processing based on.

The operation will be described with reference to the flow chart of FIG. 4 based on the configuration shown in FIG. Process S1 In process S1, the position detector determines whether or not the VC1 has reached a predetermined position on the conveyor 2. And V
When the presence of C1 is detected, the process proceeds to the next step.

Process S2 In process S2, the signal V ₁ which is the output from the optical sensor 6 input to the input / output circuit 8 is input to the determination processing means 13. Process S3 In process S3, the signal V ₂ that is the output from the optical sensor 7 that is input to the input / output circuit 9 is input to the determination processing unit 13.

Processing S4 In processing S4, the judgment processing means 13 performs processing according to the judgment table of Table 1 based on the signals V ₁ and V ₂ input from the input / output circuits 8 and 9. Processing S5 and S6 In processing S5, the result of the judgment based on the judgment table of Table 1 is V
When it is determined that the tape is not wound around the reel hub 1a of C1, the outputs V ₃ and V ₄ are output to the warning unit B and the discharge unit C.

Although one embodiment of the present invention has been described above, the present invention is not limited to this embodiment, and various modifications according to the gist of the invention, for example, a position detector on one side of the conveyor 2 It is possible to use a semiconductor device such as a reflection type photocoupler installed on the side of, and to change the number of photosensors to four.

[0028]

As described above, the present invention can automatically detect whether or not the tape is wound regardless of the size of the reel hub and regardless of the color of the clamp of the reel hub. This has an effect that a video cassette, in which a tape is not wound, caused by a mechanical problem in the cassette manufacturing line, a work error, or the like is not mixed in a finished product.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a tape presence / absence inspection device for a video cassette according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of a detection unit included in the tape presence / absence inspection device of the video cassette according to the embodiment of the present invention, FIG.
Is a plan view and (B) is a front view.

FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram of a control unit that constitutes a tape presence / absence inspection device for a video cassette according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is an operation flowchart of the tape presence / absence inspection device for the video cassette according to the embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

M inspection device M ₁ detection unit M ₂ control unit B warning unit C discharge unit 1 video cassette (VC) 1a reel hub 1b clamp 1c tape storage unit 2 conveyor 3 light emitting element 4 light receiving element 6,7 optical sensor 12 processor 13 determination processing means

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A position detector, such as a photocoupler, which sends a trigger signal when a video cassette moving by a conveyor is detected, and a light from diagonally forward toward a transparent window of the video cassette detected by the position detector. And a pair of optical sensors arranged at an interval slightly larger than the clamp width attached to the reel hub of the video cassette, and whether the tape is wound on the reel hub from the output from the optical sensor. A tape cassette presence / absence inspection device for a video cassette, comprising: a judgment processing means for judging.