JPH081099A - Color sorter for bottles - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To make it possible to sort waste bottles by colors with good accuracy even in the case of the bottles having relatively high transparency by changing over the light intensity or illuminance to two stages with a color sorter for bottles provided with the light source disposed to face a color image pickup camera across a transporting path. CONSTITUTION:The bottles m2 of, for example, a brown color having the relatively low transparency are transported and the light source 5 is changed over to the two stages by a command from a computer 7 while the bottles exist in the visual field of the lens part 6a of the color image pickup camera 6, by which the light intensity or luminance thereof is changed over to large and small values. First, the light source is changed over to the light source of the low illuminance. The color difference from the other kind of the bottles having the relatively low transparency is small when the light intensity or illuminance is relatively low and, therefore, decision is not made. The transmitted light is received at the time of the high intensity or illuminance to be changed over next and the bottles of the brown color and black having the relatively poor transparency are identified. The middle-diameter bottles having the relatively high transparency and low transparency are thus housed in any of housing casings 12 to 15 with good accuracy.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method for selecting a waste glass bottle, which is a target for recycling resources, of municipal solid waste.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art At present, waste bottles are particularly selected for recycling in each of the municipal waste treatments. For example, the waste bottles are sorted according to each color, sorted, and crushed into cullet. It is used to make new bottles of the same color, or some bottles are supplied to the manufacturer as-is, all of which must be visible to the operator or rely on an incomplete color detection device. There wasn't.

[0003]

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and relates to a waste bottle sorting apparatus which can automatically and accurately perform color sorting of waste bottles and can be efficiently used as a resource for recycling.

[0004]

[Means for Solving the Problems] The above object is to provide a carrier for transporting a bottle along a predetermined carrier path, a color image pickup camera disposed on one side of the carrier, and the carrier path. In a bottle color selecting device provided with a light source arranged to face the color imaging camera, a light intensity of the light source when the bottle is conveyed in front of the color imaging camera, or This is achieved by a bottle color selection device characterized in that the illuminance is switched in two stages.

[0005]

[Function] When a brown or black bottle having a relatively low transparency in a bottle passing in front of the color image pickup camera receives high light intensity or illuminance, for example, if it is brown, it is determined to be brown, and if it is black, it is black. Therefore, it is possible to distinguish between brown and black. Further, a bottle that passes through a color imaging camera and has a relatively high transparency, such as a light blue bottle, is judged to be blue when receiving low light intensity, or another relatively transparent bottle. High bottle colors can also be reliably identified. In the past, light blue or light brown could not be discriminated by these relatively highly transparent bottles, but this can be surely discriminated.

[0006]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS A bottle color selecting apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

1 and 2 show a bottle color selecting device according to a first embodiment of the present invention, in which the whole device is designated by 1, and a belt conveyor 2 is wound around a driving roller 3 and a driven roller 4. A pulse encoder E is attached to the driven roller 4. As shown in FIG. 2, a color image pickup camera 6 is arranged on the upstream side of the belt conveyor 2 and faces the light source 5 with the belt conveyor 2 interposed therebetween. The intensity or illuminance of the light source 5 is switched in two steps according to the output voltage from the computer 7. The color image pickup camera 6 has a structure similar to that of a known color television camera, and from the color signal in the image pickup signal to the color difference signal R,
G and B are formed, and the computer 7 judges the color according to these levels. According to the judgment, the drive shafts 8a, 9a, 10a and 11a of the diverters 8, 9, 10 and 11 arranged along one side of the belt conveyor 2 are driven,
The bottles transported from the upstream side are rotated to the position shown by the one-dot chain line to accommodate the casings 12, 12
It is configured to be discharged to 13, 14, and 15. Further, a case 16 for accommodating a color or colorless bottle not accommodated in any of the accommodating casings 12, 13, 14 and 15 is provided immediately below the discharge end of the belt conveyor 2.
Are being discharged. The first embodiment of the present invention is constructed as described above. Next, this operation will be described. The pulse encoder E measures the number of rotations of the driven roller 4, and the pulse is supplied to the computer 10 to calculate the transport distance of the bottle from this.

In FIGS. 1 and 2, various kinds of medium-sized bottles sorted by diameter are supplied from the upstream side, and in FIG. 2, a brown bottle m ₂ having a relatively low transparency is conveyed. This is the lens section 6a of the color image pickup camera 6.
The light source 5 is switched in two steps in response to a command from the computer 7 while passing in front of, ie, in this field of view, and its light intensity or illuminance is switched between large and small.
When entering the field of view of the color imaging camera 6, first, a light source with low illuminance is used, and a brown bottle with relatively low transparency is regarded as a bottle with other relatively low transparency when light intensity or illuminance is low. Since the color difference is small, it is not judged when this intensity or illuminance is low, and the transmitted light is received at the next high intensity or illuminance to distinguish the brown and black bottles with relatively poor transparency. be able to. If it is brown, the diverter 8 is driven (this timing is the time from passing through the camera 6 to reaching it is determined by the pulse of the pulse encoder E), and the bottle is placed in the housing casing 12 facing it. Discharge.
Similarly, if it is a medium-sized bottle m ₄ which is relatively low in transparency and is black, the diverter 10 is driven to discharge it to the accommodation box 14 facing it.

Next, when a medium-sized bottle having a relatively high transparency reaches the front of the camera 6, the transmitted light has a luminous intensity higher than a predetermined level even if the illuminance is lowered immediately after entering the visual field as in the above case. When the camera 6 receives the light, if the bottles of relatively high transparency are blue and brown in this embodiment, when the blue medium-sized bottle m ₃ passes in front of this, the diverter 9 is identified as blue. It is driven and discharged into the housing casing 13 facing it. If it is brown, diverter 11
Is discharged to the housing casing 15 facing it. The illuminance of the light source 5 is made high while the camera 6 is in the field of view. At that time, since the color of the medium-sized bottle having relatively high transparency is already selected, this output is ignored.

As described above, the medium-sized bottle having a relatively high transparency and the medium-sized bottle having a relatively low transparency are accurately accommodated in any one of the casings 12, 13, 14 and 15 and have any color. The bottle m ₅ which does not belong to the container or is colorless and transparent is discharged from the discharge end of the belt conveyor 2 to the housing casing 16.

FIG. 3 shows a bottle color selecting apparatus according to a second embodiment of the present invention, which is designated by 21 as a whole.
The parts corresponding to those of the first embodiment are designated by the same reference numerals, and detailed description thereof will be omitted.

That is, in this embodiment, the light source 22
Is a plurality of fluorescent lamps 25a, 25a, 25a, 25b, 25
b, 25b, these two groups of fluorescent lamps 25
Among the a and 25b, the fluorescent lamp 25a of the first group is constantly turned on, and the fluorescent lamp 25b of the second group is switched between on and off in synchronization with the shutter of the camera 23.
Now, when the medium bottle m ₂ having a relatively low degree of transparency reaches the front of the camera 23, first, according to a command from the computer 24, all the fluorescent lamps 25a and 25b are turned on. That is, at this time, the color of the medium diameter bottle having a relatively low transparency is selected, and if it is determined to be brown, it is discharged into the corresponding housing casing 12. Further, as soon as the medium-sized bottles m ₁ and m ₃ having high transparency enter the field of view of the camera 23, the fluorescent lamp 25b is turned off by a command from the computer 24. As a result, the color of the bottle having a relatively high transparency that allows the light having a relatively low illuminance to pass through is selected, and in the present embodiment, blue and brown are selected and discharged to the housing casing facing the bottle.

FIG. 4 shows a bottle color selecting apparatus according to a first embodiment of the present invention, which is designated by 31 in its entirety, and parts corresponding to those in the above embodiment are designated by the same reference numerals, and a detailed description thereof will be given. Omit it. That is, according to this embodiment, the light source 3
A liquid crystal filter 33 is arranged in front of and in close proximity thereto. As is well known, this is a transparent state when a voltage is applied, becomes opaque when the voltage is zero, and is obtained by extending a liquid crystal emulsion on a plastic sheet of a good conductor. The voltage of 33 is switched between high and low in order to make the illuminance of the transmitted light from the constant light source 32 large and small, thereby distinguishing the bottle having relatively low transparency from the bottle having high transparency as in the above embodiment. Make a selection.

Although the respective embodiments of the present invention have been described above, the present invention is not limited to these, and various modifications can be made based on the technical idea of the present invention.

For example, in the above embodiments, the belt conveyor was used as the bottle carrier, but a vibrating conveyor having a linear trough may be used instead.

In the above embodiment, the light source 22 is composed of a plurality of fluorescent lamps 25a and 25b, but a spherical lamp may be used instead of the fluorescent lamps to selectively turn on and off. .

Further, in the above embodiment, the illuminance of the light rays from each light source is set to low illuminance immediately after the bottle enters the visual field of the camera and switched to high illuminance within the visual field. Good.

Although the color selection of the medium bottle has been described in the above embodiments, the present invention can be applied to the color selection of the large, medium and small bottles. Moreover, in the above, the medium bottle m ₁ having relatively high transparency and the brown medium bottle m having relatively low transparency m
_{Although the} sheets are discharged into the storage boxes 15 and 12 which are separate from the storage box _2, they may be discharged into a common storage box.

[0019]

As described above, according to the bottle color selecting apparatus of the present invention, any bottle color can be reliably and accurately selected.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side view of a bottle color selecting device according to a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a plan view of the same.

FIG. 3 is a plan view of a bottle color selecting device according to a second embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a plan view of a color selecting device for a waste bottle according to a third embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a side view of the same.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Bottle Color Sorter 2 Belt Conveyor 5 Light Source 6 Color Imaging Camera 7 Computer 21 Bottle Color Sorter 22 Light Source 23 Color Imaging Camera 25a Fluorescent Lamp 25b Fluorescent Lamp 31 Bottle Color Sorter 32 Light Source 33 Liquid Crystal Filter

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A transporter for transporting a bottle along a predetermined transport path, a color image pickup camera arranged on one side of the transporter, and a color image pickup camera opposed to the color image pickup camera across the transport path. In a bottle color selecting device provided with a light source that is arranged in the same manner, the light intensity or the illuminance of the light source is switched between two stages when the bottle is conveyed in front of the color imaging camera. A bottle color selection device. 2. The bottle color selecting apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the switching is performed by controlling a voltage applied to the light source. 3. The bottle according to claim 1, wherein the light source is composed of a plurality of lamps or fluorescent lamps, and the illuminance can be switched between two levels by selectively turning on or off these lamps or fluorescent lamps. Color sorter. 4. The liquid crystal filter is disposed in front of the light source, and the light intensity or illuminance can be switched between two levels by controlling the voltage applied to the liquid crystal filter. Bottle color sorter.