JPH09225874A - Changing device for spacer of article conveying unit - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To automatize the spacer changing operation of a spacer changer in an article conveying unit retaining articles through spacers by attracting spacers to a recovery conveyor by means of a recovery magnet while enabling fitting by means of a retaining magnet of article conveying unit. SOLUTION: A spacer 2 is attacted by means of retaining magnet pieces 22 arranged at several positions in the circumferential direction above a main body 15 of a cap conveying unit 11, and on this spacer 2 a cap 1 to be fitted to a bottle into which liquid is charged fully is attraction held. This cap conveying unit 11 is conveyed while being attracted by a conveying magnet 21. When the kind of cap 1 is changed. the spacer 2 is replaced with an optimum one, and the change is carried out a spacer changer 23. Namely, after the spacer 2 on the unit 11 carried in the changer 23 is attracted by a recovery magnet and is recovered, a new spacer 2 is supplied through a fitting dunit 25 and it is attracted by the retaining magnet 22 of the conveying unit 11.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a spacer exchanging device for an article conveying tool for exchanging the spacer in an article conveying tool for holding an article via a spacer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In the manufacturing process of shampoo and conditioner,
There is a cap transfer line that transfers caps from the cap aligner to the cap mounting machine that attaches caps to bottles filled with the content liquid. In this transfer line, caps are held by the cap transfer tool (cap hakama) for transfer. There is something to do.

In this case, when it is desired to change the cap type, from the viewpoint of cost reduction, the type of the cap carrier is not changed, but the spacer mounted on the cap carrier is changed to change the cap carrier of the same type. Has adopted a method of reliably gripping caps of different types.

[0004]

However, in the prior art, since the above-mentioned replacement of the spacer is performed manually,
A great deal of labor and time are required for this spacer replacement work.

An object of the present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned circumstances, and an article transfer which can reduce the labor and time of the spacer exchange operation by automating the operation of exchanging the spacers mounted on the article transfer tool. An object of the present invention is to provide a spacer exchanging device.

[0006]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an article carrying tool for carrying an article carrying article through a spacer magnetically held by a holding magnet installed in the article carrying tool. And an article transporting device transporting device that is disposed above and above the article transporting device transporting device so as to be able to move up and down, and has a recovery magnet having a magnetic force stronger than the magnetic force of the holding magnet of the article transporting device. The article conveyer has a collection conveyor that is arranged obliquely upward along the conveyance direction of the article conveyer, and the spacer of the article conveyer conveyed by the article conveyer conveyer by the magnetic force of the collecting magnet. And a spacer collecting device that sucks and collects the product onto the collecting conveyor, and a mounting magnet that is arranged to be movable up and down above the article conveying device conveying device and magnetizes the spacer of the article conveying device. And It has a mounting conveyor which is arranged obliquely downward along the transport direction of the article transport tool transporting apparatus, and matches the transport pitch between the article transport tools transported by the article transport tool transporting apparatus. The article conveying tool, which is supplied to the mounting conveyor and is attracted to the mounting conveyor by the mounting magnet, is conveyed by the article conveying tool conveying device by the magnetic force of the holding magnet of the article conveying tool. And a spacer mounting device to be mounted on.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the invention, the article is a container cap and the article carrier is a cap carrier.

The invention according to claim 1 or 2 has the following operation. During the transportation of the article transport tool by the article transport tool transport device, the spacers mounted on the article transport tool are attracted to the recovery conveyor by the magnetic force of the recovery magnet of the spacer recovery device to be adsorbed and recovered. The spacer to be mounted next, which has been attracted by the magnetic force of the mounting magnet to the mounting conveyor of the device, is magnetically attached to the article carrier by the magnetic force of the holding magnet of the article carrier, and the spacer replacement work Can be automated. Therefore, as compared with the case where the replacement work of the spacer attached to the article carrier is manually performed, the work labor and the work time can be reduced.

[0009]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram showing a spacer exchanging device for a cap conveyor, which is one embodiment of a spacer exchanging device for an article conveyor according to the present invention.
FIG. 2 is a plan view showing the spacer recovery device of FIG.
FIG. 3 is a front view of the spacer recovery device of FIG. FIG.
FIG. 4 is a sectional view taken along line IV-IV in FIG. 5 is shown in FIG.
5 is a sectional view taken along line VV of FIG. FIG. 6 is a plan view showing the spacer mounting device of FIG. FIG. 7 is a front view showing the spacer mounting device of FIG. FIG. 8 shows VIII-VII of FIG.
It is sectional drawing which follows the I line. FIG. 9: shows a cap conveyance tool, (A) is a top view and (B) is a longitudinal cross-sectional view.

In the manufacturing process of shampoo, rinse, etc., a cap 1 (FIG. 9 (B)) as an article is attached to a bottle filled with the content liquid by a cap attaching machine.
The cap mounting machine is supplied with the cap 1 from the aligning machine via a cap transport tool transport conveyor 10 (FIG. 1) as an article transport tool transport device.

The cap conveyer conveyer 10 comprises:
A cap transfer tool (cap hakama) 11 capable of holding the cap 1 is placed on a moving body (for example, a belt 12), and the cap transfer tool 11 is circulated between a cap aligning machine and a cap mounting machine for continuous transfer. To do. FIG.
As shown in (B), a guide magnet 14 is installed on the back side of the belt 12 and on the back side of the belt support plate 13 that supports the belt 12. This guide magnet 14 is
The transfer magnet 21 (described later) of the cap transfer tool 11 is attracted, the cap transfer tool 11 is attracted to the belt 12, and the cap transfer tool 11 is stably transferred by the belt 12 of the cap transfer tool transfer conveyor 10.

Here, the cap carrier 11 is shown in FIG.
As shown in (A) and (B), the carrier body 15 is provided with a pair of cap holding claws 16A and 16B. These cap holding claws 16A and 16B are engaged with the opening inner diameter surface of the cap 1 at the cap holding position where the diameters of the caps are expanded, and hold the cap 1, and at the cap non-holding positions where the diameters of the caps are reduced, the opening inner diameter surface of the cap 1 is held. Away from and release the holding of the cap 1.

A wedge piston-shaped manipulator 17 is built in the lower portion of both cap holding claws 16A and 16B. The manipulator 17 can be elevated and lowered between the holding operation position and the non-holding operation position, and can be switched and set to any of these positions. The cap holding claw 1 at the holding operation position (raised position)
6A and 16B are set to the cap holding position, and the cap holding claws 16A and 16A are set in the non-holding operation position (down position).
Set 6B to cap non-holding position.

A biasing element 18 made of a compression spring is built in the lower portion of the operating element 17. The biasing element 18 always sets the operating element 17 to the holding operation position (raised position) by its spring force. As a result, the cap 1 transferred to the cap transport tool 11 has an opening inner diameter surface that is different from that of the biasing member 18.
By the spring force of, the cap holding claws 16A and 16B set to the cap holding position are fitted and held via the operating element 17.

The cap carrier 11 is a carrier body 1.
An insertion hole 19 through which a magnet for pulling down an operator (not shown) is inserted is provided at the bottom of 5. On the other hand, the operating magnet 20 is installed at the lower center of the operating element 17. The operating element lowering magnet lowers the operating element 17 to the non-holding operation position against the biasing force of the biasing element 18 by the magnetic action of the operating element 17 and the operating magnet 20. 16B
Is reduced to the cap non-holding position so that the holding of the cap 1 can be released.

Further, the cap carrier 11 is provided with a carrier magnet 21 under the carrier body 11. The transfer magnet 21 is provided on the belt 12 of the cap transfer tool transfer conveyor 10.
Under the magnetic action with the guide magnet 14 installed below, the cap carrier 11 is attracted to the belt 12 to contribute to the stable running of the cap carrier 11.

Further, the cap carrier 11 is provided with holding magnets 22 at an upper portion of the carrier body 15, for example, at four circumferential positions. At least the upper and lower surfaces of the holding magnet 22 are magnetically attached to the spacer 2 and the spacer 2 is held by the cap carrier 11. This spacer 2 is made up of many types of caps 1 and one type of cap carrier 11
When it is attached to the, the attachment is surely performed.

Therefore, when the type of the cap 1 is changed, the cap carrier 11 is not changed and the spacer 2 is not changed.
Needs to be replaced with the optimum one for the cap 1 of the changed type. The replacement of the spacer 2 is carried out by the spacer replacement device 23 of the cap carrier. As shown in FIG. 1, the spacer exchanging device 23 of the cap carrier is
The cap transport tool transport conveyor 10, the spacer collecting device 24, and the spacer mounting device 25 are provided.

The spacer collecting device 24 includes a spacer collecting conveyor 26, a collecting chute 27 and a spacer collecting box 28.
The spacer 2 is recovered from the cap carrier 11 which is carried by the cap carrier conveyor 10.

The spacer recovery conveyor 26 is shown in FIGS.
As shown in FIG. 2, the conveyor mechanism 30 is arranged by the elevating mechanism 29 so as to be able to move up and down above the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10. The conveyor mechanism 30 is provided with the cap transport tool 11 of the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10. It is arranged obliquely upward along the transport direction A.

The lifting mechanism 29, as shown in FIG.
An elevating cylinder device 32 is vertically provided on a supporting member 31 which is erected from the side of the cap conveying tool conveying conveyor 10, and a suspension member 34 is fixed to a piston rod 33 of the elevating cylinder device 32, and a conveyor member is attached to the suspension member 34. Mechanism 30
The pair of conveyor frames 35 are fixed.

The elevating mechanism 29 extends and lowers the elevating cylinder device 32 when the spacer 2 is replaced so that the collecting magnet 41 of the conveyor mechanism 30 conveys the spacer 2 of the cap carrier 11 which is transporting the cap carrier 11. The conveyor mechanism 30 is brought closer to the cap carrier conveyer 10 to the extent that it exerts a magnetic effect on. Further, the elevating mechanism 29 contracts the elevating cylinder device 32 when the spacer 2 is not exchanged (during normal operation), and the conveyor mechanism 30 is operated.
The collecting mechanism 41 moves the conveyor mechanism 30 away from the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10 to the extent that it does not magnetically affect the spacer 2 of the cap transport tool 11 that is transporting the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10.

As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, the conveyor mechanism 30 is provided with a drive pulley 36 and a driven pulley 37 at both ends of a pair of conveyor frames 35, and between the drive pulley 36 and the driven pulley 37. The belt 38 is wound around and the drive pulley 36 is driven by the drive motor 39 to travel. The belt 38 continuously runs at substantially the same speed as the belt 12 of the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10 in a direction B substantially the same as the transport direction A of the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10. In addition, the drive motor 3
9 is fixed to the conveyor frame 35 via a support rod 40.

Further, the conveyor mechanism 30 has a plurality of collecting magnets 41 along the belt 38 inside the both conveyor frames 35, as shown in FIGS. 3 and 4.
Prepare on the back side of. The recovery magnet 41 is housed in a support frame 43 having a U-shaped cross section, and the support frame 43 is fixed to the inside of both conveyor frames 35.

The recovery magnet 41 is used in the cap carrier 1.
The magnetic force is stronger than the magnetic force of the holding magnet 22 of No. 1. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 3, when the conveyor mechanism 30 is lowered by the elevating mechanism 29, the cap carrier 1 conveyed by the cap carrier conveyor 10 is conveyed.
The spacer 2 magnetically attached to the first holding magnet 22 is attracted by the magnetic action of the recovery magnet 41 and is attracted to the running belt 38.

Of the recovery magnets 41 arranged along the belt 38, the one closest to the chute 27 and the belt 3
8, a tapered magnet guide 44 made of a non-magnetic material is interposed. Therefore, when the spacer 2 attracted to the running belt 38 by the magnetic force of the recovery magnet 41 reaches the recovery magnet 41 closest to the chute 27, the attraction force of the spacer 2 by the recovery magnet 41 is gradually weakened. As a result, gravity causes the shoot 2 to move away from the belt 38.
It falls to 7. The spacer 2 dropped on the chute 27
As shown in FIG. 1, the spacer is collected in the spacer collection box 28. The recovery chute 27 is supported by a support member 27A (FIG. 5) provided upright from the side of the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10.

By the way, the cap conveyer conveyer 1
In FIG. 0, the floating prevention plate 45 is installed at a position corresponding to the lower side portion of the conveyor mechanism 30 that is inclined. As shown in FIG. 2, the floating prevention plate 45 locks both sides of the upper surface of the cap transport tool 11 transported by the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10, and the cap transport tool 11
When the spacer 2 is pulled away from the cap carrier 11 by the magnetic force of the recovery magnet 41 of the conveyor mechanism 30, the cap carrier 11 is prevented from rising.

As shown in FIG. 1, the spacer mounting device 25 comprises an aligning device (dexter) 46, a cap conveyor 47, a timing conveyor 48, a timing screw 49 and a spacer mounting conveyor 50.

The aligning device 46 is then operated by the cap carrier 11.
The spacers 2 to be mounted on are aligned. The cap conveyor 47 continuously supplies the spacers 2 aligned by the alignment device 46 to the timing conveyor 48. On the other hand, the timing screw 49 is arranged on the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10, and the spacer recovery device 2 is installed during transport on the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10.
Cap transport tool 11 with spacer 2 removed at 4
Is set to a predetermined conveyance pitch before being carried into the spacer mounting device 25.

In the timing conveyor 48, a belt 52 having locking claws 51 at predetermined intervals is driven by a servo motor (not shown), and one spacer 2 can be arranged between each locking claw 1. It is said that The timing conveyor 48 intermittently drives the belt 52 to supply the spacers 2 to the spacer mounting conveyor 50. At this time, the supply pitch between the spacers 2 is set by the timing screw 49 on the cap carrier tool carrier 10. The belt 5 so that it matches the conveyance pitch between the cap conveyance tools 11.
2 is driven intermittently. In addition, this timing conveyor 48
Is the conveyor frame 59 of the spacer mounting conveyor 50.
Supported by

The spacer mounting conveyor 50 is shown in FIGS.
As shown in FIG. 8, a conveyor mechanism 54 is arranged by an elevating mechanism 53 so as to be able to move up and down above the cap transport tool transporting device 10. The conveyor mechanism 54 includes the cap transport tool 11 in the cap transport tool transporting device 10. It is arranged obliquely downward along the transport direction A of.

The lifting mechanism 53, as shown in FIG.
An elevating cylinder 56 is vertically provided on a supporting member 55 which is erected from the side of the cap conveying tool conveying conveyor 10, a suspension member 58 is fixed to a piston rod 57 of the elevating cylinder 56, and a conveyor mechanism 54 is attached to the suspension member 58. The pair of conveyor frames 59 are fixed.

The elevating mechanism 53 extends the elevating cylinder 56 when the spacer 2 is replaced, and the cap transport tool 1 is transported by the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10.
The holding mechanism 22 brings the conveyor mechanism 54 close to the cap conveyer conveyance conveyor 10 to the extent that the holding magnet 22 exerts a magnetic action on the spacer 2 attracted to the belt 62 of the conveyor mechanism 54 as described later. In addition, the elevating mechanism 53 causes the elevating cylinder device 56 to contract when the spacer 2 is not replaced (during normal operation), so that the cap conveyor tool conveyor 1
The holding magnet 22 of the cap carrier 11 which is carrying 0
The conveyor mechanism 54 is moved away from the cap carrier transport conveyor 10 to such an extent that the mounting magnet 65 of the conveyor mechanism 54 is not magnetically affected.

In the conveyor mechanism 54, as shown in FIGS. 6 and 7, a drive pulley 60 and a driven pulley 61 are arranged at both ends of a pair of conveyor frames 59, and between the drive pulley 60 and the driven pulley 61. The belt 62 is wound around, and the drive pulley 60 is driven by the drive motor 63 to travel on the belt 62. This belt 62
Continuously travels in substantially the same direction C at substantially the same speed as the belt 12 of the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10. Further, the drive motor 63 is fixed to the conveyor frame 59 via the support rod 64.

Further, the conveyor mechanism 54 has a plurality of mounting magnets 65 along the belt 62 inside the both conveyor frames 59, as shown in FIGS. 7 and 8.
Prepare on the back side of. The mounting magnet 65 is housed in a support frame 67 having a U-shaped cross section, and the support frame 67 is fixed to the inner surfaces of both conveyor frames 59.

As shown in FIG. 7, when the spacer 2 is supplied from the timing conveyor 48 to the spacer mounting conveyor 50 as described above, the spacer 2 is attached to the mounting magnet 65 of the conveyor mechanism 54 in the spacer mounting conveyor 50.
Is attracted to the belt 62 by the magnetic action of
Drive along with. In this state, when the conveyor mechanism 54 is lowered by the lifting mechanism 53, the belt 6
The spacer 2 adsorbed by 2 is gradually hooked on the cap holding claws 16A and 16B of the cap carrier 11 which is carried by the cap carrier conveyor 10, and eventually the holding magnet 22 of the cap carrier 11 is held. It is adsorbed and transferred to the cap carrier 11.

Next, the operation will be described. When the type of the cap 1 is changed and the spacer 2 is changed, the spacer exchanging device 23 of the cap carrier is operated. At this time, first, the spacer 2 to be mounted next on the cap carrier 11 is put into the alignment device 46 of the spacer mounting device 25. Next, under the operating condition of the cap transfer tool transfer conveyor 10, the spacer recovery device 24 is activated, and while the conveyor mechanism 30 is operated, the elevator mechanism 29 lowers the conveyor mechanism 30 to a predetermined position to transfer the cap. The spacer 2 is recovered from the cap transport tool 11 transported by the tool transport conveyor 10.

The spacer mounting device 25 is activated with a slight delay from the activation of the spacer recovery device 24, and the elevating mechanism 53 is operated while operating the aligning device 46, the cap conveyor 47, the timing conveyor 48, the timing screw 49 and the conveyor mechanism 54. The timing conveyor 48 and the conveyor mechanism 54 are lowered to a predetermined position. This allows
The spacers 2 supplied from the aligning device 46 to the conveyor mechanism 54 via the cap conveyor 47 and the timing conveyor 48 and adsorbed to the belt 62 of the conveyor mechanism 54.
Are mounted on the cap transport tool 11 being transported by the cap transport tool transport conveyor 10.

According to the above-described embodiment, the spacer 2 mounted on the cap carrier 11 while the cap carrier 11 is being carried by the cap carrier 10 is shown.
The spacer recovery conveyor 26 of the spacer recovery device 24.
The magnetic force of the recovery magnet 41 in FIG.
The spacer 2 to be mounted next, which is attracted by the magnetic force of the mounting magnet 65 to the belt 62 in the spacer mounting conveyor 50 of the spacer mounting device 25, is transferred to the cap carrier 11 by the magnetic force of the holding magnet 22 of the cap carrier 11. Since the magnets are attached by magnetic attachment, the replacement work of the spacer 2 can be automated. Therefore, as compared with the case where the replacement work of the spacer 2 mounted on the cap transport tool 11 is performed manually, the work labor and the work time can be reduced.

In the above embodiment, the case where the article is the cap 1 and the article carrier is the cap carrier 11 has been described, but it is applicable as long as the article carrier holds the article through the spacer. it can. Further, in the spacer recovery device 24 in the above-described embodiment, the cap transport tool transfer conveyor 10 is described with the floating prevention plate 45 installed, but the floating prevention plate 45 may not be installed. Further, in the elevating mechanism 29 of the spacer collecting device 24 and the elevating mechanism 53 of the spacer mounting device 25, the elevating cylinder devices 32 and 56 elevate and lower the conveyor mechanisms 30 and 54, respectively. , 54 may be moved up and down by a motor and a screw mechanism.

[0041]

As described above, according to the spacer exchanging device for the article conveying tool according to the present invention, the exchanging work of the spacers mounted on the article conveying tool can be automated to reduce the labor and time of the spacer exchanging operation. .

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram showing a spacer exchanging device for a cap conveying tool, which is one embodiment of a spacer exchanging device for an article conveying device according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a plan view showing the spacer recovery device of FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is a front view of the spacer recovery device of FIG.

FIG. 4 is a sectional view taken along the line IV-IV in FIG. 2;

FIG. 5 is a sectional view taken along the line VV of FIG. 2;

FIG. 6 is a plan view showing the spacer mounting device of FIG. 1.

FIG. 7 is a front view showing the spacer mounting device of FIG. 6;

FIG. 8 is a sectional view taken along line VIII-VIII in FIG.

9A and 9B show a cap carrier, in which FIG. 9A is a plan view and FIG. 9B is a vertical sectional view.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Cap (article) 2 Spacer 10 Cap transport tool transport conveyor (article transport tool transport device) 11 Cap transport tool (article transport tool) 12 Belts 16A, 16B Cap holding claws 22 Holding magnet 23 Cap spacer spacer replacement device 24 Spacer collecting device 25 Spacer mounting device 26 Spacer collecting conveyor 29 Lifting mechanism 30 Conveyor mechanism 38 Belt 41 Collecting magnet 48 Timing conveyor 49 Timing screw 50 Spacer mounting conveyor 53 Lifting mechanism 54 Conveyor mechanism 62 Belt 65 Mounting magnet

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. An article transport tool transporting apparatus for transporting the article transport tool, which holds an article through a spacer magnetically attached and held by a holding magnet installed in the article transport tool, and the article transport tool transport. It is arranged so that it can be raised and lowered above the device,
A recovery magnet having a recovery magnet having a magnetic force stronger than that of the holding magnet of the article carrier, and having a recovery conveyor inclined obliquely upward along the carrying direction of the article carrier tool. And a spacer collecting device for attracting and adsorbing the spacers of the article conveying device conveyed by the article conveying device conveying device to the collecting conveyor by the magnetic force of the collecting magnet, and the article conveying device conveying device. It is arranged so that it can be raised and lowered above the
In the article transport tool transporting apparatus, a loading magnet for magnetically attaching the spacer is provided inside, and a loading conveyor is provided that is inclined obliquely downward along the transport direction of the article transporting tool transport apparatus. The spacers, which are supplied to the mounting conveyor and are attracted to the mounting conveyor by the mounting magnet, in conformity with the transportation pitch between the article transportation tools to be transported, by the magnetic force of the holding magnet of the article transportation tool, A spacer replacing device for an article transporting tool, comprising: a spacer mounting device to be mounted on the article transporting tool transported by the article transporting tool transporting device. 2. The spacer exchanging device for an article carrier according to claim 1, wherein the article is a cap of the container, and the article carrier is a cap carrier.