JPS5964414A - Lateral discharge bucket conveyer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide a bucket conveyer with a sorting function which can laterally discharge the content of a bucket by fixing the bucket to a circulating transport apparatus in such a manner that the side thereof can be engaged and disengaged to incline laterally, and releasing the engagement of the bucket at a fixed position to incline the bucket laterally. CONSTITUTION:A bucket 30 is moved in the arrow direction in engagement with a chain 18. When a limit switch 17 is opened and closed by a cam 16 rotating with a shaft 14, a micro-computer not shown is operated to generate a start signal when the center line of the bucket 30 is aligned with the center line of a lever 43 of an engaging lever 40. The interval of generating a start signal is made equal to the one-pitch transfer time of the bucket 30, so that the lever 43 is operated for an assigned bucket 30 to release the engagement of the bucket 30. Thus, the bucket is turned laterally to discharge the contents thereof to the side of a transport path. This arrangement enables a bucket conveyer having a sorting function, which can discharge the contents of a bucket laterally.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a bucket conveyor, and more particularly to a bucket conveyor that discharges an object in a horizontal direction based on an external command when the object reaches a predetermined position. .

Conventional bucket conveyors were simply transporting devices for transporting objects loaded at the start point of the conveyor and ejecting or processing them at the end point, so when using this as a sorting line for transported objects It was common for conveyors to be provided in a number corresponding to the number of ranks to be sorted. Therefore, a large space was required to install the device.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and has a sorting function that enables conveyed objects to be discharged laterally by tilting a specified bucket at a predetermined position along the route of a bucket conveyor. The purpose is to provide a bucket conveyor with

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIGS. 1A and 1B are a partially cutaway plan view and side view of a bucket conveyor according to the present invention.

Reference numeral 1 designates a frame, and sprockets 15 and 19 are pivotally supported near both left and right ends of the frame, and a chain 18 is suspended between the two sprockets. A plurality of buckets 30 are engaged at predetermined intervals. In this embodiment, nine buckets 30 appear on the upper surface and are held horizontally with their openings facing upward.

Reference numeral 10 denotes a geared motor, which is disposed inside the frame 1 and has a sprocket 11 joined to its shaft.

On the other hand, a separate sprocket 43 is fixed to the shaft 14 of the sprocket 15, and a chain 12 is suspended between it and the sprocket 11.

Further, a cam 16 is fixed at a predetermined position on the shaft 14, and a switch lever of a limit switch 17 comes into contact with this cam 16, and the limit switch 17 opens and closes in response to the rotation of the force l to signal an electric signal. is starting to occur.

Note that detection of the rotation angle and generation of signals are not limited to the cam and limit switch of this embodiment, but can also be used with light-shielding discs, emitters, light receivers, rotary encoders, etc. that generate electrical signals depending on the rotation angle. Bye.

Reference numeral 40 designates locking devices, and in this embodiment, nine locking devices are installed parallel to the chain 18 on the pedestal 1 at intervals equal to the pitch of the buckets 30.

As will be described later, a lever 43 is hinged to the locking device 40, and a hook 44 is fixedly attached to the tip of the lever 43.
By engaging with the letter-shaped guide portion 33, the bucket 3
0 is held approximately horizontally.

The width of the hooker 44 is determined in relation to the width and pitch of the bucket 30, and one or more hookers 44 are always engaged with each bucket being transferred.

2 is a cover for protecting the locking device 40;
5 is a guide plate which will be described later.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken along line A--A shown in FIG. 1.

As described above, the geared motor 10 is disposed inside the frame 1, and the sprocket 11 is fixedly attached to the shaft of the geared motor 10, and the chain 12 is suspended and tensioned from the sprocket 11.

A chain 18 is stretched on the left side of the frame 1, and blocks 21 made of plastic or the like are fixed at predetermined intervals to the left side of the chain via L-shaped fittings 20. an Ω-shaped groove consisting of a parallel-width slit groove cut into one side of the block, and a round hole communicating with the slit groove and bored at approximately the center of the block and having a diameter larger than the slit width. 22 is opened, and a stopper 23, such as a round head bolt, is provided protruding from the upper surface of the block 21.

A U-shaped hinge part 31 is located on the outer surface of the bucket 30.
The shaft 32 has a diameter slightly smaller than the diameter of the central round hole of the Ω-shaped groove 22, which is fixed to the hinge part 31 by caulking or welding after insertion into the tip thereof. It is press-fitted through the slit portion of the shaped groove 22 and is pivotally supported in the round hole.
As a result, the bucket 30 is rotatably supported on the chain 18 about the shaft 32. Furthermore, when the bucket is pulled toward the user, the shaft 32 can escape through the slit groove. Therefore, by adopting this method of not sticking, each bucket 30 can be easily attached and detached.

3 and 4 are chain guides, which prevent the chain 1 from unbalanced loads from buckets etc. on the sides of the chain 18.
8 is held in a predetermined relative position with respect to the side plate of the pedestal 1.

The locking device 40 includes a solenoid composed of a coil portion 41 and a movable core 42, and the upper end of the movable core 42 has a lever 43 with a substantially square cross section that is disposed substantially horizontally above the solenoid. It is pivoted on the lower surface of the center.

One end of the lever 43 is pivoted to the frame by a pin 45 with this as a pivot point, and the other end, that is, the hook 4
The vicinity of the end where 4 is fixed is biased downward by a spring 46.

Reference numeral 5 denotes a guide plate, which is bent approximately 30 degrees downward and is fixed to the side plate of the pedestal 1.
The tilting angle when tilting in the lateral direction about the shaft 32 is limited.

The functions and operations of the embodiment according to the present invention configured as described above will be explained below.

When the power is turned on, the geared motor 10 starts rotating, and the chain 18 is driven through the sprocket 11, the drive chain 12, the sprocket 13, the shaft 14, and the sprocket 15 in order, and the bucket 3 engaged with the chain 18 is driven.
0 are each transported in the direction of the arrow in FIG.

On the other hand, a cam 16 is provided around the shaft 14, and based on the opening and closing of a limit switch 17 in contact with the cam 16, a pulse-like start signal is generated from a separate electronic circuit to execute a program in a microcomputer, which will be described later. Although it occurs,
As shown in FIG. 1, the center line of the bucket 30 and the locking device 4
Since the relative positions of the cam 16 and the mitt switch 17 are adjusted in advance so that the start signal is generated when the center line of the lever 43 of O is substantially coincident with the center line of the lever 43, the interval at which the start signal is generated is determined by the bay of the bucket 30 being transferred. It is equal to the pitch transfer time, and therefore a start signal is generated when the bucket 30 moves to the position of the adjacent bucket. The bucket conveyor according to the present invention is controlled by a microcomputer based on this start signal, but when the transported objects are sorted based on the weight value of a tenon, as shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, the transported objects are Bucket positions (b), (c), ..., (i) are classified into eight rank values set in advance at predetermined weight intervals, and correspond to each of the above rank values 1.2, ..., 8. The corresponding conveyed objects classified by rank are discharged. That is, the RAM (random access
As shown in Figure 3, the bucket position (a),
(b),..., 9 memory areas Ma corresponding to (i)
, Mb, . . . , Mi are provided, and every time the start signal is generated, the entire rank values stored in the memory areas Ma, . . . , Mi are shifted by one in the direction of the arrow in FIG. The rank value of the transported object loaded in the bucket 30 at position (a) is stored. Therefore, the rank values are shifted and stored in each memory area in synchronization with the movement of the bucket 30.

The above operation will be explained according to the flowchart of FIG. 4. Upon input of the start signal, the microcomputer inputs the weight of the object to be transported, and the object is loaded onto the bucket 30 at the bucket position (a). Then, the microcomputer shifts the contents of the nine memory areas Ma, . . . , Mi in its RAM by one. Next, it is determined which rank value the input weight value corresponds to, and the determined rank value is stored in the memory area Ma corresponding to the bucket position (a). Furthermore, the microcomputer searches all the rank values stored in the eight memory areas Mb, .
Outputs a discharge signal to 0. For example, as shown in FIG. 3(a), if the rank values of the transported objects loaded in the buckets 30 at bucket positions (b) and (d) are 1 and 3, the bucket positions and Since the rank values match, a discharge signal is output to the locking device 40 at the bucket positions (b) and (d). Then, the coil portions 4 of these two locking devices 40
1 is energized, the movable iron core 42 is attracted upward,
The lever 43 is pushed up to the position 43'.

As a result, the hooker 44 comes off from the guide part 33 of the bucket 30, and the bucket 30 is moved to the second position by its own weight around the shaft 32.
It tilts in the direction of the arrow in the figure until it reaches a position of 30 degrees limited by the guide plate 5, and discharges the transported objects in a direction transverse to the traveling direction of each bucket 30.

Note that the coil portion 41 of the locking device 40 is energized by a pulsed current based on the discharge signal, and if the pulsed current passes, the current is immediately cut off.
0 starts tilting, the lever 43 is immediately returned to its original position by the spring 46, and the next bucket subsequently transferred can be locked in the lateral direction without tilting.

Then, when each bucket 30 moves to an adjacent bucket position and a start signal is generated again, the next object to be conveyed is loaded onto the bucket 30 at the bucket position (a), for example, as shown in FIG. The conveyed object is discharged in the above-mentioned manner from the bucket 30 at the bucket position (h) where the rank value and the bucket position match.Furthermore, the above-mentioned operation is repeated every time a start signal is generated.

Note that objects to be conveyed that do not correspond to the rank values of 1 to 8, that is, those that are out of rank (for example, have a rank value of zero), are moved to the bucket position (b).
,..., (i), the product is not discharged, but is transported to the terminal end in the same way as in a conventional bucket conveyor, and is discharged as an out-of-grade product in the direction of movement of the conveyor at the bucket position (i).

Also, when the bucket 30 reaches the right end of the conveyor and is reversed and transported in the opposite direction along the lower path of the chain I8, the stopper 23 protruding from the block 21 as shown in FIG. The bucket is transported in a position shown as 30'' with its head abutting the back end of the bucket 30, reaches the left end of the conveyor, returns to its initial position, and circulates along the chain 18.

As described above, the present invention enables the bucket conveyor to have both the functions of transporting and sorting the transported objects, since the transported objects can be discharged laterally at a position determined according to the rank. This eliminates the need for separate equipment for sorting, and the work space required for sorting can be significantly reduced compared to conventional methods.

Furthermore, since the bucket can be attached and detached with a single touch, the bucket can be easily cleaned or replaced.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Figures 1 (A) and (B) are partially cutaway views and side views of a bucket conveyor according to the present invention, and Figure 2 is Figure 1 (A).
FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of a memory area for storing rank values, and FIG. 4 is a flow chart illustrating the operation of the present invention. 1... Frame, 30... Bucket, 40... Locking device. 21st "ff1 43 \, 83-)'('+', -

Claims (5)

[Claims] (1) A transport device disposed on a pedestal, a plurality of buckets that are cyclically transferred by the pedestal and tiltable laterally to the transport direction, and buckets that are disposed on the pedestal and are cyclically transferred. The bucket is configured with a plurality of locking devices that sequentially lock the bucket, and by operating a predetermined locking device to release the lock of the bucket, the bucket is tilted laterally and the transported object in the bucket is A horizontal discharge bucket conveyor characterized by discharging in a horizontal direction. (2) The transport device has a detection device that detects movement of the bucket by one pitch, and discharge of the transported object from a predetermined bucket is controlled by a program executed based on a signal from the detection device. A horizontal discharge bucket conveyor according to claim 1, characterized in that: (3) A chain driven in circulation is used as the conveying device, and a shaft provided at the attachment part of each bucket can be removably engaged with a large diameter groove at the end of each block fixed to the chain. A horizontal discharge conveyor according to claim 1, characterized in that: (4) The locking device has a solenoid, a hooker at its tip for locking the bucket, a lever operated by the solenoid, and a sublink that urges the lever downward, and the hooker The horizontal discharge bucket conveyor according to claim 1, wherein the bucket is locked by engaging with a guide portion formed on the upper surface of the bucket. (5) The bucket is locked with one locking device, then simultaneously locked with two locking devices, and is transported while being locked by repeating this process. A horizontal discharge bucket conveyor according to claim 1.