JPS60210720A - Monitoring device for clean room - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To achieve an automatic monitoring at a high accuracy by automatically travelling a vehicle on a specified locus in a clean room to have a probe of a dust meter automatically scanning with a displacement mechanism provided thereon. CONSTITUTION:A lift mechanism 2 displacing vertically is carried on an unmanned vehicle 1 and a rotary mechanism is attached to the lift mechanism 2 to rotatively displace a mobile section thereof. The mobile section is equipped with an X-Y table 3 in a horizontal attitude and a mobile part 4 of the table 3 which displaces two-dimensionally within a horizontal plane is equipped with an air sampling probe 5 of a dust meter in a vertical attitude. The vehicle 1 is also equipped with a controller centered on a computer, a dust meter, a tape recorder for recording outputs thereof and a DC power source unit for driving all these components.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to an inspection device for substantially automatically carrying out leak inspection and cleanliness inspection of air filters in a clean room.

For air filters (HEPA filters) installed on the ceiling or wall of a clean room, the following leakage test is generally performed. This is an inspection to see if there is any air leaking from the filter surface that does not pass through the filter material, or if air is leaking from the joints around the filter mounting frame. Conventionally, this inspection has been performed manually. In other words, attach the air sampling probe (air suction port) of the dust meter to the tip of a suitable work rod, and insert this probe 2.5 mm from the HEPA filter surface.
While maintaining the distance within C111, move the probe slowly along the filter surface to thoroughly scan the entire surface of the filter. Furthermore, the probe is placed in correspondence with the peripheral portion of the filter, and the joint portion is thoroughly scanned. The probe scanning speed during this inspection must be 5 cm per second or less.

Such inspection work forces the worker to remain in the same position for a long time, making the work painful.

Furthermore, since the probe is held manually, the probe may wobble or vibrate, making it impossible to maintain correct inspection conditions, and the probe may also hit the filter surface, damaging the filter.

Cleanliness tests are also carried out by sampling the air in a clean room using the probe, but in this case, there is a considerable amount of dust generated by the workers themselves, making it impossible to perform accurate measurements and having a negative impact on maintaining cleanliness.

This invention was made in view of the above-mentioned conventional problems, and its purpose is to perform leak inspections in clean rooms and 3! using unmanned vehicles. An object of the present invention is to provide a clean room inspection device capable of automatically performing a cleanliness inspection with high precision.

In order to achieve the above object, the inspection device of the present invention has the following features:
An unmanned running vehicle, a running control means for automatically controlling the running position of the running vehicle, a lifting mechanism mounted on the running vehicle and displacing in the vertical i direction, and a rotation for rotationally displacing a movable part of the lifting mechanism. a mechanism, a positioning control means for positioning the elevating mechanism and the rotation mechanism, an XY table attached to a movable part of the elevating mechanism, a scanning control means for controlling the XY table, and a movable XY table. The device is characterized by comprising an air sampling probe attached to the air sampling probe and a dust meter connected to the probe.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail based on the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows the appearance of an inspection device according to an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the electrical configuration of this inspection device. Note that FIG. 2 also shows the configuration of the remote control device side.

As shown in FIG. 1, the structural main body of this inspection station is an unmanned vehicle 1. A vertically displacing elevating mechanism 2 is mounted on the traveling vehicle, and a rotating mechanism is attached to the elevating mechanism 2 to rotationally displace its movable portion. installed.

The movable part 4 of the XY table 3 is two-dimensionally displaced in a horizontal plane, and the air sampling probe 5 of the dust meter 6 is attached to the movable part 4 in a vertical position.

The traveling vehicle 1 is also equipped with a control device including a computer 7, a data recorder 8 for recording the dust meter 6 and its output, and a DC power supply unit 9 for driving the entire device. As shown in FIG. 2, the computer 7 has CPU10. ROM11. RAMI 2. It is composed of a clock generator 131, an interrupt controller 14, 10 a boat 15, and the like.

FIGS. 3A and 3B show two configuration examples of the running section of the vehicle 1. FIG. Figure A shows a caterpillar type, which is equipped with a pair of caterpillars 16.16 that drive the vehicle 1 in the front-back direction and a pair of caterpillars 17 and 17 that drive the vehicle 1 in the left-right direction. This drive system has a brake 9. A clutch, position sensor, etc. are added. The caterpillar 17 is driven by a motor 19, and its drive system includes a brake as described above.

A position sensor is added. Here, the position sensor is a rotary encoder that statically and dynamically detects the rotational position and displacement of the drive shaft of the caterpillar.

In the wheel type shown in FIG. 8, there are two power transmission wheels 20.
21 and two steering wheels 22 and 23. The power transmission wheels 20.21 are each driven by a motor 24.25, and the steering wheel 22L 23 is driven by a motor 26. Ru.

Each drive system is equipped with brakes, clutches, position sensors, etc.

The block diagram in FIG. 2 corresponds to the configuration of the traveling section in FIG. 3B. The traveling drive motors 24 and 25 are connected to the computer 7 via a drive controller 27, and the steering motor 26 is connected to the computer 7 via a drive controller 28.
controlled by

By servo-controlling these motors 24, 25, and 26 using the computer 7 (feedback control based on the output of the position sensor), the vehicle 1 can be driven along an arbitrary travel trajectory and stopped at an arbitrary position.

This running control includes a guidance method in which a guideline is provided on the running floor of the vehicle 1 and the vehicle position is moved along the guideline while the guideline is detected by a sensor. There is a trajectory program method in which a trajectory is registered and the vehicle is driven along the trajectory, and any of these methods may be adopted. The former guidance method may employ any method, such as one using an optical guideline or one using an electromagnetic induction guideline. In this case, a guide runr is provided on the vehicle 1 side to detect the guideline. Based on the output of this sensor, the computer 7
controls the running of the vehicle 1.

The latter trajectory programming method includes a method in which the traveling trajectory is programmed using a teaching playback method, and a method in which the traveling trajectory is programmed from a drawing. In the dieting playback method, the vehicle 1 is pushed by hand to travel along a desired trajectory, the transition trajectory is detected by a travel position sensor 29 (Fig. 2), etc., and the vehicle is started traveling based on the detected data. The locus is programmed into the RAM 12 or the like.

During automatic travel, the vehicle 1 is stopped at a predetermined reference position, and the vehicle 1 is driven from there according to the set trajectory program while the traveling position sensor 29 detects the traveling direction and speed 1 position. When programming the travel trajectory from the drawing, press 2 on the remote control device side in Figure 2.
A desired travel locus on the drawing is traced using a dimensional digitizer 30, and the data is input into a computer 31. The computer 31 creates a travel trajectory program based on the trace data, and wirelessly transmits it from the transmitter/receiver 32 to the transmitter/receiver 33 on the vehicle 1 side. On the vehicle side, the received trajectory program is stored in the RAM 12 of the computer 7 or the like. Note that the computer 31 has a C
PU34. ROM35, RAM36. Clock generation circuit 3F9 A keyboard 40 is connected to this computer 31, and its DC N source unit 41 also includes a charging circuit 42 for rectifying and charging AC power. A keyboard 43 is also connected to the computer 7 on the vehicle 1 side, with which various command signals and data can be input to the computer 7.

With the above configuration, the traveling vehicle 1 travels along a preset trajectory and also stops. In addition, in order to avoid collisions with obstacles while driving, the vehicle 1 has various amounts? A guide is provided. As shown in FIG. 1, a plurality of ultrasonic sensors 44 are provided to detect when an obstacle approaches a predetermined location of the vehicle 1, and a mechanical system is installed around the lower part of the vehicle 1 to prevent contact with obstacles. A detecting tape switch 45 is provided. This ultrasonic sensor 44 and tape switch 45
The outputs are input to the computer 7, and based on these detection signals, the computer 7 brings the traveling vehicle 1 to an emergency stop in order to prevent the traveling vehicle from colliding with an obstacle.

The vehicle 1 is also provided with a buzzer 46 for notifying when an obstacle is detected, an abnormality in a measurement result, or any other abnormality, and a display 47 for optically notifying the running state of the vehicle 1 and the like.

FIG. 4 shows the configuration of the elevating mechanism 22, rotation mechanism 48, and XY table 3. The lifting mechanism 2 consists of a telescope-type movable arm, and the movable part 50 at the upper end is connected to the motor 5.
1 to be displaced in the vertical direction via a gear mechanism 53. The drive system of this motor 51 includes a brake 52.15 and a position sensor (a) for detecting the position of the movable part 50.
- Consists of tally encoder, linear encoder, etc.)
54 has been added. Further, a rotation mechanism 48 is added to the movable portion 50 of the elevating mechanism 2. This rotation mechanism 48 has a drive motor 49, and rotation of the drive motor 49 rotates the movable part 50 about a vertical axis.

Brakes and position sensors are also added to this drive system.

The XY table 3 is attached to the movable part 50 of the lifting mechanism 2 via a horizontal holding mechanism 55.

The horizontal holding 111m55 has a sensor for detecting the inclination of the XY table 3 and a motor 56 (FIG. 2) for correcting the inclination of the XY table 3.

The XY table 3 also has an
It has an axis motor 57 and a Y-axis motor 58 that drives in the Y-axis direction.

As shown in FIG. 2, the drive motor 49 of the rotation mechanism 48 is controlled by a drive controller 59, the drive motor 51 of the lifting mechanism 2 is driven by a drive controller 60, and the drive motor 56 of the horizontal holding *1lR55 is controlled by a drive controller 59. 61, XY table 3
The drive motor 57゜58 is the drive: I seat 0-ra 62
controlled by

All positioning servo control of these mechanisms is performed by the computer 7.

The outer shape of the XY table 3 is almost the same as the outer shape of the HEPA filter mounting frame described above. Image sensors are installed at two opposite corners of the outer frame of this XY table 3.
63, 63 are taken out. This image sensor 63 images the upper part and obtains image information for aligning the outer shape of the XY table 3 and the outer shape of the HFPA filter as described later. The output of the image sensor υ-63 is introduced into the computer 7.

Next, the operation of the clean room inspection apparatus configured as described above will be explained. The automatic travel controller function described above causes the vehicle 1 to travel along a predetermined trajectory and stop at a predetermined position. FIG. 5 shows the running vehicle 1 fitted with a HEPA filter 64.
It is shown stopped just below. Next, the lifting mechanism 2
is raised by a pre-programmed stone, and the XY table 3 is placed below the filter 64 at a predetermined interval (2,50111
(within) and stand still facing each other. At this time, the outer square of the XY table 3 and the outer square of the filter 64 almost match according to the travel trajectory program of the vehicle 1, but due to the accumulation of various control errors, it is not possible to match them with high precision. . This error is detected by the image sensor 63. In other words, image sensor-63
The image of the filter 64 side is captured by the computer 7, and the computer 7 analyzes whether a corner of the filter 64 exists at a predetermined position within the imaging area. Then, XY for the filter 64
The position error (rotation direction) of the table 3 is detected, and the motor 49 of the rotation mechanism 48 is driven to correct the error. This will cause the XY table 3 to be slightly displaced in the rotational direction, and
The squares of the Y table 3 and the squares of the filter 64 are made to completely match. Next, the motors 57 and 58 of the XY table 3 are driven according to preprogrammed contents, and the probe 5 attached to the movable part 4 of the XY table 3 is scanned in a plane.

FIG. 6 shows how the probe 5 is scanned by the XY table 3. In other words, the arrow 65 is the scanning locus of the probe 5. In this manner, the probe 5 is scanned in a reciprocating manner, similar to the Lasceux scan of a television, to thoroughly check for leaks in the filter 64. Similarly, the probe 5 is also scanned at the joint portion of the mounting frame of the filter 64. As the probe 5 scans in this manner, the air taken in from the probe 5 is measured by the dust meter 6, and the results are recorded on the data recorder 8. At the same time, the measurement results are analyzed by the computer 7, and if an abnormality is detected, it is notified by the display 47 or the buzzer 46, and the transmitter/receiver 33 notifies the remote control device of the abnormality wirelessly. do.

FIG. 7 shows two examples of running patterns of the running vehicle 1. In FIG. 7A, the traveling vehicle 1 is started from the reference point S, is driven to the position 1-1, and the above-mentioned inspection is performed here, and when the inspection is completed, the vehicle position is moved to the position 2. Run the vehicle, then stop and perform the inspection again. In the same way, the inspection is carried out from "3-1" to "4", and finally returns to the reference point S again. FIG. 7B shows a running pattern during an inspection of a clean room in which a filter 64 is disposed on the entire surface of the ceiling. In this case, the traveling vehicle 1 travels one filter 64 at a time and then stops.
The vehicle 1 moves in the
In combination with the scanning of the probe 5 by the table 3, inspection is performed evenly over the entire area of the filter installation surface. Note that when the measurement is finished at a certain measurement point and the vehicle 1 is moved to the next measurement point, the lifting mechanism 2 is lowered and then the vehicle 1 is moved. By doing so, it is possible to prevent the probe 5 and the XY table 3 from colliding with structures on the ceiling side.

Note that in the above embodiment, the XY table 3 and the filter 64
For example, the output of the image sensor 63 is transmitted to the combination coater 31 on the remote control device side, and the computer 7 receives a position adjustment command from the computer 31 to perform rotation. The motor 49 of the moving mechanism 48 may be controlled to perform the above alignment.

Furthermore, it is preferable to provide the following self-diagnosis function for various abnormalities in the device. A tilt sensor will be installed to detect abnormalities in the posture of the equipment. Also, abnormal sounds coming from various parts of the device are detected using a microphone and a voice recognition circuit. Overloads such as Tanabata are detected by checking the current and voltage Fi. In addition, to monitor the surrounding conditions of the equipment, an i-Review camera will be installed and the video will be played back outside the clean room. Thermosensors are installed to detect temperature abnormalities in various parts of the device.

As explained in detail above, according to the clean room inspection device according to the present invention, a vehicle is automatically driven along a predetermined trajectory in the clean room, and the probe of the dust meter is automatically moved by the displacement mechanism provided on the vehicle. By scanning, a leak test of a HEPA filter disposed in a clean room can be accurately performed according to preset test conditions. Therefore, this type of inspection, which was conventionally performed manually, can be almost automated, and inspection accuracy is greatly improved.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an external view of an inspection device according to an embodiment of the present invention;
Figure 2 is a block diagram showing the electrical configuration of the above device;
The figure is a perspective view showing an example of the configuration of the vehicle running section of the same device as above;
The figure is a perspective view showing the configuration of the mechanical displacement mechanism in the above device, and Figure 5 shows the XY table and HE P in the same device.
FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram showing the scanning locus of the probe of the HEPA filter by the above device, and FIG. M7 is a plan view showing an example of the running pattern of the above device in a clean room. . 1... Unmanned vehicle 2... Lifting mechanism 3... XY table 4... Movable part of XY table 5... Probe 6. ...Total of dust 7...
... Computer 48 ... Rotating mechanism 50 ...
Patent applicant for the movable part of the lifting mechanism: Obayashi Kumihiro Co., Ltd. Patent attorney - Kensuke Shiro Figure 1 Figure 3

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) An unmanned vehicle, a scanning control means for automatically controlling the traveling position of the vehicle, a lifting mechanism mounted on the vehicle and displacing in the vertical direction, and a rotational displacement of the movable part of the lifting mechanism. a rotating mechanism for positioning the lifting l1lI14 and the rotating mechanism; an XY table attached to the movable part of the lifting mechanism; a scanning control means for controlling the XY table; A clean room inspection device equipped with an air sampling probe attached to the movable part of an XY table and a dust meter connected to this probe.