JPS60227498A - Size changing mechanism of plate material processing line - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] This bulletin contains application data before electronic filing, so abstract data is not recorded.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Technical Field of the Invention] This invention relates in particular to a size change mechanism for a plate material processing line.

[Technical background of the invention and its problems]

For example, a plate-shaped material processing line that processes plate-shaped materials such as a liquid crystal panel production line, a thermal head production line, a photomask production line, a printed circuit board production line, etc. is a system for inputting plate-shaped materials into a process, It consists of a processing line and a system for storing the processed plate material. Conventionally, in such a plate-shaped material processing line, it has been extremely difficult to change the size or lot of the plate-shaped material. That is, when changing the material size or loft, it was necessary to recognize the size or manage the number of items.

However, size recognition is difficult to process in terms of hardware and software, and the cost is enormous.

In addition, in the case of quantity control, there is a drawback that deviations occur when a defect occurs in the middle of the line.

[Purpose of the invention]

This invention was made to solve the above-mentioned problems, and it is an object of the present invention to provide a size change mechanism for a plate-shaped material processing line that can easily change the size and lot of plate-shaped materials. With the goal.

[Summary of the invention]

That is, the size change mechanism of the plate-shaped material processing line according to the present invention divides the lots of the first and second plate-shaped materials to be processed into materials (
A dummy material) is flowed between lots, and the size is changed by distinguishing between the processed material and the dummy material using sensors installed on the loader and unloader to detect the above-mentioned properties.

[Embodiments of the invention]

An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows the main components of a plate material processing line, which is roughly divided into three parts: a loader (2), a processing line (12), and an unloader (month).

The loader is a plate-like material (e.g. glass) (16)
Glass plates (16) are fed one by one to a processing line (U-) from a lot (18) in which mounts and mounts are sandwiched alternately, while removing the mounts. In this case, the glass plate (
16) is absorbed by the suction pad of the orthogonal transfer robot (20) and transferred from the lot (18) to the processing line (12).
) One by one, the sheets are transferred to a loading conveyor (22) connected to a loader (Mr.). Figure (B) shows its movement trajectory. Also, this loader (pressure) has a loft conveyor (24) that moves as shown by the arrow in the figure (A).
This conveyor (24) is designed to automatically supply the next waiting lot (26) when the lot (18) becomes empty.

The unloader (dan) stores the processed glass plate (16) removed from the processing line (yu) into a storage cassette (28). In this case, the unloader (Dan) handles the processed glass plate (16) taken out from the processing line (U-).
, an unloading conveyor (30
), and is always stopped at a fixed position and in a fixed state by a fixed position stopping device (32). Then, the glass plate (16) is attached to the suction pad of the orthogonal robot (34).
) is suctioned to the untreated back side, and is moved to the storage cassette (28) and inserted and stored therein. Figure (C) shows its movement trajectory. Also, like the loader, this unloader is also a cassette conveyor that moves in the direction of the arrow.
36), and this conveyor (3G) automatically moves to the next waiting cassette (38) when the cassette (28) is full or the number of glass plates (16) reaches a predetermined number.
).

The plate-shaped material processing line as described above is controlled by a control section (not shown). A block diagram of this plate-shaped material processing line is shown in FIG. Here, the control section (40) includes an operation panel, CPU, memory, 1/O, etc., and it is configured to control the operation program of this line stored in the memory in advance and the size and size of the glass plate (16) inputted. Based on the data on the number of sheets, each block such as the robot body (20) and (34), loft conveyor (24), cassette conveyor (36), Wi-man conveyor (22), and take-out conveyor (30) is controlled.

The above plate-like material processing line shows the case where there is only one processing line, and if subsequent lines (for example, exposure line, post-processing line, etc.) are added, the above-mentioned An unloader like this can also be used as a loader by operating in reverse.

That is, the glass plates (16) are taken out one by one from the storage cassette (28) in which the set glass plates (16) are stored and supplied to the processing line. In this case, the fixed position stop device I (32) may not be provided.

In the loader (10) of such a plate material processing line, as shown in FIG. , the first glass plate (113
1) A plate-like material having different properties is interposed between the second glass plates (162) as a dummy (42). As this dummy (42), for example, since the glass plate (16) is non-metallic, it is conceivable to use metal. In addition, the glass plate (16) of the robot (20) of the loader (rule)
) The dummy (4) is attached to the robot arm (46) to which the suction pads (441) and (442) are attached.
2) A sensor (48), for example a metal sensor, is attached.

In this case, the sensor (48) is preferably installed between the suction pads (441) and (442) to ensure reliable detection. The detection result of this sensor (48) is transmitted to the control section (40). That is, the control unit (40) recognizes the size change when the metal sensor (48) detects the metal dummy (42). This has priority over the number management performed by the number of operations of the robot (20).

That is, the robot arm (46) of the loader station gradually approaches the loaded first glass plate (1ei), picks it up, and transfers it to the conveyor (22).

At this time, if the number of glass plates (161) is not the predetermined number,
The above operation is repeated. However, when the metal sensor (48) detects the metal dummy (42), the control unit (40) instructs the loader (dan) and the processing line (kun) to change the size as programmed in advance.

Alternatively, if the first glass plate (161) and the second glass plate (162) are loaded separately, that is, the first
A lot (18) as shown in the figure is placed on a first glass plate (1
61), the waiting lot (26) is placed on the second glass plate (16).
In the case of 2), a dummy is loaded at the end of the first glass plate (161) or at the start of the second glass plate (162), and by changing the program, the lot conveyor ( 24) can also be performed.

Also, on the unloader side, the robot (34
) and the robot arm (46) of the loader (10).
By attaching a sensor in the same manner as above, it is possible to change the size and cassette in the same way as in the case of the loader (rule) mentioned above.

Further, as described above, even when the unloader shown in FIG. 1 is used as a loader, the size change and cassette can be changed in the same way.

That is, a dummy material (42) having different properties from the first and second plate-shaped materials (1ei) and (162) of different sizes to be processed is used as the first and second plate-shaped materials (161 and (162)). ), and the dummy material (42) is determined by the loader (rule) and unloader (dan), thereby changing the lot or size.

In addition to detecting the relationship between metal and non-metal as shown in this example, the dummy material (42) can also be used to detect magnetic and non-magnetic materials, transparent and non-transparent materials, reflective materials and non-reflective materials, Alternatively, it may be possible to determine based on the characteristics of the material, such as density or temperature.

Also, in the case of plate-shaped materials of three or more different sizes,
The same can be done.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to provide a size change mechanism for a plate-shaped material processing line, which can easily change the size and lot of the plate-shaped material in the plate-shaped material processing line.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figure 1 shows the outline of the plate material processing line (A
) is an external view, (B) and (C) are diagrams showing glass movement trajectories, FIG. 2 is a block schematic diagram of the plate material processing line in FIG. 1, and FIG. 3 is an example of the present invention. It is a figure showing the composition of the size change mechanism of a plate material processing line. Group...Loader, Dan...Processing line, Mad...Unloader, 16...Glass plate, 161...First glass plate, 162...Second glass plate, 20... Robot, 42...dummy, 48...sensor. Applicant's agent Patent attorney Takehiko Suzue Figure 2 Figure 3

Claims (1)

[Claims] In a plate-shaped material processing line consisting of a loader for charging the plate-shaped material into the processing line, a processing line, and an unloader for storing the processed plate-shaped material, a first plate-shaped material, and a second plate-shaped material made of the same material but different in size, a dummy material having characteristics different from those of the first and second plate-shaped materials is interposed between the dummy material and the dummy material, and the dummy material is passed through a plate-shaped material processing line; The plate-shaped plate-shaped plate is characterized in that it comprises sensor means configured on the loader and unloader, respectively, and means for causing a lot change or size change of the loader and unloader, respectively, when the respective sensor means detect a dummy material. Size change mechanism for material processing line.