JPS606516A - Device for discriminating orientation of part - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To perform reliable discrimination of orientation of a part, by a method wherein, in a device for discriminating the orientation of a part such as a vibraion hopper, the features of a part are detected and stored in advance, compared with those of a passing part, and the its orientation is discriminated, based on a difference therebetween. CONSTITUTION:When a part 23 passes through a single observe/reverse discriminator 26, the observe or the reverse of the part are discriminated, and in turn- over, it is retained on a V rotor 27 by means of a shutter 28 to be turned over. Thereafter, the front and the rear are discriminated by a front/rear discriminator 29, and when it is in the state of front side back, the front or the rear is reversed by an H rotor 30. In which case, the front/rear discriminator 29 reads and stores the features of the part 23 with the aid of a reflection type photolectric sensor, and compares those of a part, passing therethrough, with the stored data each time a part passes through the sensor 29. This finds a difference between the data in relation to the part 23 to discriminate its orientation, resulting in the possibility to reliably discriminate the orientation.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a component orientation determining device that is attached to a parts feeder such as a vibrating hopper and detects the characteristics of transferred components to determine their orientation.

It also has an alignment function, and in order to perform this alignment function, the directionality of the transferred parts must be determined.

Figures 1 (a) and 1 (b) are schematic diagrams for explaining the operation principle of this peach direction discriminating device.
The photoelectric sensor 2 is a mechanical pencil lead case.

The core case 2 is a transparent case 2a fitted with a black υ lid 2b, and is transported in the left direction (direction of arrow Y) in the figure.

The light beam 3 output from the light emitting section of the photoelectric sensor 2 is reflected by the core case 2 and returns to the light receiving section of the photoelectric sensor 2. In this case, when the light ray 3 hits the crystal-colored lid 2b, as shown in FIG. 3A, the amount of reflection is extremely large, and the output of the light receiving section is almost zero. On the other hand, when the light ray 3 hits the case 2a as shown in FIG. 3B, the amount of reflection increases and the output of the light receiving section also increases. Therefore, by establishing a threshold voltage in advance, the output of the photoelectric sensor 2 (ie, the output of the light receiving section) can be used to determine this threshold voltage.

By the way, in this method of identifying the orientation of a component by setting a threshold voltage in advance, there is a slight difference in clarity [l].
There were six drawbacks: the difference in K could not be detected.

Therefore, as shown in FIG. 2, a method has been proposed for determining the orientation of a component based on the difference in output between a pair of sensors. In FIG. 2, a source fiber 7.8 is connected to the input ends of a pair of reflective sensors 5, 6, and the output ends of the sensors 5, 6 are connected to each input end of a differential amplifier 9. Then, the original i5a output from the sensor 5 passes through the optical fiber, is reflected by the orientation mark 10a of the component 1O, passes through the optical fiber 7 again, and is received by the sensor 5. On the other hand, the light beam 6a output from the sensor 6 passes through the light beam 7 and the orientation mark lO& and the orientation mark 1y.
The light is reflected at a point 10b on the component 10 located at the position J1, passes through an optical fiber 8, and is received by a sensor 6. As a result, the differential amplifier 9 emits the reflected light from the safety orientation mark lOa, and the comparator 11 determines the direction of the component lo.

Since this method determines the direction based on the level difference between a pair of reflected lights, the reliability is improved because fluctuations in the brightness of the small parts can be ignored. However, it has the following drawbacks.

(1) The sensitivity of the pair of sensors 5 and 6 must be made the same. Otherwise orientation mark 10a
The slight difference in brightness between the point 10b and the point 10b cannot be detected. And this Iv adjustment is difficult for the monk.

(2) If one of the sensors 5 (or 6) becomes dirty, or if it is reinstalled for cleaning or the like, the sensitivity of the sensors 5 and 6 may become unbalanced, resulting in a singing motion.

(3) When the component 10 is small, it may be physically impossible to install the pair of sensors 5 and 6.

As described above, the conventional orientation determination system described above is sufficient for determining the delicate orientation of parts.

In view of the above-mentioned circumstances, the present invention provides a direction 1'υ separation device that can reliably distinguish 10 directions of fit. , and a storage middle stage for storing the output of this detection stage 1, nil? The 9th characteristic is to distinguish the direction of the parts based on the data stored in the 6th and 1st stages.

Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the four boxes.

FIG.
is a plan view, (b) f is a side view. In these figures, 21 is a parts feeder and 22 is a chute.

Here, the parts feeder 21i feeds the L parts 23 into the chute 22 by vibration, and the chute 22 transports the parts 23 by the action of gravity.

Then, connect the chute 22 with the accumulator chute 24, the gate 25. je & discrimination device 26, V rotor (duty direction reversal low reactuator) 27, shutter 28, front/rear discrimination device 29, Ho-tor (horizontal rotary actuator) 30, shutter 3
1. An alignment chute 32 is commonly used.

Now, when the gate 25 is opened and one of the parts 230 pooled in the accumulator chute 24 passes through the mounting discrimination device 26, the front and back sides of this part 230 are discriminated. Then, when the parts 23 are turned together, they are held on the {circle around (1)} rotor 27 by the keyhole shutter 28 and turned over by the V rotor 27.

The part 23 with the different side facing up in this way is detected by the front and rear discriminating device 29.
The front and rear are determined by , and if the front and rear are reversed, the shutter 31 stops it on the H rotor 30 .
Rotated 180 degrees and a half. And in the right direction, Seiyu 1.”
The collected parts 23 are pooled in a bill tally chute 32.

In such a parts feeder, a direction-separating device according to the present embodiment is applied as 29, and has the configuration shown in FIG.

The present embodiment will be described below with reference to FIG. 4.

In FIG. 4, reference numeral 41f is a reflection type optical first section sensor (hereinafter simply referred to as a sensor), which has a light emitting element and a light receiving element. Then, the light emitted from the light emitting element is directed to the component 23 in FIG. The output of the light-receiving element is amplified by an amplifier in the sensor 41, and its output A (analog amount) is supplied to an A/D (analog/digital) switch 43. The A/D converter 43 converts the output A of the sensor 41 into an 8-bit digital signal DK and supplies it to a reading/input stage 44 in units of 8 bits. (L/F44 included) - Stage 44 is a passage detector 45 that detects the passage of the part 23 (this is installed near the sensor 41, and when the part 23 approaches the sensor 41, a passage detector 45 detects the passage of the part 23).
It is triggered by the passing No. 48 P supplied from the A/DI converter 43 (which outputs the No.
"Writing is performed from address 0 of the fixed area to the I area. Hereinafter, the digital signal convoluted in the middle storage stage 46 will be referred to as data D. This data D is, for example, the data set 41 shown in FIG. Sampling the output A of at a constant period r,
This is obtained by A/D conversion, and as shown in the figure, n ll + '4 data DO obtained for each period T
+DI...consists of D Arou. And read/
Assuming that the time when the writing means 44 is triggered by the passing signal P is 0, and the time tl is the time when the data D1 is stored at address 1 of the haj/9i fixed area, ti = 'ro ten iT...・・・・・・・・・
・・・・・・・・・ (1) T here. ki The time from when the trigger is triggered until the data D is obtained; In this way, n pieces of data D1 (1=0.l·
. . n-1) is stored. Next, 4
7 &, t, in the middle row, predetermined address j,
Is there a bath f for k (j<k)? A pair of data DJ, D
k is extracted from the middle storage stage 46, and the part 2 is selected depending on its size.
3 direction will be updated. For example, in the case of a part 23 where the front part is higher than the rear part as shown in Figure 5, when the part 23 is fed in the correct direction as shown in Figure (A), the rear part receives more light. Because of the extra reflection, Dj x Dk is established, and when the component 23 is sent in the opposite direction as shown in FIG. In this way, the orientation of the component 23 is determined. In addition, in consideration of the shape and transfer speed of the part 23, the data extraction area J is installed at a location 1k where the movement between the special ridge part and other parts can be clearly seen. Note that the above-mentioned (1-! components 44, 46, 47 are generally constructed by a #:t microcomputer, etc.).

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be explained by taking as an example the case where the direction of the component 23 shown in FIG. 5 is discriminated by the front/back discriminating device 29 (that is, this embodiment) shown in FIG. 3.

First, FIG. 4 shows seven sensors 41. The A/D conversion gain 43 is always in an active state, and the output A of the sensor 41 is converted into a digital signal (E1) and supplied to a read/write stage 44.

Now, when the component 23 passes through the pass detector 45 and sensor 41 in sequence, a pass signal P is output from the one pass detector 45, and the read/write f stage 44 is triggered.

As a result, the read/'%i' stage 44 is a/D
The digital signal supplied from the K converter 43 is picked up and successively convoluted into a predetermined area of the middle storage stage 46. In this case, as already explained, data D1 is stored at address 1 in the predetermined area.

When the acquisition and insertion of the data are completed in this way, the intermediate judgment stage 47 reads data Dj and Dk from the j-th address and the j-th address of the target layout predetermined king rear, respectively, and calculates the difference between them. When Dj-Dk (0), it is determined that the direction of the component 23 is correct, and when Dj-Dk) is 0, it is determined that the direction of the component 23 is in the opposite direction. In the case of the opposite direction, the component 23 is reversed by the H rotor 30 shown in FIG.
Since the directionality is determined based on the number, all inconveniences caused by differences in the sensitivity of the bank number sensors can be eliminated. Further, even if the light trap hat of the part 23 changes, correct judgment can be made without being affected by the change.

In the above embodiment, two data Dj and Dk were extracted from the data D, and the direction was determined based on this, but it is of course possible to determine the direction based on a larger number of data. By doing this, it is possible to further increase the reliability of the judgment.

Further, in the above embodiment, the photoelectric sensor 41 is used to detect the characteristics of the component 23, and the direction \U is distinguished depending on the direction of the component 23. However, the present invention is not limited to this; Any sensor can be used depending on the nature of the sensor cap and parts.

As explained above, the present invention includes a detection means (sensor) that sequentially detects the characteristics of the parts to be transferred, and a memory stage that stores the output of the first detection stage. Since the parts are separated in direction 1'u based on the data stored in ten stages, the following effects can be obtained.

(1) Even if the sensitivity of the sensor itself is low, it can be distinguished easily.

(2) Sensor sensitivity adjustment becomes easier.

(3) Even if the condition of parts (for example, orientation marks or background color) changes from lot to lot, reliable identification is possible regardless of this.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

1(a) and 1(b) are schematic diagrams for explaining the operating principle of a conventional direction determining device; 21st is a perspective view showing another example of the conventional direction determining device; FIG. 3; This figure does not show the structure of a parts feeder device that is used as an example of an embodiment of the invention. The figure is a block diagram showing the configuration of the same embodiment,
FIGS. 5(A) and 5(B) are diagrams showing the relationship between the output A of the sensor 41 and the data D1 when the component 23 passes through the sensor 41. 23... Parts, 41... Sensor (detection-P stage), 4
6...I'm stupid, 47...i'tt, D
···data.

Claims (1)

[Claims] A part orientation determining device that detects the characteristics of a transferred part and determines its direction, which includes a detection middle stage that sequentially detects the features of the part, a memory middle stage that stores the output of the detection middle stage, and the memory A judgment middle stage that selects a pair of data from the data stored in the middle stage and determines the orientation of the part based on the difference between the pair of data. Device.