JP2022018690A - Article transfer device and combination weighing device using the same - Google Patents

Abstract

To provide a new article transfer device that can detect the amount of accumulated articles with an inexpensive force sensor that supports a light object and thereby control the transfer of articles, and a combination weighing device using the article transfer device.SOLUTION: An article transfer device includes: a first transfer unit that transfers an article; a chute that slides the article discharged from the first transfer unit and discharges it to an article receiving surface; a force sensor that detects force acting on the chute; and a control unit that controls the first transfer unit based on an output of the force sensor. The chute is disposed at a position that is insulated from the first transfer unit and the article receiving surface and receives force from the article staying on the article receiving surface.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 1

Description

The present disclosure relates to an article transfer device that controls the transfer of articles by a force sensor and a combination weighing device using the same.

There are various methods for controlling the transfer of articles by the vibration feeder. Among them, in the invention described in Patent Document 1 below, in order to detect the clogging of the article in the vibration feeder, an article detection sensor is provided at a position where the article discharged from the vibration feeder is collected, and the sensor is used for a predetermined time for the article. If is not detected, it is assumed that the article is clogged with the vibration feeder, and the vibration intensity of the vibration feeder is increased.

Further, there is also a method in which a transport means such as a vibration feeder is loaded on a measuring device and the transport amount of the transport means is controlled based on a change in the mass of an article on the transport means. The invention described in Patent Document 2 discloses an example of such a transporting means. In this Patent Document 2, a weighing means is arranged in the upper stage, a powder transport path (belt conveyor) is arranged in the middle stage, and a screw feeder is arranged in the lower stage. This is a device that supplies powder in a fixed quantity. In particular, the powder transport path in the middle stage is suspended from the weighing means in the upper stage so that the powder spilling from the powder transport path does not accumulate on the weighing means. There is.

Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2020-09946 Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2012-06325

However, there is a problem that a sensor that detects the presence or absence of an article, as in Patent Document 1, cannot detect how much the article is deposited.
On the other hand, when the transport means is loaded on the weighing means and the mass of the transported object is detected as in Patent Document 2, the deposited amount of the transported object can be estimated. However, since the transport means, which is a heavy object, must be loaded on the load sensor of the weighing means, a load sensor having rigidity is required, and there is a problem that the device becomes expensive accordingly.

In order to solve such a problem, the present invention provides a new article transfer device capable of detecting the accumulated amount of an article with an inexpensive force sensor that supports a light object and thereby controlling the transfer of the article. , It is an object of the present invention to provide a combined weighing device using the same.

The article transporting device according to the present invention is
The first transport unit that transports goods,
A chute that slides the article discharged from the first transport unit and discharges it to the article receiving surface.
A force sensor that detects the force acting on the chute, and
A control unit that controls the first transport unit based on the output of the force sensor is provided.
The chute is characterized in that it is insulated from the first transport unit and the article receiving surface and is arranged at a position where it receives a force from the article staying on the article receiving surface.

The transport unit used here is a vibration feeder or a belt conveyor that transports articles, but is not limited thereto. Further, the article discharged from the first transport unit is discharged to the article receiving surface via the chute, but if the discharge amount is too large, the article is deposited on the article receiving surface, and the article touches the chute and exerts a force. The output of the sensor changes. The force sensor detects it and transmits it to the control unit.
From the output change, the control unit determines that the article is deposited on the article receiving surface and controls the first transport unit. The control in this case is, for example, a control for reducing the transport amount of the first transport unit or stopping the drive. Further, when the amount of discharge from the first transport unit decreases or increases, the output of the sensor received when the chute slides down also changes. The control unit may adjust the transfer amount of the first transfer unit based on such a change.

As a result, even if the entire vibration feeder, belt conveyor, etc. are not weighed by a highly rigid weighing device, the discharge of the articles from the first transport unit is controlled only by detecting the force of the accumulated articles acting on the chute. can do. Moreover, unlike the article sensor of Patent Document 1, it can detect not only the presence or absence of an article but also the amount of deposit on the article receiving surface, so that it is a highly versatile transport device that can be applied to various articles. be able to.

In the article transporting device, the article receiving surface is an article transporting surface of a second transporting unit that receives articles discharged from the chute and transports them downstream.

As a result, the articles discharged from the first transport section are transported to the downstream side by the second transport section, so that the transport amount of the second downstream transport section is reduced or the transport volume from the upstream first transport section is reduced. If the amount of discharge is excessive, the article will be deposited on the second transport section, and the pressure will be different from the normal pressure and will act on the force sensor. Since the control unit controls the drive of the first transport unit based on the force acting on the force sensor, an appropriate amount of articles is always accumulated on the second transport unit. Therefore, it can be used as a supply device for a combination weighing device in which the accumulated articles must be supplied to the weighing device at random timings.

In the article transfer device, the force sensor is a load cell, and the chute is suspended from a movable end portion of the load cell.

In this case, the load cell does not require rigidity to support a heavy object, so that it can be compact and inexpensive. Moreover, since the load cell that supports the chute can be arranged above the first transport section and the second transport section, it is more space-friendly than the method in which the first transport section and the second transport section are loaded on the weighing device. It can be a compact device.

The article transporting device is characterized in that the second transporting section is provided with a layer thickness adjusting section for controlling the layer thickness of the article.

The layer thickness adjusting portion is composed of a rotating body that rotates around a rotation axis parallel to the article transport surface in a direction orthogonal to the article transport direction. Further, instead of this rotating body, a scraper for adjusting the layer thickness of the article may be used. Further, the rotation direction of the lower half of the rotating body in this case is a direction facing the transport direction. As a result, the layer thickness of the articles transported by the second transport section can be made constant, so that a substantially constant amount of articles can be supplied downstream only by driving the second transport section for a fixed period of time.

A plurality of lines including the article transporting device and a weighing device arranged on the downstream side thereof and receiving and weighing the articles supplied from the article transporting device are arranged in a direction orthogonal to the transporting direction of the article. It is characterized by being a combination weighing device.

As a result, the transfer amount of each line can be stabilized by using an inexpensive force sensor, so that the weighing accuracy and operating rate of the combined weighing device can be improved.

According to the present invention, the article discharged from the first transport unit is slid down by a chute and acts on the chute received at that time and the chute received when the article deposited on the article receiving surface rides on the chute. Since the force is detected by the force sensor, it is possible to obtain a highly versatile transfer device that can be applied to the transfer control of various articles.

Further, since the force sensor only detects a slight force acting on the chute, it is not necessary to support the entire transport device with a load cell having high rigidity unlike the conventional device, and it is possible to configure the load cell with an inexpensive load cell. can. Further, since the chute is suspended from above so as not to interfere with the transport portion, the device can be designed compactly.

Further, if the amount of the goods discharged from the first transport unit becomes excessive, or if the discharged goods do not flow downstream and the goods are deposited on the goods receiving surface at the lower part of the chute, it can be detected. Therefore, the control unit can appropriately adjust the accumulated amount of the article receiving surface and store an appropriate amount of the article on the transport surface of the second transport unit constituting the article receiving surface. Therefore, there is an advantage that it can be applied to a combination weighing device that randomly supplies the articles stored in the second transport unit according to the combination calculation result.

The side view of the main part of one Embodiment of the combination weighing apparatus which concerns on this invention. Partial front view of the first transport section as seen from the chute. Partial front view of the chute seen from the discharge end of the second transport section. The block diagram of the control system of the combination weighing apparatus. The block diagram of the control system of the weighing device which constitutes one element of the combination weighing device.

Hereinafter, an embodiment of an article transporting device according to the present invention and a combination weighing device using the same will be described with reference to the drawings. The embodiments shown below do not limit the technical scope of the present invention.

In FIGS. 1 to 3, the combination weighing device CW has a plurality of lines having a downstream weighing device W and an upstream article transporting device F for supplying articles to the weighing device W in a direction orthogonal to the paper surface. It is a line-arranged configuration.

The weighing device W is provided with a pool hopper PH having two opening / closing gates G1 and G2, and two weighing hoppers WH1 and WH2 below the pool hopper PH that receive and weigh the articles discharged from the opening / closing gates G1 and G2. The gates G1 to G4 of the pool hopper PH and the measuring hoppers WH1 and WH2 open and close to the positions indicated by the broken lines, but since the link mechanism for opening and closing these is well known, it is omitted here. ing.

The pool hopper PH includes a pair of gates G1 and G2 that selectively open and close in the left-right direction, and only one of the gates G1 and G2 opens and closes. Further, below the pool hopper PH, two measuring hoppers WH1 and WH2 are arranged back to back corresponding to the gates G1 and G2. Further, as shown in FIG. 5, each measuring hopper WH1 and WH2 is provided with load cells LC1 and LC2 for detecting the mass of each hopper WH1 and WH2. In the space above the space between the two measuring hoppers WH1 and WH2, a side-viewing triangular distribution plate D for distributing the articles discharged from the pool hopper PH to the left and right measuring hoppers WH1 and WH2 is arranged.

The article transport device F for supplying articles to the pool hopper PH includes a first transport section 1 on the upstream side, a second transport section 2 on the downstream side, and a chute 3 arranged between them. The chute 3 is suspended from above between the discharge end of the first transport unit 1 and the article receiving surface (article transport surface) 28 of the second transport unit 2 in a non-contact state with them.

A force sensor 4 composed of a load cell LC is arranged above the chute 3. This load cell LC has a well-known configuration in which a strain gauge is attached to a strain-sensitive portion of an equilibrium beam type. Further, a suspension frame 5 is attached to the movable end of the load cell LC, and an adjustment plate 51 capable of raising and lowering the attachment position is attached to the lower end portion 50 (see FIGS. 2 and 3) of the suspension frame 5 which is divided into two branches. The chute 3 is detachably attached to the chute 3 via the above.

Specifically, a long hole 52 is provided in the upper part of the adjusting plate 51, and the long hole 52 is positioned up and down with respect to the lower end portion 50, and then a screw (not shown) inserted into the long hole 52 is used. The adjusting plate 51 is fixed to the lower end portion 50 of the hanging frame 5. As a result, the vertical position of the chute 3 can be positioned at an appropriate height.

Further, two pins 53 and 54 separated from each other are embedded in the outer surfaces of the left and right adjusting plates 51, and the hanging plates 30 for suspending the chute 3 are hooked on the pins 53 and 54, respectively. It is supposed to be.

As shown in FIGS. 1 to 3, the chute 3 is composed of an inclined plate 31 for sliding an article, a side wall 32 rising from both side surfaces of the inclined plate 31, and a hanging plate 30 welded to both side walls 32. It is configured. Further, a hook 33 for hooking on the pin 53 is formed on the upper portion of the hanging plate 30, the hook 33 is hooked on the upper pin 53 to be hung, and the rotation of the hanging plate 30 is restricted by the lower pin 54. It has become like. Therefore, the chute 3 can be attached to and detached from the adjusting plate 51 by lifting the hanging plate 30 and hooking or removing the hook 33 from the pin 53.

The left and right hanging plates 30 are connected and reinforced by horizontal upper and lower connecting rods 34 at the upper portions thereof.

The first transport unit 1 is composed of a vibration feeder. Specifically, the transport trough 10 having a flat article transport surface, the vibrating device 11 for transporting the article by reciprocating the transport trough 10 diagonally forward, and the vibrating end 12 of the vibrating device 11 are transferred to the transport trough 10. A connecting portion 14 that is connected to the base portion 13 of the above and transmits vibration, and a pedestal 15 that supports the vibration device 11 are provided.

As shown in FIG. 2, the transport troughs 10 are arranged side by side and evenly in four rows, and the lower end discharge port 6 of the upper hopper H faces in each transport trough 10. Further, the upper portion of the hopper H is formed in one storage chamber, and four discharge ports 6 are formed downward in the lower portion of the storage chamber, and the discharge ports 6 are formed at a predetermined distance from the transport surface of the transport trough 10. It is mounted at a distant height. Therefore, the article discharged from the discharge port 6 rests on the transport surface of the transport trough 10, and when the transport trough 10 vibrates in that state, the article is transported in the direction of the chute 3 and is newly released from the hopper H. Articles are supplied to the transport trough 10.

In this embodiment, two adjacent transport troughs 10 are attached to one vibrating device 11, and two adjacent transport troughs 10 vibrate simultaneously in one vibrating device 11. A vibrating device 11 that is individually driven for each transport trough 10 may be attached.

The second transport unit 2 is also composed of a vibration feeder. Specifically, the transport trough 20 in which the article transport surface gradually narrows toward the downstream side, the vibrating device 21 for transporting the article by reciprocating the transport trough 20 diagonally forward, and the vibrating device 21. It is provided with a connecting portion 22 similar to the connecting portion 14 that transmits vibration to the transport trough 20. Further, each transport trough 20 is equipped with a vibration device 21 that is individually driven.

The transport trough 20 is composed of a wide trough 23 on the upstream side, a buffer trough 24 whose width gradually narrows from the width of the wide trough 23 toward the downstream side, and a narrow trough 25 on the downstream side. Has been done. Further, the article transport surface of the wide trough 23 and the buffer trough 24 is flat, but the article transport surface of the narrow trough 25 is provided with a step portion 26 in the middle, and the downstream side of the step portion 26 is shown in FIG. As shown, the cross section is formed in a V-shaped narrow trough 25 so that the articles are conveyed in an aligned state.

Further, in the upstream portion of the narrow trough 25, a rotating body 27 that keeps the layer thickness of the transported article constant is arranged. The rotating body 27 has three blades arranged at a pitch of 120 degrees, and by rotating the blades counterclockwise, the articles sent to the narrow trough 25 are leveled and the layer thickness thereof is adjusted. It is designed to do. However, depending on the article, this rotating body 27 may not be used.

Two adjacent second transport units 2 are connected to one first transport unit 1. As a result, articles are conveyed from one first transport unit 1 to two second transport units 2 at the same time. Therefore, the chute 3 is arranged so as to straddle the two wide troughs 23, and the side walls of the adjacent wide troughs 23 are lowered by one step as shown by the arrow P in FIG. 3 so as to allow it, and one of them. The side wall of one overlaps the other side wall to prevent leakage of the article. Further, the chute 3 is held at a position slightly raised from the lowered side wall. Therefore, even if one of the second transport units 2 is stopped and the articles are deposited on the article transport surface, the deposited articles get over the lower side wall and are in operation next to the second transport unit. It is designed to move to 2. In this case, when the deposited article comes into contact with the chute 3, it is transmitted to the force sensor 4 via the chute 3, and when the force acting at that time exceeds a predetermined value or the state continues for a predetermined time, FIG. 4 shows. The control unit 7 is designed to stop the first transport unit 1.

Instead of this configuration, the first transport unit 1 and the second transport unit 2 may have a one-to-one correspondence, and the chute 3 may also be arranged for each second transport unit 2. In this case, the upstream first transport unit 1 can be finely controlled according to the transport status of the downstream second transport unit 2.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of the control system of the combination weighing device CW. In this figure, the control system of the article transport device F is mainly composed of a control unit 7, a force sensor 4 electrically connected to the control unit 7, and a vibration device 11 of the first transport unit. Further, the control system of the combination weighing device CW is mainly a control unit 8 for combination, a vibration device 21 of a second transport unit 2 electrically connected to the control unit 8, and eight weighing devices in this embodiment. It is composed of devices W1 to W8.

As shown in FIG. 5, each weighing device W has a drive unit D1 and D2 for opening and closing two gates G1 and G2 of the pool hopper PH, and a load cell LC1 for detecting the mass of each weighing hopper WH1 and WH2. , LC2 and drive units D3 and D4 for opening and closing the gates G3 and G4 of the measuring hoppers WH1 and WH2, respectively, and these are electrically connected to the control unit 8.

The control units 7 and 8 are composed of a microcomputer, and execute a well-known combination operation by executing a predetermined program incorporated therein. The control for each of the transport units 1 and 2 will be described later. Further, in this embodiment, the control unit 7 of the article transport device F and the control unit 8 of the combination weighing device are separated, but a control unit in which these are integrated may be used.

A detection signal of the force sensor 4 is input to the control unit 7 of the article transport device F, and the control unit 7 monitors it to control the first transport unit 1 and additionally supply articles to the hopper H. Instruct. For example, the first transport unit 1 is driven to store the average value of the outputs of the force sensor 4 when the article is normally flowing through the chute 3. Then, when the detection output of the force sensor 4 becomes equal to or less than the memorized average value, it is estimated that the amount of discharge flowing to the chute 3 is reduced due to the decrease of the articles in the hopper H, so that the articles are additionally supplied to the hopper H. Is notified. Then, until the article is additionally supplied to the hopper H, the vibration intensity of the first transport unit 1 is increased or the vibration time is lengthened according to the force acting on the chute 3, so that the discharge amount is constant. Control to be.

Further, when the downstream second transport unit 2 is stopped and the articles discharged from the first transport unit 1 are deposited on the article receiving surface 28, the deposited articles ride on the chute 3 and thereby the force sensor 4 Output changes. The control unit 7 catches the change and stops the first transport unit 1. Further, when the transport of the second transport unit 2 is resumed, the articles on the chute 3 disappear, and the force sensor 4 detects the tare of the chute 3, the control unit 7 again transfers the first transport unit 1. It is driven to supply the article to the second transport unit 2. The control unit 7 executes such control based on the output of the force sensor 4 so that a certain amount of articles can be stored in the transport trough 20 of the second transport unit 2. As a result, even if the weighing device W requests the supply of goods at random timing, it is possible to respond to the request.

On the other hand, the control unit 8 of the combination weighing device executes the combination calculation based on the mass of the article for each weighing hopper WH input from the load cells LC of the total 16 weighing hoppers WH1 to 16, and measures the closest to the predetermined mass. Select the combination of hopper WH. At this time, a combination is executed in which the pair of weighing hoppers WH1 and WH2 arranged back to back are not selected at the same time. Subsequently, the control unit 8 drives the drive unit D3 (D4) of the gate G3 (G4) of the selected weighing hopper WH to discharge the article from the selected weighing hopper WH. The discharged articles are put into a packaging machine or the like via a collecting chute (not shown) and packed in a bag.

Subsequently, the control unit 8 drives one of the corresponding Kate G1 (G2) with respect to the corresponding pool hopper PH of the weighing hopper WH emptied by discharging the article, and the emptied weighing hopper. Supply goods to WH. Subsequently, the empty pool hopper PH is driven by a second transport unit 2 corresponding to the empty pool hopper PH to supply articles to the empty pool hopper PH. The control unit 8 repeats such a series of controls in a fixed cycle.

Further, the drive time and the vibration intensity of the second transport unit 2 are set to an appropriate transport amount that enables the combined weighing to be established each time. As a result, the movable rate of the combined weighing is improved, and the combined weighing accuracy is improved.

Although one embodiment of the present invention has been described above, the present invention is not limited to this, and other embodiments can also be adopted. For example, although it is configured as a combination weighing device in the above embodiment, a single article transporting device may be configured as a supply device for supplying articles to a normal weighing device. Further, in this combination weighing device, articles are selectively supplied from one pool hopper PH to two measuring hoppers WH, but one pool hopper PH and one measuring hopper WH are one-to-one. It may be configured to correspond.

1 1st transport unit 2 2nd transport unit 3 chute 4 force sensor 27 layer thickness adjustment unit 28 article receiving surface W weighing device F article transport device CW combination weighing device

Claims (5)

The first transport unit that transports goods,
A chute that slides the article discharged from the first transport unit and discharges it to the article receiving surface.
A force sensor that detects the force acting on the chute, and
A control unit that controls the first transport unit based on the output of the force sensor is provided.
The chute is insulated from the first transport unit and the article receiving surface, and is arranged at a position where a force is received from the article staying on the article receiving surface.
Goods transfer device. The article transporting device according to claim 1, wherein the article receiving surface is an article transporting surface of a second transporting unit that receives articles discharged from the chute and transports them downstream. The article transfer device according to claim 1, wherein the force sensor is a load cell, and the chute is suspended from a movable end of the load cell. The article transporting device according to claim 2, wherein the second transporting section is provided with a layer thickness adjusting section for controlling the layer thickness of the article. A line comprising the article transporting device according to any one of claims 1 to 4 and a weighing device arranged downstream thereof and receiving and weighing articles supplied from the article transporting device is the line of the article. Multiple arrangements are arranged in the direction orthogonal to the transport direction,
Combination weighing device.

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