JP5788753B2 - Article conveying device - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an article conveying apparatus that can convey an article at high speed.

  The article conveyed at random on the conveyor is imaged by an imaging means such as a CCD camera, and based on the imaged information, the robot arm is rotated and the article is adsorbed by an adsorber provided on the arm. An apparatus for transferring an article to another conveyor is known (for example, see Patent Document 1). The apparatus disclosed in Patent Document 1 rotates an arm of a robot on the basis of information on an article on a first conveyor imaged by an imaging unit, and the first conveyor has an irregular interval in front, rear, left, and right in the transport direction. A specific article is adsorbed from among the articles conveyed in (1), the arm is rotated toward the second conveyor, and the article is placed on the second conveyor.

JP 2006-160416 A

  In the apparatus disclosed in Patent Document 1, since one arm of the robot travels back and forth between the first conveyor and the second conveyor to convey the article, when the subsequent process is processed at a high speed, the high-speed processing is performed. Each article cannot be sucked and conveyed at a high speed so as to correspond. Since the articles that could not be adsorbed by the robot are frequently collected by the collection device, the articles cannot be efficiently transferred from the first conveyor to the second conveyor.

  That is, the present invention has been proposed in order to suitably solve these problems inherent in the conventional article transport apparatus, and is an article that has been transported at an arbitrary interval or orientation. Another object of the present invention is to provide an article transport apparatus that can transport at a high speed so as to face a specific direction at the placement position.

In order to overcome the above-mentioned problems and achieve the intended purpose, an article transporting apparatus according to claim 1 of the present application provides:
A rotating body that rotates around a vertical axis at a constant speed in a constant direction;
A plurality of arms that are rotatably supported with respect to the rotating body apart from the rotation center of the rotating body, and that are independently rotated around an axis in the vertical direction;
An adsorber that is provided on the free end side of each arm in the plurality of arms so as to be rotatable around an axis in the vertical direction, and can be moved up and down independently for each arm to adsorb an article;
An article recognition means for recognizing the position and orientation of each article having directivity conveyed on the first conveyor at an arbitrary interval and orientation in front, rear, left, and right in the conveyance direction;
Based on the information regarding the position of each article obtained by the article recognition means, an order for sucking the articles is determined, and an arm associated with the suction order is selected from a plurality of arms according to the suction order. While rotating independently during rotation, the adsorbing tool is lifted after adsorbing the article with the lowered adsorbing tool,
Based on the information on the orientation of each article obtained by the article recognition means and the information on the amount of rotation of the arm, the article is placed on the second conveyor by adsorbing the suction tool that has attracted the article being conveyed by the first conveyor. position is rotated to face in a particular direction, characterized in that the location be so that structure mounting the mounting position the article disconnect the article as well as lower the sucker.
According to the first aspect of the present invention, even if the article has been conveyed on the first conveyor at an arbitrary interval and orientation, the article is directed from the first conveyor to the mounting position of the second conveyor in a specific direction. So that it can be transported at high speed.

In the invention according to claim 2, the state in which the article is adsorbed after rotating the adsorber based on the information on the direction of the article to be adsorbed and the information on the amount of rotation of the arm at the position of the article to be adsorbed Then, the suction tool is rotated in the reverse direction by the amount rotated, and the article is directed in the specific direction at the placement position.
According to the invention which concerns on Claim 2, when rotating an adsorption | suction tool, the arithmetic processing in the case of the rotation becomes simple, and it can respond to the further high-speed of conveyance of articles | goods. Further, it is possible to prevent the twisting of the piping or the like that would hinder the rotation of the suction tool.

The invention according to claim 3 is characterized in that the suction tool is rotated by a motor in a direction in which the rotation angle decreases.
According to the invention which concerns on Claim 3, it can respond to the further increase in the speed of conveyance of articles | goods by reducing the rotation amount of an adsorption tool. In addition, the load on the motor can be suppressed, and energy loss can be reduced.

In the invention according to claim 4, the suction tool releases the suction of the article after the inertia of the article caused by the rotation of the suction tool itself disappears.
According to the fourth aspect of the invention, since the suction of the article is released after the inertia of the article caused by the rotation of the suction tool disappears, the positional deviation of the article at the mounting position can be prevented.

  According to the article conveying apparatus according to the present invention, even an article having directivity that has been conveyed on a conveyor at an arbitrary interval and direction can be conveyed at high speed so as to face a specific direction at the placement position. Can do.

(a) is a schematic plan view which shows the article conveyance apparatus which concerns on the suitable Example of this invention, (b) is a schematic front view of a 2nd conveyor. It is a schematic front view of the article conveyance apparatus of an Example. It is explanatory drawing which shows a motion of the arm at the time of adsorb | sucking the articles | goods on a 1st conveyor with an adsorption tool. It is a control block diagram of the goods conveyance apparatus of an Example.

  Next, the article conveying apparatus according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings by way of preferred embodiments.

  As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the article conveying apparatus receives a first conveyor (conveyor) 12 including a belt conveyor that conveys a plurality of articles 10 at a predetermined speed, and receives the articles 10 from the first conveyor 12. And a robot 14 that conveys the article 10 so as to be delivered in a specific direction to the placement position X. In the embodiment, the placement position X is set at the upstream portion of the second conveyor 16 disposed adjacent to the first conveyor 12 so that the article 10 is placed at the same position every time. The article 10 is placed at the placement position X at a timing between the partition members 18 and 18 disposed in the space (see FIG. 1B). The article conveying apparatus according to the embodiment includes an article 10 having a direction directed by a shape, an article 10 having a direction directed by a pattern or a character attached to an outer surface, or an article 10 having a direction directed by a combination thereof. It is preferably used for conveying the article 10 having directivity. In the first conveyor 12, a plurality of articles 10 are conveyed in an arbitrary state with irregular intervals at front, rear, left, and right in the conveying direction and in different directions. The second conveyor 16 conveys the articles 10 placed one by one between the partition members 18 and 18 at the placement position X in a row, and puts the articles 10 into the tubular film in the horizontal bag making and filling machine at predetermined intervals. To supply.

  The robot 14 is attached to a gantry (not shown), and includes a rotating body 20 that is rotatably arranged around a vertical axis (see FIG. 1 or 2). The rotator 20 receives the drive of the rotator motor 22 and rotates at a constant speed in a certain direction (counterclockwise in FIG. 1 in the embodiment). The rotating body 20 is provided with four support portions 24 having the same shape and extending outward in the radial direction. In each support portion 24, a rotation shaft 28 whose axis extends in the vertical direction with respect to the support portion 24 is separated from the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 by the same distance, and the rotation center Q is centered on the rotation center Q. Supported at angular intervals. The rotation shaft 28 is rotated by receiving a driving force of an arm rotation motor 26 disposed in each support portion 24. Each pivot shaft 28 is provided with an arm 32 that can be moved up and down along the pivot shaft 28 under the drive of an arm lift motor 30. Each arm 32 is configured to receive a drive from a corresponding arm rotation motor 26 and to rotate independently by a predetermined angle in the horizontal direction around the rotation shaft 28 together with the rotation shaft 28. The moving angle is set so as not to contact the adjacent arm 32.

  As shown in FIG. 1, each arm 32 is provided with a suction tool 34 rotatably on the arm 32 on the free end side of the arm 32 that is separated from the corresponding rotation shaft 28 by the same distance. The suction tool 34 is rotated around the vertical axis in response to the driving force from the tool motor 36. The suction tool 34 has a suction head 40 detachably attached to a lower end of a tubular body 38 supported by the arm 32, and includes an air flow path 42 penetrating vertically in the tubular body 38 and the suction head 40. . The suction head 40 is exchanged according to properties such as the shape and hardness of the article 10 to be conveyed. The adsorber 34 supplies air from the side to the air flow path 42 from an air supply source (not shown) such as a compressor via an air pipe 44 (see FIG. 2) connected to the lower side surface of the tubular body 38. A main air supply unit 43 (see FIG. 4) is provided, which serves as a so-called ejector-type vacuum generating unit that generates a negative pressure at the lower end surface of the suction head 40 by supplying air from the main air supply unit 43. Further, the adsorbing tool 34 supplies air from an auxiliary air supply source (not shown), so that the adsorbing tool 34 is connected to the air channel 42 via an auxiliary air pipe 46 (see FIG. 2) provided above the air channel 42. An auxiliary air supply unit 45 (see FIG. 4) for supplying air from the upper opening is provided. The suction tool 34 sucks the article 10 by the suction head 40 when air is supplied from the main air supply unit 43 when the article 10 is sucked. When the article 10 adsorbed to the adsorption head 40 is cut off, the supply of air from the main air supply unit 43 is stopped and air is blown from the auxiliary air supply unit 45 into the air flow path 42 in accordance with this timing. Thus, the breakage of the negative pressure state in the air flow path 42 is assisted. Air can be supplied to each of the suction tools 34 independently from the main air supply unit 43 and the auxiliary air supply unit 45, and the suction of the article 10 or the release of the article 10 is performed for each suction tool 34.

  While the rotating body 20 is rotating, the robot 14 rotates the adsorbing tool 34 that adsorbs the article 10 so as to be closer to the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 than the rotating shaft 28. The article 10 is moved to the placement position X while being moved in the transport direction of the second conveyor 16. Further, the robot 14 has an arm so as to spread more widely than an angle θ1 of the arm 32 with respect to a line segment connecting the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 and the rotation shaft 28 when the article 10 is placed at the placement position X. 32 is rotated, and the article 10 conveyed in the article holding area K on the first conveyor 12 is adsorbed by the adsorber 34.

  As shown in FIG. 4, each of the rotary body motor 22, the arm rotation motor 26, the arm lifting / lowering motor 30, the suction tool motor 36, and the air supply unit having the main air supply unit 43 and the auxiliary air supply unit 45 is an article. It is controlled by the robot controller 15 based on the information of the article 10 obtained by the recognition means. The robot controller 15 performs horizontal bag making in order to issue drive commands for the various motors 22, 26, 30, 36, air supply commands to the air supply units 43, 45, and drive commands to the drive motor 12a of the first conveyor 12. Communicates and inputs information such as the respective preparation status with the packaging machine controller 50 that controls packaging such as sealing and cutting of the article 10 supplied in the film formed into a cylindrical shape in the filling machine The operation timing is adjusted in accordance with the origin position by the origin position sensor provided on the second conveyor 16 and information such as an encoder. The rotating body motor 22, the arm rotation motor 26, the arm lifting / lowering motor 30, and the suction tool motor 36 may be motors whose position and speed can be controlled by the robot controller 15, for example, servo motors are used.

As shown in FIG. 1, on the first conveyor 12, an article recognition area N in which the article detection means 11 images the conveyance state of the article 10 every predetermined time, and is positioned downstream of the article recognition area N. Thus, an article holding region K for adsorbing the article 10 by the suction tool 34 of the robot 14 is set. In the article recognition area N, the article recognition means 11 indicates the respective states of the article 10 conveyed at irregular intervals (arbitrary intervals and orientations) in the article recognition area N in the front and rear, right and left directions. The captured image data is sequentially transmitted to the data processing unit in the robot controller 15 every time the image is captured, and the position and orientation of each article 10 are recognized by the processing in the data processing unit. The article detection unit 11 can employ an area sensor such as a CCD line sensor, a detection method such as X-rays. The article holding area K is an area where the arm 32 itself can rotate within a range of a predetermined angle during the movement of the arm 32 due to the rotation of the rotating body 20 and can adsorb the article 10. , And the rotation of the suction tool 34 can complete the preparation to be placed at the placement position X of the second conveyor 16. The area is smaller than the article recognition area N and spreads to the left and right of the first conveyor 12. It is set as an area where any article 10 can be adsorbed.

  The robot controller 15 determines the order in which the articles 10 are sucked and conveyed each time a plurality of articles 10 are recognized by the article recognition means. After the article 10 sucked by the suction tool 34 is placed at the placement position X of the second conveyor 16, the robot controller 15 moves the rotation shaft 28 of the arm 32 that supports the suction tool 34 in the counterclockwise direction. The order of adsorbing the articles 10 is determined by the information from the article recognition means before reaching the advanced start position A, and the start position A is scheduled from the position of the plurality of articles 10 on the first conveyor 12 to the next. The position of the article 10 to be sucked by the suction tool 34 is calculated. For example, the suction order of the plurality of articles 10 recognized by the article recognition means is the minimum angle (described later) at which the suction tool 34 is closer to the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 than the rotation shaft 28 of each arm 32 for high-speed processing. The arm 32 is rotated at a large angle so that the arm 32 is larger than θ1, and the adjacent articles 10 are not contacted with each other in the rotation trajectory of the arm 32 among the plurality of articles 10 in the article holding region K. In addition, the suction tool 34 sequentially determines from the article 10 farthest in the rotation direction of the rotating body 20.

  Further, in the robot controller 15, the next suction plan of the article 10 to be sucked is calculated by considering the transport speed of the first conveyor 12 and the like with the information obtained by the article recognition means until the suction tool 34 reaches the start position A. Based on the position U, the angle β from the starting position A of the rotating shaft 28 based on the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 up to the position U, and the arm 32 when the article 10 is adsorbed at the position U Various movements of the arm 32 and the suction tool 34, such as the angle θ of the suction tool 34 and the lifting / lowering timing of the suction tool 34 (arm 32), and the information on the orientation of the article 10 to be sucked at the position U, The angle at which the suction tool 34 is rotated before the article 10 is sucked (rotation angle before suction), the direction in which the suction tool 34 is rotated, the angle at which the suction tool 34 is rotated after the suction of the article 10 (rotation angle after suction), etc. Suck The rotational motion of the dressing 34 is determined. Note that the determination of the rotation operation of the suction tool 34 includes information on the amount of rotation of the arm 32 at the position U where the article 10 is sucked. The suction tool 34 is rotationally driven at the placement position X of the second conveyor 16 so as to direct the article 10 in a specific direction, for example, forward in the transport direction, and the rotational position of the suction tool 34 at that time is set as the origin. Yes. Then, when the suction tool 34 whose rotational position has reached the origin attracts the next article 10, the rotation angle before suction from the origin is determined based on information on the orientation of the article 10. At this time, the rotation angle before suction is determined so that the rotation angle of the suction tool 34 becomes small (180 ° or less). For example, even if the suction tool 34 is rotated 90 ° clockwise or the suction tool 34 is rotated 270 ° counterclockwise, the suction tool 34 is oriented in the same direction when the article 10 is suctioned. Then, the rotation angle before suction is determined so that the suction tool 34 is rotated 90 ° clockwise. Further, in order to return the rotation position of the rotated suction tool 34 to the original position at the placement position X, the rotation direction after suction is determined to be opposite to the direction rotated before suction, and the rotation angle before suction is determined. And the rotation angle after adsorption having the same absolute value. Therefore, for example, if the article 10 is adsorbed by rotating the adsorber 34 at a rotation angle of 90 ° clockwise before the adsorption, the adsorber 34 is moved from the position U to the placement position X. The suction tool motor 36 is driven based on control command information determined in advance so as to rotate 90 ° counterclockwise in the opposite direction by the amount of rotation of the.

  In the article transport device, since the rotating body 20 rotates at a high speed, when the suction tool 34 contacts the article 10 at the position U, the arm 32 is moved to the position U so that the article 10 does not jump out in the rotation direction. At the timing before and after the rotation at the position U, the rotation angle is rotated forward (θ + α) (for example, α is 5 °) from the corresponding rotation angle θ to the front side in the rotation direction of the rotating body 20. As shown, the arm 32 is rotated by 2α from the rotation angle (θ + α) to the rotation angle (θ−α). As a result, the relative speed between the adsorbing tool 34 and the article 10 is offset or reduced, and the article 10 can be adsorbed stably. When the arm 32 is rotated by 2α, the suction tool 34 descends together with the arm 32 and descends most at the position U to adsorb the article 10, and then the adsorbed article 10 is an adjacent article on the first conveyor 12. 10 and the arm 32 are raised to a height that does not hit the partition member 18 of the second conveyor 16.

  As preparation for placing the article 10 at the placement position X, the robot 14 moves the suction tool 34 so that the placed article 10 faces in the same direction based on information obtained from the article recognition means. While rotating, the angle of the arm 32 is changed to the angle θ1. The angle θ1 of the arm 32 is the arm when the suction tool 34 on the free end side of the arm 32 is closest to the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 among the angles of the arm 32 within the set predetermined angle range. 32 angles. Therefore, the distance (R1) from the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 to the suction tool 34 is the shortest (R1 <the distance from the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 to the rotating shaft 28), and the angle θ1 of the arm 32 is reached. The rotation speed of the suction tool 34 is the slowest. The reason why the rotation speed is the slowest by setting the angle of the arm 32 to be the angle θ1 is to synchronize with the timing when the second conveyor 16 conveys each article 10, and the placement position of the article 10 on the second conveyor 16 This is important for reducing variation in X.

  As shown in FIG. 1 (b), the suction tool 34 descends while moving over the moving partition member 18 from the rear in the transport direction of the second conveyor 16. The supply of air from the main air supply unit 43 is stopped at the timing immediately before the suction tool 34 finishes descending in the state where the angle of the arm 32 is the angle θ1, and above the air flow path 42 from the auxiliary air supply unit 45. Air is blown from. When the vacuum state in the air flow path 42 is broken in a short time by blowing air from the auxiliary air supply unit 45, the placement position X of the article 10 extends in the width direction intersecting the transport direction of the second conveyor 16. In order to prevent deviation, the angle of the arm 32 gradually increases from the angle θ1, and the arm 32 conveys the center of the suction tool 34 to the center of the second conveyor 16 as shown by the two-dot chain line in FIG. Move in a straight line toward the direction along the center. The suction tool 34 is located at a position shorter than the distance from the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 to the rotation shaft 28 at an angle θn of the arm 32 at the end of the linear movement (θn is an angle slightly larger than θ1). In order to attract the next article 10 by the rotation of the rotating body 20, the moving toward the start position A.

  Next, functions and effects of the article transport device according to the embodiment will be described. While the rotating body 20 is rotating, the arm 32 is rotated to change the distance from the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 to the suction tool 34, and the arm within a predetermined angle range in which the rotating angle of the arm 32 is set. The centrifugal force acting on the article 10 by rotating the rotating body 20 by moving the suction tool 34 toward the transport direction of the second conveyor 16 with the minimum rotation angle θ1 among the 32 angles. And the positional deviation of the articles in the width direction of the second conveyor 16 can be reduced. Further, when adsorbing the article 10 based on the angle θn of the arm 32 when the article 10 is placed, the arm 32 is rotated so that the arm 32 spreads larger than the angle θn. Compared to the case where the article 10 is sucked by an existing type of robot that does not, the article holding region K can be set wider, and the positional relationship between the base point and the position where the article 10 is sucked can be easily calculated. High-speed processing is possible. Since the article conveying apparatus uses the robot 14 that adsorbs the article 10 with the adsorbing tool 34 disposed on the free end side of the arm 32 that can rotate with respect to the rotating body 20 that rotates at a constant speed in a constant direction, When adsorbing the article 10 when compared with an existing type of robot that does not have (a robot that does not have an arm corresponding to the arm 32 and is provided with a suction means on the rotating body 20), the suction tool 34 is used. Move the wide range of the first conveyor 12 at a high speed to suck the article 10 and place the article 10 on the placement position X. The article 10 is surely placed on the second conveyor 16 by decelerating from the speed at which the article 10 is sucked. It can be mounted on. The articles 10 adsorbed by the respective adsorbers 34 are continuously placed between the partition members 18 and 18 of the second conveyor 16, so that the empty bag making and filling machine can perform emptying even in high-speed processing. Generation of a bag can be prevented. Further, the suction tool 34 releases the suction and releases the article 10 while the center of the suction tool 34 moves along the transport center of the second conveyor 16, so that the article 10 is not displaced left and right. It can be placed on the second conveyor 16. Therefore, even if there is no allowance for the opening size of the tubular film, the article 10 can be supplied to the tubular film, and the film can be wrapped at high speed while consuming the film appropriately.

The article transporting apparatus rotates the arms 32 in the same direction by an angle that does not interfere with the adjacent arm 32 from the minimum angle θ1 with the angle θ1 of the arms 32 as a minimum angle. to adsorb the article 10, since the arm 32 defines a predetermined angle of rotation, allowing high-speed processing positional relation to the position of adsorbing article 10 processing and so easy Kunar from minimum angle . Moreover, the collision between the adjacent arms 32 and 32 can be avoided. When the article conveying device sucks the article 10 in the article holding area K with the suction tool 34 at a position far from the rotation shaft 28 of the arm 32 with respect to the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20, the rotation direction of the rotating body 20 is determined. The arm 32 is rotated in the opposite direction to reduce the relative speed of the suction tool 34 with respect to the article 10. For this reason, since the moving speed of the suction tool 34 increases at a position farther from the rotation shaft 28 of the arm 32 with respect to the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20, the suction tool 34 comes into contact with the light article 10 or the like. However, when the article 10 is sucked by the suction tool 34, the arm 32 is rotated in the direction opposite to the rotation direction of the rotating body 20 to make the suction tool 34 relative to the article 10. Misalignment is less likely to occur by reducing the speed.

  According to the article transporting apparatus, even if the article 10 having directivity is transported on the first conveyor 12 at an arbitrary interval and orientation, the adsorber 34 is provided based on the information about the article 10 obtained by the article recognition means. By rotating, for example, 200 or more articles 10 on the first conveyor 12 are sucked per minute so that the articles 10 are placed in a specific direction from the first conveyor 12 to the placement position X. In this way, high-speed processing can be performed. The adsorber 34 is rotated from the origin at the pre-adsorption angle determined based on the information related to the orientation of the article 10 to be adsorbed and the information about the amount of rotation of the arm 32 at the position U where the article 10 is to be adsorbed. When the suction tool 34 is rotated, the suction tool 34 is rotated in the reverse direction by the amount of rotation of the suction tool 34 in the state where the suction tool 34 is sucked and the product 10 is sucked. In addition, the arithmetic processing for the rotation is simplified, and it is possible to cope with further speeding up of the conveyance of the article 10. In addition, twisting of the pipes 44, 46, etc., which may hinder the rotation of the suction tool 34, can be prevented. Further, since the suction tool 34 is configured so that the rotation angle before suction is set to 180 ° or less and is rotated in a direction in which the rotation angle becomes smaller, the amount of rotation of the suction tool 34 can be reduced. It is possible to cope with further increase in the speed of 10 conveyances. Since the suction tool 34 releases the suction of the article 10 after the inertia of the article 10 caused by the rotation of the suction tool 34 disappears, the position of the article 10 at the placement position X is prevented. Can do.

(Change example)
The present invention is not limited to the configuration of the embodiment, and can be modified as follows, for example. It should be noted that the present invention is not limited to the following modification examples, and various embodiments may be adopted for the configurations described in the examples within the scope of the gist of the present invention.
(1) The robot 14 is an example, and the arm 32 may be any one that is supported by the rotating body 20 at an equal interval angle. The number of the arms 32 is not limited, and a plurality of rotating bodies 20 are provided at the rotation center Q. The arms 32 may be rotated and supported by the respective rotating bodies, and the arms 32 may be arranged at equal intervals. The arm 32 is preferably the same type.
(2) Further, another arm may be connected to each arm 32 pivotally supported by the rotating body 20, and the other arm may be rotationally driven to attract the article 10.
(3) Although the second conveyor 16 is arranged in parallel to the first conveyor 12, if the placement position X is on the tangent line of the movement track of the suction tool 34, the second conveyor 16 is second to the first conveyor 12. The conveyors 16 may be arranged so as to intersect, for example.
(4) Although the articles 10 are arranged in a row on the second conveyor 16, the articles 10 may be arranged in a plurality of rows and conveyed, or a storage box, a tray, or the like may be placed on the second conveyor 16. A container may be placed, the article 10 may be arranged inside the box or container, and placed in the next box or container when the storage is completed.
(5) Although the arm 32 and the suction tool 34 are lifted and lowered together, lifting means for lifting and lowering only the suction tool 34 may be used. In this case, the suction tool 34 may be moved up and down by an air cylinder or the like instead of the motor.
(6) When changing the pitch of the partition members 18 of the second conveyor 16, the rotation angle of the arm 32 is changed to move from the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 along the conveyance center of the second conveyor 16. What is necessary is just to change the distance to the center of the suction tool 34. FIG. What is necessary is just to make it the relationship which the partition member 18 moves on the tangent of the movement locus | trajectory of the suction tool 34. FIG.
(7) The order of adsorbing the articles 10 in the article holding area K is the order of the articles 10 that obstruct the front side in the rotation direction of the arm 32 accompanying the rotation of the rotating body 20 among the articles 10 placed in the article holding area K. What is necessary is just to adsorb | suck from the outermost side in order. Further, in the article holding region K in which a plurality of articles 10 are arranged in the transport direction, it may be adsorbed from the downstream side of the outermost side where there are no obstructing articles. Further, if the distance from the rotation shaft 28 to the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 is increased so as not to interfere with the adjacent arm 32, the direction in which each arm 32 rotates may be freely set. .
(8) The packaging machine is not limited to the horizontal bag making and filling machine that supplies the article 10 placed on the second conveyor 16 into the cylindrical film and wraps the film. A boxing and packaging machine for boxing the article 10 that has been used may be used.

(9) If the suction tool 34 is not configured to be restricted by rotation of the air pipe 44 or the like, the suction tool 34 may continue to rotate in the same rotational direction.
(10) When a plurality of types of articles 10 are mixed and conveyed by the first conveyor 12, the specific direction at the placement position X not only aligns the direction of the directional articles 10 in one direction. Depending on the type of the article 10, the article 10 may be placed in different directions at the placement position X.
(11) When a plurality of types of articles 10 are mixed and conveyed by the first conveyor 12, the arm 32 for a line segment connecting the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 and the rotation shaft 28 according to the type of the articles 10. The article 10 may be placed at the placement position X by rotating the arm 32 with different angles. The placement position X may be set at a position where the suction tool 34 is farther from the rotation center Q of the rotating body 20 than the rotation shaft 28.
(12) The placement position X may be set on the bed on which the article 10 is pushed by the pusher conveying member, instead of being set on the conveying surface such as the belt conveyor exemplified in the second conveyor 16. The article 10 may be set on a simple fixed base and moved by another robot hand.
(13) The first conveyor 12 can also be used to place the articles 10 conveyed in a regularly aligned state in a specific direction at the placement position X. Moreover, the direction of the articles 10 conveyed at irregular intervals or in an aligned state on the first conveyor 12 in the front-rear and left-right directions may be aligned.

10 article, 12 first conveyors, 16 second conveyor 20 rotating body, 32 arm,
34 Suction tool, 36 Suction tool motor (motor), Q rotation center, U (planned suction) position,
X Placement position

Claims (4)

A rotating body (20) that rotates around a vertical axis at a constant speed in a constant direction;
A plurality of arms (32) that are rotatably supported with respect to the rotating body (20) away from the rotation center (Q) of the rotating body (20) and are independently rotated about an axis in the vertical direction. When,
In the plurality of arms (32), provided on the free end side of each arm (32) so as to be rotatable around an axis in the vertical direction, each arm (32) can be lifted and lowered independently to adsorb the article (10). Adsorber (34),
Article recognition means for recognizing the position and orientation of each article (10) having directivity conveyed on the first conveyor (12) at an arbitrary interval and orientation in front, rear, left and right in the conveyance direction;
Based on the information on the position of each article (10) obtained by the article recognition means, the order for sucking the article (10) is determined, and the arm (32) associated with the suction order from the plurality of arms (32) ( 32) are rotated independently during rotation of the rotating body (20) according to the adsorption order, and the adsorber (34) adsorbs the article (10) with the lowered adsorber (34). )
Based on the information on the orientation of each article (10) obtained by the article recognition means and the information on the amount of rotation of the arm (32), the article (10) being conveyed by the first conveyor (12 ) is adsorbed. The adsorber (34) is rotated so that the article (10) is directed in a specific direction at the placement position (X) of the second conveyor (16), and the adsorber (34) is lowered and the article (10) is lowered. disconnect and product transport apparatus being characterized in that said article (10) to the mounting location to so that configuration placing position (X).   Based on the information on the orientation of the article (10) to be sucked and the information on the amount of rotation of the arm (32) at the position (U) where the article (10) is to be sucked, the suction tool (34) is rotated. The adsorbing tool (34) is rotated in the reverse direction while adsorbing the article (10), and the article (10) is directed in the specific direction at the placement position (X). The article conveying apparatus according to claim 1, wherein   The article transporting device according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the suction tool (34) is rotated by a motor (36) in a direction in which a rotation angle becomes smaller.   The suction tool (34) is configured to release the suction of the article (10) after the inertia of the article (10) caused by the rotation of the suction tool (34) disappears. The article carrying device according to any one of claims 3 to 4.

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