JPH08208007A - Position-recognitive pallet for automatic operation-controlled warehouse - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide a position recognitive pallet for an automatic operation- controlled warehouse, which is excellent in its saving, stabilization and rationalization, because no hands are required and also positioning accuracy is high when housing a plurality of articles in their respective predetermined positions of the pallet in a warehouse, and further recognizing marks do not need to be put on all articles. CONSTITUTION: This pallet is equipped with coordinate position recognizing marks 5 regularly attached per each grid on the top surfaces of respective grid-like diaphragms of the pallet. A robot 05 takes out and returns a magnetic tape 1 from/to the pallet based on the coordinate position recognizing marks 5.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a position-recognizable pallet for an automatic operation management warehouse.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art For example, as an automatic operation management warehouse for storing a cartridge type magnetic tape by a computer,
2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, the one shown in FIG. 2 (A) cross-sectional view and FIG. 2 (B) plan view is known. That is, an automatic operation management warehouse (hereinafter referred to as a warehouse) 01 has a traveling path 03 that extends longitudinally through the center of the floor of the warehouse building 02, and is movable along the traveling path 03 in the longitudinal direction and at the top. , A tower robot 05 rotatably supporting a horizontal arm 04, pallets 06 arranged side by side on the left and right of the traveling path 03 in several stages, and attached to the tip and the tip of the arm 04, respectively. CCD camera 07, pneumatic drive hand 08
And a magnetic tape device 09 and the like that are attached to the left side of the warehouse building 02. Here, on the top surface of the cartridge type magnetic tape (hereinafter referred to as magnetic tape) 010, as shown in the perspective view of FIG.
Is attached.

In such a warehouse 01, the robot 0
5 moves to the storage position coordinate of the target magnetic tape 010 along the traveling path 03 by an external command, grasps the magnetic tape 010 with the hand 08, and the magnetic tape device 09
To insert. Also, the magnetic tape 010 after use, which is taken out from the magnetic tape device 09 by the reverse operation, is grasped and returned to the original storage position.

At the time of taking out and returning the magnetic tape, the robot 05 recognizes the storage position coordinates of the magnetic tape 010 by photographing the recognition mark 011 displayed on the top surface of the magnetic tape 010 by the CCD camera 07, The centroid of the image-processed recognition mark 011 is used. Since the warehouse 01 stores several thousand to ten thousand thousands of magnetic tapes 010, the individual storage position coordinates of the magnetic tapes 010 are stored in the robot 05.
In order to make the robot recognize, a large number of magnetic tapes 010 displaying the recognition mark 011 are manually loaded in the pallet 06 by hand, and then the CCD camera 07 of the robot 05 takes an image to perform image processing.

If a magnetic tape containing actual data is already loaded in the pallet 06, it is not used for position coordinate recognition, and since the recognition mark is not attached, the magnetic tape is once manually Magnetic tape 01 for position coordinate recognition that has been removed and displayed with recognition mark 011
After replacing with 0, the storage position coordinates are recognized in the same manner as above.

However, such a device has the following drawbacks. (1) Since the work of loading the magnetic tape 010 into the pallet 06 in advance is performed manually in the narrow warehouse 01, it takes a lot of time and the positional accuracy is not constant, so that the cost is low. It is bulky and the operational efficiency is unstable. (2) When the actual data is loaded in the pallet 06 by the magnetic tape without the recognition mark 011 attached,
Since it is necessary to manually take out this magnetic tape and replace it with the magnetic tape 010 having the recognition mark 011 attached, a lot of time is spent and therefore the cost is increased.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been proposed in view of such circumstances, and it requires no manual labor to store a plurality of articles in predetermined positions of a pallet in a warehouse. It is an object of the present invention to provide a position recognizable type pallet of an automatic operation management warehouse which has high position accuracy and does not require a recognition mark to be attached to each article, and is therefore labor-saving, stable and rational.

[0008]

To this end, the present invention provides a pallet arranged on the left and right sides of a warehouse in a shelf shape and capable of storing a plurality of articles between grid-like partition plates, and a front and rear direction inside the warehouse. In the automatic operation management warehouse equipped with a tower robot having an arm that can move and swivel and ascend and descend, and a hand for grasping articles and a CCD camera for coordinate position detection at the tip and the tip of the arm, A coordinate position recognition mark regularly provided for each lattice is provided on the top surface of each lattice partition plate, and the robot is configured to take out and return the article based on the coordinate position recognition mark. It is characterized by having done.

[0009]

According to this structure, the coordinate position recognition marks regularly provided for each grid on the top surface of each grid partition plate of the pallet are provided, and the robot is provided with the coordinate position recognition marks. Since the article is taken out and returned based on the above, the following operation is performed. (1) Since the work of preliminarily loading the articles into the pallet is automatically performed in a narrow warehouse, the time of the above work is shortened and the positional accuracy is improved. (2) Since it is not necessary to attach a coordinate position recognition mark to an article in advance, it becomes possible to handle general articles as they are.

[0010]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Referring to the drawings, an embodiment in which the present invention is applied to the pallet of a warehouse shown in FIG. 3 will be described. The same reference numerals as those in FIG. 3 denote the same members as those in FIG. In the figure and the plan view (B), 1 is a general cartridge type magnetic tape (hereinafter referred to as a magnetic tape), 2 is a pallet with a coordinate position recognition mark for storing a plurality of magnetic tapes 1 aligned vertically and horizontally, The front-rear direction is divided into a plurality by a plurality of all-through partition plates 3 each extending in the left-right direction with a dimension slightly larger than the width of the magnetic tape 1, and the left-right direction extends in the front-rear direction with a dimension slightly larger than the thickness of the magnetic tape 1. The partition plate 4 is divided into a plurality of partitions, and the heights of the all-through partition plate 3 and the partial partition plate 4 are slightly higher than the height of the magnetic tape 1.

Reference numeral 5 denotes a plurality of coordinate position recognizing marks provided on the top surfaces of the front and rear end portions of each partial partition plate 4, and in this embodiment, they are displayed with white paint having a diameter of 3.5 mm. Reference numeral 6 denotes an automatic operation management warehouse (hereinafter referred to as a warehouse) formed by the warehouse building 02 to the tower robot 05, the CCD camera 07 to the magnetic tape device 09, the marked pallet 2 to the coordinate position recognition mark 5, etc. .

In such a warehouse 6, the robot 05
(FIG. 2) grabs a predetermined magnetic tape 1 from the plurality of magnetic tapes 1 stored in the marked pallet 2 by the hand 08, or one magnetic tape taken out from the magnetic tape device 09 (FIG. 2) When the robot 1 picks up 1 at a predetermined position on the marked pallet 2, the robot 05 uses the C
The CD camera 07 photographs the coordinate position recognition mark 5 on the marked pallet 2, processes the image, and recognizes the centroid of the mark 5 as the coordinate position.

Then, the robot 05 presets a positional difference between the coordinate position of the coordinate position recognition mark 5 and the coordinate position of the magnetic tape 1 to be handled, and recognizes the coordinate position of the magnetic tape 1 on the marked pallet 2. After that, by adding or subtracting the above position difference with a computer,
The coordinate position of the target magnetic tape 1 is automatically recognized.

According to the apparatus of this embodiment, the robot is provided with the coordinate position recognizing marks regularly attached to each grid on the top surface of each grid partition plate of the pallet.
Since the article is taken out and returned based on the coordinate position recognition mark, the following effects can be obtained. (1) The work of pre-loading the goods into the pallet is automatically performed in a narrow warehouse, and as a result, the above-mentioned work time is shortened and the positional accuracy is improved, thus reducing the cost and operating it. Efficiency improves. (2) Since it is not necessary to attach a coordinate position recognition mark to an article in advance, it becomes possible to handle general articles as they are, and therefore costs can be reduced.

[0015]

In summary, according to the present invention, a pallet which is arranged on the left and right sides of the warehouse in a shelf shape and which can store a plurality of articles between the grid-like partition plates, and which can be moved forward and backward in the warehouse. In an automated operation management warehouse equipped with a tower robot having an arm that can be swung and raised and lowered, and a hand for gripping an article and a CCD camera for coordinate position detection at the tip and tip of the arm, each grid of the pallet By providing a coordinate position recognition mark regularly attached to each lattice on the top surface of the partition plate, the robot is configured to take out and return the article based on the coordinate position recognition mark. In order to store a plurality of items in the pallet at predetermined positions in the warehouse, no labor is required and the position accuracy is high, and each item has a recognition mark. There is no need, therefore, labor-saving,
INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY The present invention is extremely useful in industry because it provides a position-recognizable pallet for an automated operation management warehouse that is highly stable and rationalized.

[Brief description of drawings]

1 shows an embodiment in which the present invention is applied to the automatic operation management warehouse shown in FIG. 3, and (A) and (B) are a perspective view and a plan view, respectively.

FIG. 2 shows a known automatic operation management warehouse, in which (A) and (B) are a cross-sectional view and a plan view, respectively.

3 is a partially enlarged perspective view showing details of a pallet 06 and a magnetic tape 010 of FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Magnetic tape 2 Pallet with mark 3 Full partition plate 4 Partial partition plate 5 Coordinate position recognition mark 6 Warehouse 04 Arm 07 CCD camera 08 Hand

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A pallet, which is arranged on the left and right sides of a warehouse in a shelf shape and can store a plurality of articles between grid partition plates, and an arm which can move in the front-rear direction and can be swung and raised and lowered. In an automatic operation management warehouse equipped with a tower robot having the above, a hand for grasping an article at the tip of the arm, a CCD camera for detecting a coordinate position, respectively, on the top surface of each lattice partition plate of the pallet. The automatic operation management warehouse is characterized by comprising coordinate position recognition marks regularly attached to each grid, and the robot is configured to take out and return the article based on the coordinate position recognition marks. Location-recognizable pallet.