Data processing: generic control systems or specific application – Generic control system – apparatus or process – Digital positioning
Reexamination Certificate
1999-07-09
2002-04-16
Grant, William (Department: 2121)
Data processing: generic control systems or specific application
Generic control system, apparatus or process
Digital positioning
C700S114000, C700S121000, C700S193000, C029S833000, C382S145000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06374146
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a component suction site-teaching system for teaching a location of a suction site (i.e. a site to be sucked by a vacuum nozzle) of an electronic component supplied to a predetermined pickup position to nozzle moving means for moving the vacuum nozzle.
2. Prior Art
In a mounter (electronic component-mounting apparatus) or the like, electronic components are sequentially fed e.g. in a state carried on a carrier tape to a forward end of a component-feeding device, and vacuum nozzles provided on a main block of the mounting apparatus are brought to a position facing the forward end of the component-feeding device from above, to pick up the electronic components one after another. In this sequential operation, the component-feeding device feeds the electronic components one after another to the pickup position at the forward end thereof with high accuracy. On the other hand, in the main block of the mounting apparatus, each of the vacuum nozzles is moved accurately in X and Y directions and brought to the pickup position. Actually, however, it is impossible to always bring the vacuum nozzle precisely to each electronic component supplied to the pickup position due to inevitable mounting errors of the component-feeding device removably mounted to the main block of the mounting apparatus. So long as the electronic component to be picked up has a large and flat suction surface, no failure of pickup occurs even if the location of a suction site of the electronic component is slightly deviated or offset from design values thereof. However, in picking up another type of electronic component, such as a surface-mount connector component, which has a suction surface thereof formed with asperities and a very small suction site, the slightest deviation of the location of the suction site from its design values may cause a failure of the pickup.
For this reason, in picking up electronic components of this type, the conventional mounter or the like requires the operator to bring the vacuum nozzle close to the electronic component visually align the nozzle with the suction site of the component, and then teach results of the visual alignment to a control system for controlling motion of X-Y stages of the apparatus. In this case, since the component-feeding device is capable of feeding electronic components accurately to the pickup position at the forward end thereof, the above alignment is only required to be carried out for an electronic component on the carrier tape which is first supplied to the pickup position.
However, in the conventional teaching method based on the visual alignment, the operator is required to manually operate the X-Y stages and a lift device to repeatedly move the vacuum nozzle (of the mounting head) in the X and Y directions and lift/lower the same vertically (i.e. in a Z direction), which is very time-consuming and effort-demanding.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is a first object of the invention to provide a component suction site-teaching system which is capable of teaching a location of a suction site of an electronic component to be sucked by a vacuum nozzle, with high accuracy and ease.
It is a second object of the invention to provide a component suction site teaching method which is capable of teaching a location of a suction site of an electronic component to be sucked by a vacuum nozzle, with high accuracy and ease.
To attain the first object, according to a first aspect of the invention, there is provided a component suction site-teaching system for an electronic component-mounting apparatus including a vacuum nozzle having a nozzle end face for picking up an electronic component thereat by vacuum, the component suction site-teaching system comprising:
nozzle moving means for moving the vacuum nozzle in directions of X axis and Y axis;
image taking means for taking an image of the electronic component set at a pickup position;
image creating means for creating a graphical image of the nozzle end face of the vacuum nozzle from shape data of the vacuum nozzle;
display means for displaying on a screen thereof the image of the electronic component taken by the image taking means and the graphical image of the nozzle end face created by the image creating means, such that the graphical image of the nozzle end face is superimposed on the image of the electronic component;
image control means for moving the image of the electronic component and the graphical image of the nozzle end face relative to each other on the screen of the display means, thereby effecting alignment of the graphical image of the nozzle end face with an image of a predetermined site of the electronic component; and
suction site-teaching means for teaching to the nozzle moving means a location of the predetermined site of the electronic component the image of which has been aligned with the graphical image of the nozzle end face by the image control means, as a location of a suction site of the electronic component to be sucked by the vacuum nozzle.
According to this component suction site-teaching system, the image of the electronic component taken by the image taking means and the graphical image of the nozzle end face generated by the image creating means are superimposed one upon the other and moved relative to each other thereby effecting alignment of the graphical image of the nozzle end face with an image of a predetermined site of the electronic component, and then a location of the predetermined site of the electronic component the image of which has been aligned with the graphical image of the nozzle end face is taught to the nozzle moving means as a location of a suction site of the electronic component to be sucked by the corresponding vacuum nozzle. Therefore, the alignment between the suction site of the electronic component and the end face of the vacuum nozzle can be carried out on screen by using the two images, whereby it is possible to teach to the nozzle moving means a suction site on the electronic component which is determined with high accuracy such that there are no asperities or obstacles existing on a suction surface within the suction site of the component. Further, the operator can carry out the alignment accurately and speedily, based or a representation of the actual positional relationship between the component and the nozzle. It should be noted that the initial position of the graphical image of the vacuum nozzle with respect to the image of the electronic component on the screen may be arbitrary, or may be set based on design value data (i.e. a location of a suction site set before the teaching).
Preferably, the component suction site-teaching system further comprises image-taking center-designating means for designating a design value-designated component center of the electronic component as a center of a field of view of the image taking means when the image taking means takes the image of the electronic component, if there is a fear that an image of the electronic component taken by the image taking means with the center of the field of view of the image taking means set to a design value-designated suction site center of the electronic component may extend of f the field of view of the image taking means.
According to this preferred embodiment, it is possible to start operation for the alignment, on the precondition that the displayed image of the electronic component is an image of an approximately central portion of the electronic component, and at the same time, since the center of the electronic component substantially agrees with that of the screen, it is easy to grasp the total picture of the component. This provides a solution to a conventional problem that when a suction site of an electronic component is deviated or offset far from the center of the electronic component, if an image of the electronic component is taken by the image taking means with the center of the field of view thereof set to the suction site of the component, it is impossible to determine which porti
Fukushima Hideaki
Ieizumi Kazuyoshi
Kuribara Shigeru
Oyama Kazuyoshi
Darby & Darby
Frank Elliot
Grant William
Sanyo Electric Co,. Ltd.
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