Classifying – separating – and assorting solids – Sorting special items – and certain methods and apparatus for... – Condition responsive means controls separating means
Reexamination Certificate
1999-08-06
2001-02-27
Walsh, Donald P. (Department: 3653)
Classifying, separating, and assorting solids
Sorting special items, and certain methods and apparatus for...
Condition responsive means controls separating means
C209S573000, C209S574000, C209S600000, C209S601000, C324S754090, C324S546000, C324S758010
Reexamination Certificate
active
06194679
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention pertains to the field of equipment used for testing and sorting small electronic components. More particularly, the invention is an improvement of the invention disclosed and claimed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,568,870. In that patent, the metal-terminated ends of the miniature electronic ceramic components are loaded in isolated compartments, and each of their terminated ends contacted with a pair of single electrical probes. This invention permits each metal-terminated end of the miniature inductor chip to be simultaneously contacted with two pairs of independent electrical probes. In addition, this invention permits these miniature inductors to be loaded, tested and sorted at processing rates exceeding 60,000 parts per hour.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As we close out the Century, the electronic industry continues its ever speedier race to develop new, smaller and faster-working electronic products. Computers are becoming an increasingly used product in our daily lives. They are being made smaller, more powerful, and to perform more tasks than were ever imagined just a few years ago. While large computers performed mathematical calculations in the '70's and 80′, smaller versions of them find increasingly diverse uses, today such as connecting many people through portable cellular telephones, controlling vehicular traffic flow, telling and monitoring time for everything from sleeping to cooking, and now even monitoring the real-time location of parents and children alike.
While more uses are being found for computers, developments come about only by shrinking computer components so that the overall product is more consumer friendly. Accordingly, there is constant pressure to reduce the size of electronic circuit components to allow computers and processors to be made smaller and smaller. As an example, the ageold inductor has shrunk from a cigarette-sized coil with wires extending from the ends thereof to a tiny ceramic device, far smaller than a grain of rice with metal terminations at the ends thereof. The metal terminations take the place of the end termination wires so that the inductor can be soldiered directly to minute parallel copper strips or pads formed on the surface of a circuit board. At the present time, these inductors have been reduced in size to a miniature device having overall dimensions of 0.040×0.024×0.024 inches. Forty-two of them can be set side-by-side within the length of one inch.
In addition to the pressure to make these inductors smaller, there is similar pressure to process, i.e., test and sort them faster. In processing these miniature inductors, it is important to contact each metallic terminated end of the inductor simultaneously with at least two conductors and also to accomplish this task quite rapidly and accurately so that the testing and handling time is reduced to a bare minimum. A reduction in processing time allows more such inductors to be processed on a single machine in a certain time-period thereby reducing capital expenditures necessary for testing equipment and labor costs involved in handling the testing itself. Rapid processing rates, for inductors requiring simultaneous contacting of the ends of the inductor with two pair of electrodes, have been almost impossible because of the difficulty in holding the inductor steady while the four independent conductors approach, contact, and withdraw from the terminated ends of the inductor.
The greatest problem in performing high-speed testing of such miniature parts is in handling them. As they get smaller, they become more difficult to handle and surface tension, static electricity, moisture on a person's hands, humidity, and ambient temperature begin to play an ever-increasing role in preventing smooth operation. In addition, the market is calling for faster handling of the inductors in order to maintain, or in some cases, drive down the cost of providing them to the industry. Competition is fierce and technical achievement is becoming paramount in maintaining market penetration.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
This invention is an improvement of the device for testing and sorting small electronic components disclosed and claimed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,568,870. In that patent, a single electrical probe was brought into contact with each of the opposed metal-terminated ends of the electrical component to perform certain electrical tests before the compartment carrying the chip was advanced to a new position where the tested chip was off-loaded into a bin.
With respect to certain electrical components, such as miniature ceramic inductors, there is a need to contact each terminated end of the inductor with two, spaced-apart electrical probes and a further requirement that all four probes, that is two on the top metal-terminated end and two on the bottom terminated end, be done simultaneously. The device shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,568,870 cannot perform this function and it is to the inventive changes brought to this machine that this patent is directed. The machine of this invention is also for high-speed electrical testing of miniature metal-terminated electronic inductors but this time through simultaneous contact with four electric contacts instead of two contacts. While the machine may look overall like the one shown in the aforesaid patent, the testing station is totally different. The machine of this invention comprises a feed station, a rotatably mounted transport wheel where the outer rim portion includes a plurality of separate, spaced-apart compartments adapted to receive miniature electrical inductors from the feed station, a test station, and a sorting station. Further included is a first element having formed therein a plurality of individual bores, each with their main axis in parallel, spaced-apart arrangement along a path, the bores of a diameter and length for loading one inductor in each bore under the influence of gravity and arranged to retain the loaded inductors therein with their metal-terminated ends in upper and lower facing arrangement parallel to the axis of each bore. A first electrically-conductive support surface is in contact with less than the complete lower facing metal-terminated end for aid in retaining the inductor in the bore. A first device is provided for passing the inductor over the first electrically-conductive support surface while simultaneously passing the same end of the inductor over and in contact with a second electrically-conductive, non-supportive surface spaced-apart from the first electrically-conductive support surface. A second device is provided for passing the inductor under and in contact with third and fourth electrically-conductive spaced-apart, non-support surfaces simultaneously with contacting the inductor with the first and second electrically-conductive support surfaces for beginning electrical tests on the inductors only while each inductor is in electrical contact with the first, second, third and fourth electrical conductors. A third device is provided for tracking the results of the electronic tests for each inductor and the position of the tracked inductor as it leaves contact with the third and fourth surfaces. Finally there is a fourth device provided for selectively extracting the inductors from the bores according to at least one of the results of the electrical testing and for joining together inductors of those desired test results.
Other features of the invention include the ability to handle and visually inspect one of the smallest components, known in the industry as an inductor chip, having external dimensions as small as 0.040×0.024×0.024 inches; the ability to handle throughputs as high as 60,000 parts per hour, moving these small inductors delicately so that handling by the machine does not result in surface damage to the inductors, and very safely and efficiently insuring only electrically acceptable inductors reach the “good” bin.
Accordingly, the main object of this invention is a machine which performs fast
Garcia Douglas J.
Herrmann Jakob
Miller Jonathan R.
Murphey John J.
Walsh Donald P.
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