Metal treatment – Process of modifying or maintaining internal physical... – Heating or cooling of solid metal
Reexamination Certificate
1998-09-30
2001-01-16
Yee, Deborah (Department: 1742)
Metal treatment
Process of modifying or maintaining internal physical...
Heating or cooling of solid metal
C148S600000, C148S580000, C148S587000, C266S249000, C266S078000, C266S090000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06174390
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a spiral parts heat treatment apparatus and method, and a spiral part, and more particularly, to a technique suitable for a machining and assembling apparatus for a coil spring as a spiral part that requires a heat treatment process.
According to the machining and assembling apparatus for a spring as a spiral part, after a wire such as a music wire or stainless steel wire is coiled, its outer dimension (free length) is inspected, and is heat-treated at about 300° C. to 500° C. for a predetermined period of time in order to remove the residual stress of coiling. For this purpose, a large number of coil springs that have been subjected to coiling are placed together in a case, are placed in the heat treatment furnace of a heat treatment apparatus in units of cases, and are heat-treated.
To automatically assemble coil springs completed in this manner, the coil springs are aligned with an aligning unit, e.g., a parts feeder, and are separated apart from each other one by one. The separated coil spring is held with a robot or the like, is moved, and is built into a container main body or the like.
With this method, since the springs are entangled with each other in the parts feeder, the reliability of alignment before the parts are held with the robot or the like is low, to cause a decrease in operability of the automatic assembly line. As a countermeasure for this, among conventional heat treatment apparatuses, one having an outer appearance shown in the perspective view of
FIG. 11
is known.
Referring to
FIG. 11
, coil springs W manufactured by a spring manufacturing machine
1160
are discriminated by an inspection unit
1150
and are sequentially dropped into a gutter-shaped accepting member
1171
. The coil springs W are moved downward along the accepting member
1171
and are spirally passed through a heat treatment furnace
1170
, thereby heat-treating the coil springs W.
Alternatively, as in the perspective view of the outer appearance of a conventional heat treatment apparatus shown in
FIG. 12
, coil springs W manufactured by a spring manufacturing machine
1160
are discriminated by an inspection unit
1150
and are sequentially dropped into a gutter-shaped accepting member
1171
. The coil springs W are fitted, with a transfer robot
1181
, on pins P that are to hold the springs on a moving belt conveyor. The pins P are passed through a heat treatment furnace
1180
by the belt conveyor, thereby heat-treating the coil springs W.
As disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 5-007961, there is also proposed a “post-treatment apparatus for a coiled product”. According to this apparatus, the hook integrally formed with a coil spring is hung from a rod. The hook is positioned with respect to a spiral member which rotates about this rod and which is formed with a spiral groove. The coil springs are fed to a heat treatment unit one by one.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
There is a case where coil springs cannot be heat-treated uniformly if they are batch-processed in a case. In the apparatus having the arrangement described with reference to
FIG. 11
, since the heat treatment furnace does not have the function of regulating the posture of the coil springs W and contact between the adjacent coil springs, the coil springs may overlap or may be entangled with each other when they collide against each other. When such a situation occurs, the heat treatment time varies to cause nonuniform heat treatment.
If the coil springs W are entangled with each other in the heat treatment furnace, to solve this entangled state, the heat treatment furnace
1170
must be partly opened to decrease the internal furnace temperature, and the internal furnace temperature must be increased again after processing, taking an extra time. This causes a decrease in line operability.
In
FIG. 12
, since the conveyor is used, the heat treatment furnace
1180
becomes bulky. A transfer device
1181
that picks the coil springs from the coiling machine and places them on the holding pins P on the conveyor one by one is required, leading to an increase in cost. The use of the transfer unit that picks and places the coil springs may cause trouble during transfer, leading to a decrease in line operability. Therefore, the apparatus cannot be directly connected to the automatic assembly line.
With the proposal of Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 5-007961, although the coil springs can be sequentially conveyed one by one, such conveyance is limited to only a coil spring integrally formed with a hook.
The present invention has been made in consideration of the above problems, and has as its object to provide a spiral parts heat treatment apparatus and method, in which the heat treatment apparatus for a spiral part can be entirely formed simple and an entangled state does not occur, and which can be directly connected to an automatic assembly line, and a spiral part.
It is another object of the present invention to prevent a decrease in operability caused by entanglement of spiral parts and to realize a low-cost apparatus.
In order to solve the problems described above and to achieve the above objects, according to the present invention, there is provided a spiral parts heat treatment apparatus for heat-treating individual ones of continuously conveyed spiral parts by passing the spiral parts through a heat treatment furnace, comprising: first guide means having a carrier portion that continuously conveys manufactured spiral parts carried thereon in a longitudinal direction, transfer means, disposed downstream from the first guide means, for feeding the spiral parts one by one after discrimination, second guide means provided continuously to the transfer means and having a carrier portion and a driving portion, the carrier portion serving to guide the spiral parts carried thereon in the longitudinal direction in the heat treatment furnace, and the driving portion serving to push the spiral parts from a rear end side thereof, and control means, connected to the transfer means and the driving portion, for performing a control operation so as to feed the spiral parts to the second guide means one by one.
The carrier portion of the second guide means is constituted by at least a gutter-shaped member, the heat treatment furnace has an inner wall surface formed into a substantially cylindrical shape, the gutter-shaped member is disposed substantially horizontally along the inner wall surface, and the driving portion is constituted by a plurality of arms extending equidistantly from a rotating shaft which is disposed at a substantially central portion of the heat treatment furnace, and a pusher formed on an end portion of each of the arms to enter the gutter-shaped member, to pass the spiral parts upon rotation of the rotating shaft.
The gutter-shaped member comprises multi-stage gutter-shaped members that are disposed in a vertical direction along the inner wall surface, openings are formed in bottom surfaces of the gutter-shaped members, respectively, to allow free fall of the spiral parts, and positions of upper and lower ones of the openings are offset and the arms are formed as multi-stage arms, so that the spiral parts are allowed to freely fall onto the gutter-shaped members thereunder and are passed to be arranged longitudinally along the inner wall surface.
The carrier portion of the second guide means is constituted by at least a gutter-shaped member, the heat treatment furnace is formed substantially linearly and incorporates the gutter-like member which is substantially linear, the driving portion is constituted by a rotary spiral member and a motor driver, the rotary spiral member having an outer circumferential surface extending along the bottom surface of the gutter-shaped member and which is formed at a pitch substantially corresponding to a longitudinal dimension of the spiral part, and the motor driver serving to rotationally drive the rotary spiral member, and the spiral parts are passed upon rotation of the rotary spiral member.
The carrier portion
Baba Tsuyoshi
Nakano Tomomasa
Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
Fitzpatrick ,Cella, Harper & Scinto
Yee Deborah
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