Motor vehicles – With means for controlling operation responsive to...
Patent
1993-02-24
1994-05-31
Focarino, Margaret A.
Motor vehicles
With means for controlling operation responsive to...
180 81, 180 85, B62D 124, B66F 724
Patent
active
053161009
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
Currently used handling means for transporting loads or components during manufacture, for example, between a manufacturing or storage site and another manufacturing, storage or dispatch site, consist either of lifting trucks with an on-board driver, or of autonomous trolleys of the type guided by wire, guided by optoelectronics or using trigonometric direction finding, using a laser or some other means.
Whatever their driving means, current trolleys require large areas in which to move, relating to the maximum radius of their movement curve, that is to say as a function of the structure and the position of their guiding wheels. Moreover, the greater the bulk of the trolley and the larger its mass, the larger the radius. In other words, the movements of these trolleys require more space, the heavier the loads carried, which makes it necessary to organize circulation paths using a lot of space, to the detriment of production and storage areas.
Another drawback of this method of changing direction is that it produces imprecision in the position of the trolley at the end of the change of direction. Although these imprecisions may be compensated with trolleys having an on-board driver, this is not the case with autonomous trolleys. Indeed, in this case, the imprecisions of circular trajectory are added to the transverse deviation, resulting from the rectilinear displacement of the trolley, and therefore affect the precision of the final positioning of the latter.
The Japanese Patent Application 58,145,573 discloses a direction changing device for a motorized chassis comprising, on the one hand, means for vertically displacing a support ring between a transport position, in which it is above the ground, and a pivoting position, in which it rests on the ground and raises the trolley and, on the other hand, means able to cause the trolley to pivot, in the raised position, with respect to the ring.
Such a device reduces the space required for direction changes of the trolley, but it does not provide any solution to the lack of precision of this rotation and can therefore not be used on an autonomous trolley transferring, under remote control, loads between two stations, a manufacturing station or storage station, with positioning of this load with respect to the means receiving it.
Moreover, when the trolley is fitted with means for vertically handling the load, the cost of these is added to that of the elevation means of the trolley, which leads to the trolley becoming more expensive.
The object of the present invention is to provide a direction changing device which overcomes these drawbacks, that is to say which makes it possible to reduce the radius of the circular trajectories of the trolley, whilst reducing the imprecisions in positioning and this being regardless of the bulk of this trolley and the mass of the load carried by it.
For this purpose, in the device according to the invention, the means for vertically displacing the ring comprise a slide which, mounted so as to slide in vertical slideways of the chassis and carrying, wedged on its lower end, a circular plate on which the ring is mounted to rotate freely, on the one hand supports in its upper part the means for vertically handling the load and, on the other hand, is connected to the chassis by drive means able to provide the vertical displacements of the trolley and those of the load, these means being equipped with means for detecting the rectilinear travel accomplished, and slaved to on-board control means, whilst the drive means bringing about the rotation of the ring are also equipped with means for detecting the circular travel performed which are slaved to the on-board control means.
It emerges from the preceding text that the same drive means command the vertical movements of the trolley and those of the load, which makes it possible to reduce the cost of the trolley but above all to benefit, in the two movements, from the precision afforded by the control means slaving these drive means. In addition, the precision procured in the rotation
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English Peter
Focarino Margaret A.
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