Continuous Fastener Manufacturing Assembly with Pre-Formed Wire
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current methods for manufacturing fasteners in continuous strips face issues such as deformation of wire grooves, defects in nut apertures and helical ribs, and bottlenecks in the manufacturing process due to the use of batch and in-line processes, leading to costly waste and reduced throughput.
Innovation Solution
A continuous assembly line that uses a die press to pierce and cut fasteners from contoured wire, with a guide and drive unit to maintain orientation and redirect fasteners to tapping devices, eliminating the need for bowl feeders and enabling consistent groove formation and rapid production.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If a combination of batch and in-line process is used to manufacture fasteners in continuous strips, then fasteners can be produced in high volumes, but wire grooves are deformed and defects occur in nut apertures and helical ribs
Solution Approach 1:
The wire is pre-formed with grooves before the fastening operation, ensuring consistent groove geometry is established in advance. This preliminary formation of the wire with precise grooves prevents deformation during the fastening process, while still allowing high-volume production through continuous processing.
2Ease of operation
If a bowl feeder is used to align fasteners uniformly, then fasteners can be oriented consistently for wire insertion, but the process throughput is reduced creating a bottleneck
Solution Approach 1:
The bowl feeder alignment step is completely removed from the process. Instead of using a bowl feeder to align fasteners, the system feeds pre-formed wire directly into the fastening device, eliminating the alignment bottleneck while maintaining consistent groove orientation through the wire's pre-formed geometry.
Solution Approach 2:
The wire itself provides the alignment function through its pre-formed grooves and geometry. The wire's structural features naturally guide proper orientation during feeding, eliminating the need for external alignment devices like bowl feeders and enabling continuous high-speed processing.
3Ease of operation
If fasteners are attached in a continuous strip, then installation is simplified, but defective fasteners cannot be replaced without breaking the strip resulting in waste
Solution Approach 1:
Quality inspection is performed on the wire and fasteners during the manufacturing process before they are attached in continuous strips. By detecting and removing defective fasteners early in the process, the system prevents defective units from entering the continuous strip, thereby maintaining installation simplicity while minimizing waste of good fasteners.
Data Source
AI summary
The present invention is an assembly and method for continuously manufacturing fasteners. A die press actuated at a first speed receives the contoured wire into a die having a piercing element for piercing an aperture and a cutting element for cutting a fastener from the wire. A guide receives the fasteners from the die press and a drive unit engages the fasteners oriented by the guide and conveys the fastener to an elevated height relative to a tapping device. The guide redirects the fasteners by a first router. The fasteners are gravity fed into the first router and redirected to one of the tapping devices. Each tapping device has a tapping element for forming internal ribs in the aperture of the fastener. The tapping devices each actuates at a second speed that in aggregate is generally equal to the first speed of the die press.