Gripper With Movable Lifting Elements For Spacer Handling
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing grippers for spacers used in tire manufacturing are prone to tolerances, leading to unreliable positioning and orientation of spacers during transport, which compromises the accuracy of bead-apex placement and overall tire build quality.
Innovation Solution
A gripper design featuring a gripper head with movable lifting elements and a confining member that allows for axial confinement of spacers, including a cam-and-notch mechanism to ensure stability and alignment, enabling the transport of spacers in sub-stacks for improved process efficiency.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If engagement jaws are used to grip spacers by inserting into central aperture and driving radially to engage recesses, then the gripper can retain spacers, but the engagement is prone to tolerances causing unreliable position and orientation maintenance during transport
Solution Approach 1:
The gripper is divided into multiple functional elements: lifting elements for vertical engagement, confining members for radial engagement, and positioning elements for orientation control. This segmentation allows each element to perform its specific function with optimized tolerance compensation, improving overall retention reliability while maintaining precision.
Solution Approach 2:
Positioning elements act as intermediaries between the lifting elements and the spacer, providing a reference surface that ensures accurate positioning and orientation. These intermediaries compensate for tolerances in the engagement jaws by establishing a precise geometric relationship before the spacer is fully engaged.
2Manufacturing precision
If spacers are transported one by one, then positioning accuracy can be maintained, but process efficiency is reduced due to sequential handling
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple spacers are gripped and transported simultaneously by the same gripper assembly. The lifting elements and confining members are configured to engage multiple spacers at once, merging several handling operations into a single action. This increases productivity while the positioning elements ensure that each spacer maintains its precise position and orientation relative to the gripper and subsequent processing stations.
Solution Approach 2:
The gripper assembly is designed with universal engagement features that can accommodate multiple spacers of the same type simultaneously. The confining members and positioning elements are arranged to provide consistent engagement across all spacers in the grip, allowing the same mechanism to perform both individual precision positioning and multi-unit transport functions.
3Reliability
If lifting elements are made movable to improve spacer engagement, then retention reliability improves, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The lifting elements are designed to be movable relative to the gripper body, allowing them to adapt to variations in spacer positioning and achieve reliable engagement. This dynamic capability enables the elements to self-adjust during the engagement process, improving reliability without requiring complex active control systems. The movement is constrained within simple guide paths that maintain structural simplicity.
Solution Approach 2:
The movable lifting elements utilize the force applied during spacer engagement to automatically position themselves correctly. As the confining members apply radial force to engage the spacer recesses, the lifting elements simultaneously move to the appropriate height and engage the spacer bottom. This self-service mechanism eliminates the need for separate positioning actuators, maintaining device simplicity while achieving reliable engagement.
Data Source
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AI summary
The invention relates to a gripper for gripping a spacer, preferably a spacer for storing a bead-apex, from a spacer stack comprising one or more of said spacers, wherein the gripper comprises a gripper head extending in an axial direction along a central axis and a plurality of spacer lifting elements protruding from said gripper head for lifting the spacer, wherein the lifting elements are movable with respect to the gripper head for engaging the spacer, wherein the gripper further comprises a confining member for confining at least a part of the spacer in the axial direction between said confining member and the lifting elements.