JPH0480113A - Flexible shaft - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To prolong the service life of a conveyer flexible shaft by providing an organic material layer on a steel wire, and by winding an organic or inorganic material cord onto the steel wire over the organic layer thereof so that the value of generated friction due o the slide of a container is comparatively restrained. CONSTITUTION:A shaft is composed of a flexible rod 1 and a resin cord 2 spirally wound on the rod 1. The rod 1 is composed of a steel wire 11 having a flexibility and a rigidity and a organic material layer 12 having an excellent wear resistance and a low dynamic frictional coefficient which is wound on the steel wire 11, and the cord 12 is composed of a resin layer 22 and a core 21 made of carbon fiber or the like and extending through the center of the resin layer 22. Rails 101, 102 having stainless steel rectangular body parts 111, 121 and shelf parts 112, 122 are supported by support arms so as to be opposed to each other. Permanent magnets 103 are embedded at predetermined pitches in the body parts 111, 121, and flexible shafts 104, 105 whose cords are wound in opposite directions are laid on the shelf parts 112, 122. The shafts 104, 105 are rotated on the rails 101, 102 by means of motors in opposite directions so as to convey a container or the like.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a flexible shaft for a conveyor used mainly in a device for conveying containers such as glass or plastic bottles.

[Conventional technology]

Containers such as glass and plastic bottles (hereinafter simply referred to as containers) that contain liquid or other fillers usually have a process of transporting them on the manufacturing process line before shipping them as products. Exists. Generally, a belt conveyor, a roller conveyor, or the like is used to transport containers, and the containers are moved by moving the belt or rotating the rollers.

In conveying devices such as belt conveyors and roller conveyors,
Usually, the positions of the containers on the conveyor are not strictly determined, and the containers are arranged randomly on the conveyor. However, when filling a container, it is necessary to accurately position the container, and in order to safely send the container to the next process, it is necessary to reposition the container that has been conveyed by the conveyor.

Further, in order to automate the manufacturing process, it is required to simplify the process line as much as possible, but it is difficult to automate container transfer by a conveyor due to the above-mentioned positioning correction required.

Moreover, conveyor-based conveyance devices not only occupy a large amount of space as fixed equipment, but also have the problem of increasing equipment costs.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] New container conveyance devices have been proposed to solve various problems found in the above-mentioned conventional container conveyance devices such as belt conveyors and roller conveyors. In this device, shafts consisting of a rod and a cord wound spirally around the rod are arranged in parallel at regular intervals, a container is suspended between the shafts, and a flange, usually located at the neck of the container, is hooked onto the shaft.)
, configured to transport the container by rotating the shaft.

This device uses a conveying principle that is completely different from that of a conveyor, that is, it moves containers by friction between the shaft and the neck of the container.It allows for accurate container positioning, allows automation of the manufacturing process line, and allows for the structure of the device itself. It is also simple and small, and the equipment cost is low.

In the above device, the shaft rotates at high speed at -II,
The container is transported while sliding on the cord and rod, and at this time, considerable frictional heat is generated on the shaft due to contact resistance with the container. Since the shaft wears out due to this large amount of frictional heat, it must be replaced periodically, but it is important to extend the life of the shaft in order to reduce maintenance costs.

Furthermore, in the above-mentioned apparatus, the conveyance IB line is not necessarily straight, but is often curved in practice.

Therefore, the shaft must have both flexibility so that it can be easily installed along a curved line, and enough rigidity to not bend due to rotation and to sufficiently transmit the rotational torque applied from one end of the shaft to the other end. is required.

Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a flexible shaft most suitable for use in the above-mentioned novel container conveying device.

[Means for Solving the Problems] The above object is achieved by a flexible shaft in which a layer made of an organic material is provided on a steel cable, and a cord made of an organic or inorganic material is spirally wound on the organic layer.

The flexible shaft of the present invention is normally used in a novel container conveying device as detailed in the following examples.
Since the rod is made of a steel cord, it has excellent rigidity and flexibility, and since the cord is made of an organic or inorganic material, wear and tear on the shaft and damage to the neck due to contact friction between the shaft and the neck of the container can be effectively prevented.

The container conveying device to which the shaft of the present invention is used usually has a guide rail on which the shaft is placed (generally has a main body portion and a shelf portion protruding from the main body portion), as described in the following embodiments. A suction means is provided. This suction means attracts and locks the shaft to the main body and shelf of the rail so that the shaft does not come off the rail. For example, if magnetic attraction is used as an attraction means, permanent magnets may be buried at regular intervals within the main body, as shown in the examples below, or rails may be made of a mixture of resin material (such as nylon) and magnetic material. Examples include configuring. Alternatively, when using negative pressure, a through hole is provided in the main body, and small holes communicating with the through hole are drilled at regular intervals on the protruding side of the shelf of the main body, and the pressure inside the through hole is reduced using a vacuum pump or the like. Examples include means such as suctioning the shaft through a small hole.

In the flexible shaft of the present invention, the steel cable constituting the rod has flexibility and rigidity,
It is ideal as a shaft rod for container transport equipment. Incidentally, if the rod is made of something other than steel cable, for example, rubber, a large amount of frictional heat is generated due to sliding with the container, resulting in significant wear and tear. Furthermore, when made of polyethylene, the rod is too rigid, making it difficult to install on curved lines. Therefore, the selection of the net rope material depends on the suction means of the rail. That is, for example, when a magnet or magnetic material is used as the attraction means, the shaft is attracted by magnetic force.
The steel cables should be made of magnetic metals such as steel, nickel, cobalt, and alloys thereof.

The structure of the rope itself is basically a well-known structure, namely several ropes (
It has a structure in which several strands are further twisted on top of a strand made of twisted wires (or several dozen wires). Preferably, it is composed of several layers of tightly wound coiled wire, each layer having multiple windings of several wires per pitch, and adjacent layers being wound in reverse order.

Note that the cross-sectional shape of the wire may be circular or rectangular, and is not particularly limited. The diameter of the wire, the number of twisted wires, and the diameter of the steel cable depend on the size of the shaft itself, but the diameter of the wire is 0.3 to 3.0 mm, preferably 0.4 to 3.0 mm.
Omm, the number of heated wires is 5 to 100, preferably 10 to 5
0, the diameter of the steel cable is 4.0 to 12 m [11, preferably 6
．． 0 to 9.0 + mn. Further, there are no particular limitations on the way the lobes are twisted, such as normal twist or rung twist, and the direction of twist, S twist or Z twist.

The organic layer provided on the steel cable flatly covers the rough surface of the steel cable with a uniform thickness, and the organic material is preferably resin or rubber. Although the resin material and rubber material are not specified, it is preferable that they have excellent abrasion resistance and a small coefficient of dynamic friction since they will slide on the container. Examples of such resin materials include polyolefins (for example, Subuma manufactured by Mitsui Petrochemical Industries, etc.), polyethers (for example, polyacetal,
polyphenylene ether, etc.), polyamide (e.g. 6
- nylon, 6,6 nylon, 11-nylon, etc.),
Polyalkylene (e.g. polyethylene, especially ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene, polypropylene), fluororesin (e.g. polytetrafluoroethylene, tetrafluoroethylene-perfluoroalkyl vinyl ether copolymer, etc.), polyester (e.g. polyethylene terephthalate, polybutylene terephthalate, etc.) ) etc. are exemplified.

Examples of the rubber material include urethane rubber and chloroprene rubber, but it is preferable to wrap an abrasion-resistant tape on the rubber layer in order to increase the abrasion resistance of the part that slides on the container. This tape can be used regardless of whether it is made of resin or metal. Examples of the resin tape include UHMWPE tape and fluororesin tape. When the attraction means provided on the guide rail is a magnet, the metal tape is preferably a non-magnetic tape in order to smooth rotation of the shaft and prevent loss of rotational energy.
Stainless steel tape, aluminum alloy tape, copper alloy tape, etc. are listed. The tape does not need to cover the entire surface of the rubber layer, and may be wrapped only around the area where the container slides (the spiral area between the cords). The thickness of the tape is 0.3 to 1.0++w in the case of a resin tape, and 0.02 to 0.3cm in the case of a metal tape.

Since the cord made of organic or inorganic material directly contacts and rubs against the neck of the container, it is preferable that the cord has good abrasion resistance, flexibility, rolling property, sliding property, etc., and has a small coefficient of dynamic friction. In addition to improving the characteristics of these codes,
It is also important to pay attention to the prevention of damage to the container, and in particular, for containers filled with carbonated beverages, it is important for product and safety reasons to be even more careful about damage to the container. Such an organic or inorganic material may be the same as the material of the organic layer on the steel cable, and although it is not illustrated here, it is most suitable to use a trumpet material mainly considering sliding properties and durability.

The entire cord may be made of the above material, but it may also have a core made of Kevlar glass fiber, carbon fiber, or the like. A cord with a core is advantageous in that it is possible to suppress cord elongation due to temperature rise due to frictional heat, tensile load, etc., and as a result, disturbances in the pitch of the spirally wound cord can be prevented.

The winding pitch of the cord around the flexible rod is determined by taking into consideration the container transport speed, the size of the container, the number of containers to be transported,
Determined based on shaft rotation speed, etc. Also, the pitch of the cords does not need to be constant over the entire length of the rod, but may vary, for example, in any part of the rod.

The shaft of the present invention is mainly used in a container conveyance device, but a shaft in which a cord is wound spirally around a rod can also be used for conveying powder and granular materials. Conventionally, one method of transporting this material is to insert and place a coiled wire, often made of steel, inside a metal or resin tube, and then rotate the steel wire to feed the powder particles through an inlet provided at one end of the tube. There is a method of transporting the body to the outlet provided at the other end, and the shaft of the present invention can be used instead of this steel wire. However, the granular materials mentioned here include, for example, gravel, crushed stone,
These are so-called bulk materials such as chips and pellets of coal, coke, iron ore, soil, limestone, grain, cement, wood, and resin.

〔Example〕

EMBODIMENT OF THE INVENTION Hereinafter, the flexible shaft for conveyor of this invention will be explained in detail based on an Example.

FIG. 1 shows an example of the shaft, and FIG. 2 shows its cross section. The shaft consists of a flexible rod 1 and a resin cord 2 spirally wound around the rod 1. Rod 1 is made of organic N12 on steel cable 1, and cord 2 is made of resin 1M2.
2 has a core body 21 at the center.

Next, the case where the flexible shaft of the present invention is used in a container conveyance device will be outlined. In FIG. 3 showing a general plan view of the entire container conveyance device, two rails 101 and 102 each having a total length of about 3 m are arranged in parallel at regular intervals in a substantially right-angled curved shape with a radius of curvature of 500 u++n.
1.102, permanent magnets 103 are buried at regular intervals (for example, 200 mm). Although not shown in detail in the drawing, the flexible shirts 04 and 105 are attracted and attached to the rails 101 and 102 by the permanent magnet 103, respectively.
One end of each shaft 104, 105 is connected to a bearing 10.
6.107, and the other end is rotatably supported by another bearing 10B. The bearing 108 is connected to the motor 109 and the shaft 1
04.105 can be rotated in opposite directions. Note that the bearing 108 may have a transmission so that the rotational speed transmitted to the shaft 104, 105 can be adjusted.

In such an apparatus, a container (not shown in FIG. 3) is suspended between shafts 104.105.
105 in the directions of the arrows, the container is moved in one direction (in the figure, in the direction of the bearing 108).

This container conveying device will be explained in more detail with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. 4 is a perspective view taken along line AA' in FIG. 3, and FIG. 5 is a sectional view taken along line AA'. The rail 102 (the rail 101 is omitted in FIG. 4) has a stainless steel rectangular main body 121 and a shelf 122 protruding from the main body 121, and the rail as a whole has an L-shape. Similarly, the rail 101 is connected to the main body 1.
11 and a shelf 112. Both rails 101, 102 are connected to the support arm 1 so that the shelves 112, 122 are opposite to each other.
10 (the rail 101 side is omitted in FIG. 4) at regular intervals.

Rectangular permanent magnets 103 are embedded in the main body part 111.121 at regular intervals, and shelf parts 112.122
A flexible shaft 104, 105 is placed on top, respectively. Each shaft 104.105 has a rail 101
．． In order to prevent it from coming off from 102, it is adsorbed to the side surface of the main body part 111.121 by a single stone 103, and is latched to the main body part 111.121 and the shelf part 112.122. Therefore, the rail 101 of the shaft 104.105
．． It can be easily attached to and detached from 102.

The shaft 104, 105 has a structure as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, that is, it consists of a flexible rod 141, 151 and a resin cord 142, 152 spirally wound around the rod. The winding direction is exactly opposite. shaft 1
04.105 motor 109 on rail 101.102
(See FIG. 3) allows rotation in mutually opposite directions as indicated by the arrows.

In such an apparatus, as is clear from FIG. 5, when the collar 201 on the neck of the container 200 made of polyethylene terephthalate is hooked to the shaft 104, 105 and the container 200 is suspended between the shafts 104, 105 (
When hanging the container, it is possible to easily hang the container between the shafts 104 and 105 by slightly increasing the distance between the ends of the shafts 104 and 105), Shirt HO4,1
05, the container 200 is conveyed in the direction of arrow A. That is, the container 200 is pushed in the direction of arrow A by the cords 142, 152 of the shafts 104, 105, and is translated one after another.

Here, a specific example of the size of the shaft used in the above-mentioned container conveyance device is as follows: the diameter of the neck of the container is 26.0 mm, the diameter of the collar is 4.
1.2mm and its wall thickness is 3.35M, the rod diameter is 7. Oan, diameter of steel cable6. Omn, the thickness of the organic layer on the steel cable is 0.5 turns, the diameter of the cord is 4.5M, the diameter of the core is 1.0 turns, and the thickness of the resin layer of the cord is 1.75 mm. In addition, the cord pitch is 40mm, and the shaft flight diameter is 16mm.
It is mm.

Next, a case will be described in which the flexible shaft of the present invention is used in a powder transport device. Since the overall structure of the conveying device is almost the same as that of conventionally known devices, only a shaft is used instead of a coiled wire, the description will focus on the transportation state of the powder and granular material.

FIG. 6 shows a vertical cross section of the powder during transportation, and shows a tube 180 made of metal (stainless steel, etc.) or resin (plastic, nylon, polyacecool, ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene, etc.), which may have a steel cable and an organic layer. flexible rod 17
1 and a resin cord 172 is inserted and arranged along the central axis of the tube. One end of the shaft 170 is connected to a motor (not shown), and the other end is rotatably supported by a bearing or the like. A powder 190 exists in the gap between the shaft 170 and the tube 180, and the powder 190 is supplied from an inlet provided on the motor side of the tube 180 and discharged from an outlet provided on the bearing side. It is composed of In such a conveyance device, when the shaft 170 is rotated by the motor in the direction of the arrow, the powder 190 is pushed by the cord 172 and conveyed in the convex direction of the arrow.

Although the conveyance line in FIG. 6 is a straight line, the amount of powder 190 discharged from the discharge port of the tube 180 is stable even on a curved line or an upward line. Further, since the shaft 170 has a large lifting force on the powder and granular material 190, the movement is constant even when applied to an uphill route in particular.

〔Effect of the invention〕

Since the conveyor flexible shaft of the present invention is configured as described above, when used in the novel container conveying device as described above, it produces the following effects.

i) Since the rod is made of steel cable, the shaft has excellent rigidity and flexibility, has good transmission of rotational torque, and is extremely easy to install on a curved conveyance line.

11) By using the organic layer on the steel cable and the organic or inorganic material of the cord, the amount of frictional heat generated due to sliding with the container can be considerably suppressed, and the life of the shaft can be extended.

Ij) Compared to the case where the cord is made of metal, since the cord is made of an organic or inorganic material, wear and tear on the neck of the container transported by the rotation of the shaft can be further reduced.

iv) In addition, the powder transport device not only has excellent wear resistance but also has a stable discharge amount of powder. Moreover, even though the lifting force of the granular material is large, the amount of the granular material transported is constant, especially on the upward conveyance route.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a partially cutaway perspective view showing an example of the shaft of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view of the shaft shown in FIG. 1, and FIG. 3 is a schematic plan view of a container conveyance device using the shaft. Fourth
The figure is a partially omitted perspective view taken along the line AA' in Fig. 3, and Fig. 5 is a partially omitted sectional view taken along the line AA' in Fig. 3.
The figure is a partially omitted vertical cross-sectional view of a powder transport device using a shaft. :Flexible rod: Cord; Steel cable: Organic layer of rod: Core body: Resin layer of cord (Figure 1, Figure 5) Office date: October 1991

Claims (3)

[Claims] (1) A flexible shaft characterized in that a layer made of an organic material is provided on a steel cable, and a cord made of an organic or inorganic material is wound spirally on the organic layer. (2) It is characterized by use in a container conveyance device in which two flexible shafts are arranged in parallel at a constant interval, a container is suspended between the two shafts, and the container is conveyed by rotating the shafts. The flexible shaft according to claim (1). (3) arranging two guide rails, each having a suction means, in parallel at a certain interval, placing a flexible shaft on the rails, and locking the shaft to the rail by the suction means so that the shaft does not come off the rail; 2. The flexible shaft according to claim 1, wherein the flexible shaft is used in a container conveying device in which a container is suspended between two shafts and the container is conveyed by rotating the shafts.