Sperry Corporation

George A Fedde

Kenneth H Kirk

Juan M Gottschalk

Ta-Tung Lin, Deceased

By Meei Lin, Executrix

A programmable force assembler for robots includes a bi-directionally actuatable slide member. A microprocessor is programmable for controlling insertion force independent of the distance moved by the slide member. A position indicator transmits slide member distance signals and velocity information to the microprocessor. A pressure transducer is connected to the bi-directional actuator and is coupled to send signals to the microprocessor. A supply valve is connected to the bi-directional actuator and is coupled for receiving signals from the microprocessor in response to the pressure transducer signals.

Force assembler apparatus for robots

A scanning apparatus which periodically sweeps a beam of light across a printed circuit board along a plurality of sweep paths, includes a detector responsive to radiation from the printed circuit board as the board is swept by the beam of light. The detector is also responsive to first and second adjustment signals indicating whether a conductor portion or substrate portion of the board is being swept. An automatic level control is responsive to the first and second signals for providing level adjusted output signals via an adjustor coupled to the detector. The levels of the output signals form a ratio R substantially the same for all boards swept in the scanning apparatus.

Automatic level control circuit

An apparatus for analyzing line sequential binary data generated by scanning a printed circuit board with a scanning laser apparatus is disclosed. The circuit board contains conducting strips on an electrically insulated substrate. The conductors can be characterized by the number and the locations of their corners and by their widths and by the widths of the substrate occurring between parallel and spaced apart conductors. The line sequential data when viewed together forms a two dimensional image array of the circuit board and the two dimensional array contains information about the conducting corners, widths, etc. The line sequential binary data is first smoothed by smoothing circuits to eliminate errors due to noise, scanning equipment tolerances, etc. Then the smoothed data in line sequential format is transmitted to a corner recognition and pairing circuit where the corner features of the conductors are recognized. Because of digitizing errors, a corner feature often appears as two, three or more vertically and/or horizontally adjacent corner pairs. The excess corners are eliminated by the corner recognition and pairing circuit. At the same time, a line/space width error detection circuit portion of the apparatus examines the widths of the horizontal and vertically directed conducting strips and the spaces between them. If any of the conductors or spaces fall below a predetermined minimum over a predetermined length of the conductor or strip an error signal is generated.

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Perkiomenville, PA, United States of America

George A Fedde