Nippon Sheet Glass Company, Limited

Katsuhiko Kitaya

Atsushi Miyake

Kazuo Yamada

Yoshimitsu Matsushita

Masuhide Kajii

Naohiro Iida

Nagayoshi Ichise

Mitsuo Kobayashi

Akira Shirai

Katsuya Uehara

An automatic drawing apparatus wherein coordinates of dots are determined on the basis of allocation data of unit dot patterns each consisting of one- or two-dimensional dot allocation and data of a reference line obtained by one-dimensionally allotting the unit dot patterns. A dot pattern is plotted on the basis of dot outline data and their coordinate data, thereby producing a high-precision pattern image within a very short period of time.

Apparatus for Automatically drawing a dot pattern

A local heater is arranged in a heating furnace in which glass plates are continuously conveyed, and a bending line on each glass plate is forcibly heated. The local heater is elongated, and positions of both ends of the local heater are independently and digitally controlled in a widthwise (X-axis) direction of the heating furnace. Control point data along the bending line is obtained by interpolating coordinate values of both ends of the bending line. X-axis velocity control is performed such that the local heater is located on the glass bending line in synchronism with conveyance of the glass plate. A heating locus is linear, and the operation of the local heater is not stepwise. An offset of the actual heating locus from the bending line can be minimized.

Glass plate heating apparatus

A local heating source is provided in a heating furnace in which a glass plate is continuously conveyed. The heating source is position-controlled by numerical data in a direction along the glass surface in accordance with the conveyance of the glass plate, so as to data-control the heating trace. As a result, the heating patterns can be easily altered in units of article types of the glass plates which are to be bent in different shapes, resulting in highly efficient production on a multi article type-small lot base.

Glass plate heating/bending device

A cutting unit and a grinding unit are aligned adjacently and adopt a common contour tracing means numerically controlled with respect to a X-Y plane coordinate system. A cutting tool and a grinding tool are provided on respective .theta.-axes along Z-direction and are commonly controlled about the .theta.-axes to direct in a tangential or a normal direction of the contour. The cutting and grinding tools are shiftable away from a reference point of the .theta.-axis to finely adjust a cutting line and a grinding edge outward/inward a reference contour.

Contour shaping apparatus

In a distortion inspection apparatus of a glass plate, a light and dark contrast pattern is sensed by an image sensor through a glass plate. The number of bits corresponding to a light or dark portion is detected from bipolar image data which are divided into a plurality of bits along each of parallel scanning lines assumed upon a surface of the glass plate. Then, a distortion state of the surface of the glass plate is discriminated in accordance with the differences among the thus detected number of bits and a reference value thereof. In such an arrangement, quantitative distortion discrimination can be performed.

Growing community of inventors

Tokyo, Japan

Katsuhiko Kitaya