Seki Kogyo Co., Ltd.

Keylex Corporation

Kouji Sakota

Seiji Miura

Masaaki Miura

Naoki Oda

Ryotaro Shinagawa

Seji Miura

Yoshiharu Horiuchi

Yuki Funaki

A nut transporting device includes: an outer cylinder, multiple attracting members that are arrayed in a spiral shape about a center axis extending in an axial direction of the outer cylinder, on an inner surface side of the outer cylinder and that form a magnetic field on an outer surface side of the outer cylinder to attract a weld nut to an outer surface of the outer cylinder; a rotary drive unit configured to rotatably move the attracting members about the center axis; and a restriction guide that restricts rotational movement of the weld nut to move the weld nut axially along the outer surface of the outer cylinder.

Part transporting device

A component transfer device includes an integration path through which both of a regular component and a defective component are to be transported, and a sorting gauge that is provided at the downstream end of the integration path and sorts the regular component and the defective component. A discharge path through which the defective component passes extends to incline in the width direction of the integration path. The sorting gauge includes a gauge body, a sorting path extending through the gauge body and into which the regular component is allowed to advance while the defective component is not allowed to advance, and a guide surface that is disposed at the gauge body so as to spread toward the discharge path and that guides the defective component to the discharge path when the defective component comes into contact with the guide surface.

Component transfer device

A component supply device is configured to feed a component having a through hole to a target position. The component supply includes: a rod including at its distal end a holding portion to be inserted into the through hole; an actuator; a valve mounted on the rod; and a fixing portion by which the valve that advances with the rod passes. The rod includes a gas outlet located in an outer periphery of the holding portion and configured to blow gas rearward, and a gas passage extending inside the rod and configured to send gas supplied from a gas source to the gas outlet. The valve includes a push switch configured to be switched between an advanced attitude and a withdrawn attitude, and a biasing unit configured to bias the push switch to the withdrawn attitude. The fixing portion includes a pressing wall portion facing the push switch.

Component supply device

Parts merge smoothly without any stopper at a branching region. A determining and sorting unit determines, between an introduction passage and a branching region, whether weld nuts at rest are facing up or down. The weld nuts determined as facing up are fed to a first branch passage, whereas the weld nuts determined as facing down are fed to a second branch passage.

Part alignment and transport device

A small-diameter front-end portion of a feed rod is allowed to enter into the screw hole of a nut delivered by a nut chute, and the nut is fed to an intended position by the forward movement of the feed rod. When an abnormal nut having a screw hole into which the small-diameter front-end portion cannot be inserted is delivered, the abnormal nut is prevented from being flicked by the feed rod. In order to achieve this, in a standby state, the small-diameter front-end portion of the feed rod enters a nut receiving chamber and is then stopped. On condition that the abnormal nut is received in the nut receiving chamber, if the feed rod moves forward to enter into the standby state, the abnormal nut is slightly pushed out forward from the nut receiving chamber.

Nut feeding method and nut feeder

The forward movement of a feed rodof a nut feeder permits pressurization of air in an air chamberdefined in a rod holder, thereby blowing the air out of the air outletthrough an air inletand an air passage. A nutis held on the feed rodby the pressure of the air blow from the air outlet

Nut feeder

A parts aligner is provided with an attraction meansorbitally movable in a specific orbit R, and also provided with a posture shift guide, a regulating pieceand a thickness sorting guidealong a specific circumference P corresponding to the specific orbit R in the order of the direction of orbital movement of the attraction means. With this structure, only regular parts shifted into a specific posture are guided to an alignment and feed guideand irregular parts are stored in an irregular parts storing part

Parts aligner

The present invention discloses a nut feeder for the feeding of nuts for resistance welding. A stopper,is provided which is so energized as to enter into the inside of a chute,from a lower-end lateral side of the chute,. A lowermost nut,in the chute,is held by the stopper,, thereby being prevented from falling. With a pin,of the nut receiver,set against a projection part,of the stopper,, a nut receiver,is moved backward together with the stopper,, by which the holding of the nut,is released. Then the nut,is placed at a position ahead of the pin,of the nut receiver,while leaning against the stopper,. Thereafter the nut receiver,is moved forward and the nut,falls down so that its threaded hole fits onto the pin,and is delivered to under the upper electrode.

Nut feeder for feeding nuts for resistance welding

The sorting and alignment of welding nuts are conducted with stability regardless of a variation in number with lower noise. A charging chute is provided on its end of obliquely downward slope with a nut-sorting part, and a face plate facing obliquely upward is disposed in a tilted position so as to define the nut-storing part. The face plate is formed with stainless steel of non-magnetic material. A permanent magnet is provided on the back of the face plate so as to move on a specific rotational locus, and moved in rotation by a motor. A posture shift guide is disposed on the front face of the face plate and a specific circumference corresponding to the specific locus to shift welding nuts attracted by the permanent magnet into their lying postures. Out of the welding nuts in their lying postures, the ones with their base in opposition to the face plate are flipped by a regulating block to be dropped in the nut-storing part, while only the ones with their top face in opposition to the face plate are allowed to pass into an alignment and feed guide, after which they are sequentially stored in aligned positions in an alignment and feed guide to be fed to a nut feeding equipment.

Parts alignment device

A guide pin of a movable electrode is inserted into a hole of a nut fed to an intermediate position between a fixed electrode and the movable electrode, and the movable electrode is then moved down together with the nut to position the nut on a portion to be welded of a workpiece overlying the fixed electrode. An air passage is formed inside of the guide pin. A plurality of air outlets are formed on the periphery of the tip of the guide pin. A pressurized air is supplied to the air passage and is then blown out of the air outlets, so that a blow of the pressurized air is given to the bottom surface of the nut thereby preventing fallout of the nut.

Growing community of inventors

Hatsukaichi, Japan

Kouji Sakota