Robotic hand tool sharpening and cleaning apparatus

Abstract

An automated hand tool sharpening and cleaning system for sharpening the two opposed cutting edges of domestic, industrial, sport, or hobby hand tool like a knife blade is provided by the invention. The apparatus comprises a six-axis robotic arm, a pneumatic gripper, a vision sensor camera for profiling the blade edges, a robotic controller, and sequentially-arranged grinding, coarse sharpening, fine sharpening, and buffing rotating wheel assemblies used to grind, sharpen, and buff or polish the cutting edges of the knife blade. The blade cutting edges are profiled by the camera image that is processed by associated software to define the blade by multiple points defined along its edge, followed by a set of algorithms that are used to clean up any discrepancies in the profile data. The resulting corrected profile data is then translated into a set of machine control commands fed to the robotic arm and pneumatic gripper via the robot controller for manipulating the knife blade edges via the robotic arm with respect to each of the grinding, coarse sharpening, fine sharpening, and buffing/polishing wheels and an associated wash station for remove bits of metal and other residue resulting from the sharpened knife blade.