Arranging randomly positioned articles into preselected positions

Abstract

Trailing wire ends of a cable supply on a pay-off reel initially are connected to respective matrix points of a controller in a preselected numerical order. The cable then is fed from the reel, and a leading end portion is desheathed, using heat. The desheathed portions of the cable wires then are pressed or 'ironed' from a twisted-pair bundle configuration into an individual-wire common plane configuration. As the desheathed portions of the wires next are fanned out of the common plane configuration in random order, they are sorted into two groups, depending on the side of a connector plug on which they are to be located, in response to signals from the controller, which also identifies each wire and stores information as to its random numerical position in its respective group. The cable then is cut to length adjacent the supply reel and a new sequence of operations is initiated. At thwe same time, a collating device, in response to signals from the controller, rearranges the wires into their proper wiring positions, after which the wires are secured to the connector plug. A second connector plug can be attached on the opposite end of a cable in the same manner, except that the first attached plug is plugged directly into the controller for the identification step. The production output of the system can be essentially doubled by feeding two different cables from separate supplies on alternate cycles of operation, and processing both cables simultaneously.