The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 24, 1989
Filed:
Aug. 28, 1987
John L Leicht, Hawthorn Woods, IL (US);
Jeffrey D Leitheiser, Crystal Lake, IL (US);
Motorola Inc., Schaumburg, IL (US);
Abstract
Unique circuit location sensing apparatus for component placement robots (100) utilizes a high-resolution optical reflective sensor (110) for detecting the location of selected circuit runners (300, 301) on a printed circuit board (350). The sensor (110) is mounted to the robot arm (106) and coupled by A/D converting circuitry (104) to the robot computer (102). The robot computer (102) positions sensor (110) over a selected runner (300, 301) and steps sensor (110) across the selected runner (300, 301), storing the digitized sensor output for each step. The robot computer (102) processes the digitized sensor outputs to determine the actual location of the selected runner (300, 301) and then calculates location offsets for the component placement program to be subsequently run on the robot computer (102). As a result, variations in actual location of circuitry on different printed circuit boards (350) are automatically compensated for and components are more accurately placed thereon. The unique circuit location sensing apparatus of the present invention may be advantageously utilized in any component placement robot for accurately detecting the location of circuitry prior to placement of components on the printed circuit board.