Standalone Intelligent Autoloader with Modularization Architectures and Self-adaptive Motion Control Ability for Mass Optical Disks Duplication

• US 20070263492A1
• Filed: 05/10/2006
• Published: 11/15/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 05/10/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Vinpower Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Vinpower Incorporated
• Inventors: Chang, Shuo Wei, Lou, Mingji, Chu, Weicheng, Cheng, Chia Chun, Chou, Chin-han
• Granted Patent: US 7,826,924 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 369/30.320
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 17/225 wherein the disks are transferred from a fixed magazine to a fixed playing unit using a moving carriage
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 414/137 including means for charging or discharging wafer cassette
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 414/141 includes means for gripping wafer

Abstract

An autoloader system with modularization architecture and self-adaptive motion control ability for mass optical disks duplication includes four physical modules: a robot arm module with sensors and joints dedicates for delivering and picking up optical disks; an optical disk duplication tower has a number of optical drives in a stack, or a matrix for optical disk duplication; a motion control module has an embedded motion controller and a power source to synchronize the motion of robot arm and duplication; a platform module has a base frame to fix other modules and a user interface. Some disk stacks are situated on top of platform module. The use of a self-adaptive control algorithm, consisting of a Motion Strategy Database, Initial Process, Motion Planning Process, Motion Generation Process and Motion Monitor Process, to ascertain system configurations and components furthest satisfy the required flexibility for modifying/upgrading hardware or ever-changing user needs. The use of DC motors and self-correcting adaptive algorithm provides better versatility to disk copier systems than most commonly used stepper motors, even in the case of “short tray” wherein the tray does not fully extend out. The stand-alone design of present invention further makes the use and operation of the disk copier easier and friendlier.

Claims

1. A Standalone Intelligent Autoloader with Modularization Architectures, comprising:

a. A robotic arm further having multiple joints and sensor and controlled by multiple actuators implemented by DC motors;

b. A duplication tower further having an embedded duplication control board and multiple writer drives;

c. A control and power unit further having an embedded motion control board and a communication channel between said duplication tower and said embedded motion control board.

d. A platform having disk stacks, user interface and geometry datum plane.

e. A specially designed self-adaptive control algorithm further consisting of a Motion Strategy Database, and four logical process-modules of Initial Process, Motion Planning Process, Motion Generating Process and Motion Monitor Process.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein, said self-adaptive control algorithm is stored in said motion control board in the form of EPROM and Flash memory and can be renewed and upgraded by end users.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the Initial Process collects the ID numbers of every module when the system is powered on, enabling the configuration to be recognized by the system when said stored parameters from the Motion Strategy Database are extracted for use in later stage.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the speed (rpm) of a DC motor, as a control parameter used and stored in the Motion Strategy Database, with respect to time r(t) is a function of duty cycle with respect to time c(t) expressed in the formula:

r(t)=f(c(t)).

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the orientation and displacement of the robotic arm, as control parameters used and stored in the Motion Strategy Database, are calculated by the integral of angular and translational velocity, respectively, by specifying the duty cycle in discrete time domain (rather than in continuous time domain) in the formula,

$p$

( T k + 1 ) = a 

∑

i - 0 ~ k 



f 

( c 

( T i ) ) 

( T i + 1 - T i ) ,

where p(T_k+1) is the displacement at time step k+1, a the constant ratio;

wherein the sensors are either joint sensors to sense position and acceleration/deceleration, or end-point sensors to sense the physical interaction between the gripped disk and the environment.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the duplication embedded control board further having a microprocessor, Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), and memory, to control the data flow between writer drives I/O and data storage such as a hard drive by Direct Memory Access (DMA) or Interrupt-driven I/O methods.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the geometry datum plane is a mechanical restriction to regulate the geometry relationship among each modules, wherein the geometry relationship between said the duplication tower module and the disk stacks has to be in the effective trajectory region of the robot arm.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the communication channel comprises a RS232-compatible chip to transfer communication data between motion control board and duplication control board.