MANUFACTURING STATION WITH IMPROVED CONTROLLER

• US 20080208380A1
• Filed: 02/22/2008
• Published: 08/28/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 02/22/2007
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Samir K. Taylor
• Original Assignee: Samir K. Taylor
• Inventors: Taylor, Samir K.
• Application Number:
  US12/035,880
• Publication Number:
  US 20080208380A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 700/108
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/0426 Programming the control sequence
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/056 Programming the PLC
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/23046 Selection out of menu by function keys
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/23377 Touch screen, with representation of buttons, machine on screen
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/45127 Portable, hand drill

Abstract

A manufacturing station comprises a tool which performs a manufacturing operation on a part, a controller programmed by a product line which controls the tool to determine that the operation is carried out, which receives information about the manufacturing operation and communicates information about the operation, and an interface between the tool and the controller, wherein the controller is configurable to one of a multiple of manufacturing operations which correspond to the product line of the controller.

Claims

1. A manufacturing station comprising, in combination:

a tool which performs a manufacturing operation on a part;

a controller programmed by a product line which controls the tool to determine that the operation is carried out, which receives information about the manufacturing operation and communicates information about the operation; and

an interface between the tool and the controller;

wherein the controller is configurable to one of a multiple of manufacturing operations which correspond to the product line of the controller.

2. The manufacturing station of claim 1 wherein the interface comprises a touchscreen display and the controller is configurable by touching the display;

and

the display displays a job mode screen corresponding to each product line.

3. The manufacturing station of claim 2 wherein the display further comprises a setup screen and the job mode screen is one of the options available at the setup screen.

4. The manufacturing station of claim 3 wherein the setup screen displays choices for a station mode screen, the job mode screen, and a maintenance mode screen.

5. The manufacturing station of claim 1 wherein the information about the manufacturing operation is communicated to a display and to a device remote from the manufacturing station, and the controller can receive information from the remote device.

6. The manufacturing station of claim 5 wherein the information transmitted to the remote device comprises data about the operation, and information received from the remote device comprises control commands.

7. The manufacturing station of claim 1 wherein the interface comprises a display and a sensor which is one of a proximity sensor, a position encoder, a linear encoder and a six degree of freedom sensor.

8. The manufacturing station of claim 7 wherein the six degree of freedom sensor transmits information to a receiver located generally adjacent the tool.

9. The manufacturing station of claim 7 wherein the sensor is mounted directly on the tool.

10. The manufacturing station of claim 1 wherein the product line is one of fastening, vision, measurement, testing, quality gating, error proofing and sequence determination or a combination thereof.

11. The manufacturing station wherein the controller backups information about the manufacturing operation so that the information can be recovered later.

12. A manufacturing station comprising, in combination:

a tool which performs a manufacturing operation on a part, wherein the manufacturing operation is a fastening operation for fastening components together to form a part;

a controller which controls the tool to determine that the fastening operation is carried out and which communicates information about a status of the operation; and

an interface between the tool and the controller, comprising a sensor mounted directly on the tool which provides information about the position of the tool to the controller;

wherein the tool is free to move in any direction.

13. The manufacturing station of claim 12 wherein the sensor measures position in three dimensions and also measures pitch, yaw and roll of the tool with respect to a reference point.

14. The manufacturing station of claim 12 further comprising receivers which receive a signal from the sensor containing information about the position of the sensor and relay this information to the controller.

15. The manufacturing station of claim 12 wherein the controller is reconfigurable for a second, non-fastening manufacturing operation.

16. The manufacturing station of claim 15 wherein the controller communicates information about the manufacturing station via a plant Ethernet to a device remote from the manufacturing station.

17. The manufacturing station of claim 12 wherein the controller can be set to determine a correct position for the tool, and a correct angle of implementation of the tool to the components.

18. The manufacturing station of claim 17 wherein the tool can be disabled by the controller if the tool is not in the correct position or if the tool is not at the correct angle of implementation.