WELDING SYSTEM PROVIDING VISUAL AND AUDIO CUES TO A WELDING HELMET WITH A DISPLAY

• US 20180126476A1
• Filed: 10/17/2017
• Published: 05/10/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 11/07/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Lincoln Global Incorporated (Lincoln Electric Holdings Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Lincoln Global Incorporated (Lincoln Electric Holdings Incorporated)
• Inventors: MEESS, Brian, EVANS, Sarah
• Granted Patent: US 10,913,125 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 9/06 Masks, shields or hoods for welders safety devices for welding in general F16P1/00
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 9/064 with two windows, one for viewing and one for use during the welding process
• CPC Class Codes: B23K 9/0953 using computing means
• CPC Class Codes: B23K 9/0956 using sensing means, e.g. optical
• CPC Class Codes: B23K 9/1087 Arc welding using remote control
• CPC Class Codes: B23K 9/322 Head protecting means masks, shields or hoods for weldersp A61F9/06
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/0138 comprising image capture systems, e.g. camera
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/014 comprising information/image processing systems
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 2027/0141 characterised by the informative content of the display
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 27/0172 characterised by optical features
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/182 characterised by the machine tool function, e.g. thread cutting, cam making, tool direction control G05B19/21 - G05B19/40 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/45044 Cutting
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/45135 Welding
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 11/60 Editing figures and text; Combining figures or text
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/20 in augmented reality scenes
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 3/10 using electric transmission; using electromagnetic transmission
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 19/24 Use of tools

Abstract

A system for aiding a user in at least one of welding, cutting, joining, and cladding operations is provided. The system includes a welding tool and a welding helmet with a face-mounted display. The system also includes a spatial tracker configured to track the welding helmet and the welding tool in 3-D space relative to an object to be worked on. A processor based subsystem is configured to generate visual cues based on information from the spatial tracker and transmit the visual cues to a predetermined location on the face-mounted display.

Claims

1. A system for aiding a user in at least one of welding, cutting, joining, and cladding operation, the system comprising:

a welding tool for performing at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld on one of a coupon or workpiece;

a see-through face-mounted display to allow the user to see a view of a welding environment including the one of a coupon or a workpiece, the face-mounted display having a combiner;

a spatial tracker configured to track position, orientation and movement of the face-mounted display and the welding tool in 3-D space relative to the one of a coupon or a workpiece and determine 6-D data that corresponds to the tracking; and

a processor based subsystem configured to

receive the 6-D data from the spatial tracker,

generate at least one visual cue based on at least one of one or more performance parameters related to the 6-D data and one or more process parameters related to the at least one welding, cutting, joining, and cladding operation,

map the at least one visual cue to a respective location on the face-mounted display, and

transmit the at least one visual cue to the combiner of the face-mounted display such that the face-mounted display shows the at least one visual cue overlaid on the view of the welding environment,

wherein the at least one visual cue provides information to the user that aids in performing the at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more performance parameters includes at least one of aim, work angle, travel angle, tool standoff, travel speed, bead placement, weave, arc length, contact tip to work distance (CTWD), deposition rate, frequency of TIG filler addition.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein at least one attribute of the at least one visual cue is changed based on whether the one or more performance parameters respectively associated with the at least one visual cue falls outside at least one of a target value and a target range for the performance parameter.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the at least one attribute is at least one of a color, a shape, a size, an intensity, and a location on the face-mounted display of the at least one visual cue.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one visual cue is semitransparent to show an underlying view of the welding environment.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the mapping is done such that the at least one visual cue is displayed at a fixed location on the face-mounted display that corresponds to at least one of a corner of the display, a top of the display, a side of the display, a top of the display and a middle of the display.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the mapping is done such that the at least one visual cue is displayed in a same relative location with respect to the welding tool.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one visual cue identifies at least one of a start position and an end position of the at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one visual cue provides an indication of a progress of the welding, cutting, joining, and cladding operation.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the spatial tracker includes at least one camera mounted on the welder'"'"'s helmet and the tracking is based on the at least one camera.

12. The system of claim 1, further comprising at least one speaker, and

wherein the processor based subsystem generates an audio cue based on at least one of the one or more performance parameters and the one or more process parameters and transmits the audio cues to the at least one speaker, and

wherein the audio cue is at least one of a tone, a buzzer and a voice alert.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein the spatial tracker is at least one of a camera based tracker, a magnetic-field based tracker, an accelerometer based tracker, a gyroscope based tracker, an optical tracker, an infrared tracker, an acoustic tracker, a laser tracker, a radio frequency tracker, and an inertial tracker.

14. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

at least one of a welding power supply, a wire feeder, and a hot wire power supply,

wherein the at least one visual cue provides an indication of at least one of a voltage and current of the welding power supply, a wire feed speed of the wire feeder, and at least one of a voltage and current of the hot wire power supply.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein the face-mounted display includes an auto-darkening lens.

16. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor based subsystem is configured to transmit to the face-mounted display media content related to at least one of instructional information on welding, information related to the user'"'"'s performance and information related to a quality of the at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld.

17. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor based system is configured to display menu items on the face-mounted display for configuring the system, and

wherein a navigation through the menu items based on at least one of controlling the welding tool, audio commands, and eye tracing input.

3. (canceled).

18. A method for aiding a user in at least one of welding, cutting, joining, and cladding operation, the method comprising:

performing at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld on one of a coupon or workpiece using a welding tool;

providing a see-through face-mounted display having a combiner to provide the user a view of a welding environment including the one of a coupon or a workpiece;

tracking a position, an orientation and a movement of the face-mounted display and the welding tool in 3-D space relative to the one of a coupon or a workpiece;

determining 6-D data that corresponds to the tracking;

generating at least one visual cue based on at least one of one or more performance parameters related to the 6-D data and one or more process parameters related to the at least one welding, cutting, joining, and cladding operation; and

mapping the at least one visual cue to a respective location on the face-mounted display, and

transmitting the at least one visual cue to the combiner of the face-mounted display such that the face-mounted display shows the at least one visual cue overlaid on the view of the welding environment,

wherein the at least one visual cue provides information to the user that aids in the performing of the at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the one or more performance parameters includes at least one of aim, work angle, travel angle, tool standoff, travel speed, bead placement, weave, arc length, contact tip to work distance (CTWD), deposition rate, frequency of TIG filler addition.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein at least one attribute of the at least one visual cue is changed based on whether the one or more performance parameters respectively associated with the at least one visual cue falls outside at least one of a target value and a target range for the performance parameter.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the at least one attribute is at least one of a color, a shape, a size, an intensity, and a location on the face-mounted display of the at least one visual cue.

22. The method of claim 18, wherein the at least one visual cue is semitransparent to show an underlying view of the welding environment.

23. The method of claim 18, wherein the mapping comprises displaying the at least one visual cue on the face-mounted display at a fixed location that corresponds to at least one of a corner of the display, a top of the display, a side of the display, a top of the display and a middle of the display.

24. The method of claim 18, wherein the mapping displaying the at least one visual cue on the face-mounted display in a same relative location with respect to the welding tool.

25. The method of claim 18, wherein the at least one visual cue identifies at least one of a start position and an end position of the at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld.

26. The method of claim 18, wherein the at least one visual cue provides an indication of a progress of the welding, cutting, joining, and cladding operation.

27. The method of claim 18, wherein the tracking is based on at least one camera mounted on the welder'"'"'s helmet.

28. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

generating an audio cue based on at least one of the one or more performance parameters and the one or more process parameters; and

transmitting the audio cue to at least one speaker,

wherein the audio cue is at least one of a tone, a buzzer and a voice alert.

29. The method of claim 18, wherein the tracking is based on at least one of a camera based tracker, a magnetic-field based tracker, an accelerometer based tracker, a gyroscope based tracker, an optical tracker, an infrared tracker, an acoustic tracker, a laser tracker, a radio frequency tracker, and an inertial tracker.

30. The method of claim 18, wherein the at least one visual cue provides an indication of at least one of a voltage and current of a welding power supply, a wire feed speed of a wire feeder, and at least one of a voltage and current of a hot wire power supply.

31. The method of claim 18, wherein the face-mounted display includes an auto-darkening lens.

32. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

transmitting to the face-mounted display media content related to at least one of instructional information on welding, information related to the user'"'"'s performance and information related to a quality of the at least one of a real-world weld and a simulated weld.

33. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

displaying menu items on the face-mounted display related to configuration of a respective at least one of welding, cutting, joining, and cladding system; and

navigating through the menu items based on at least one of controlling the welding tool, audio commands, and eye tracing input.