ELECTRONIC DEVICE FOR DETERMINING THE HEIGHT, WIDTH, LENGTH AND VOLUME OF A CONTAINER
First Claim
1. A device capable of sensing and recording the length, width, height and volume of a container as the container passes through said device on a conveyor system, said device comprising:
- a rectangular frame member having a top, two sides and a bottom and being open at its ends;
means for conveying a container through said frame member at a preset velocity;
a first and second row of photo transistors with the first row of photo transistors mounted on the bottom or top of said frame member and the second row of photo transistors mounted on one of the side of said frame member;
two elongate, parabolic mirrors with the first parabolic mirror mounted along the top or bottom of said frame opposite said first row of photo transistors and the second parabolic mirror mounted along the side of said frame opposite said second row of photo transistors;
a first and second quartz light source and means for directing the light produced by said first quartz light source against the first parabolic mirror and means for directing the light produced by said second quartz light source against the second parabolic mirror whereby the light reflected by said parabolic mirrors is in equal length, parallel light rays;
means for directing said equal length, parallel light rays from said first parabolic mirror against said first row of photo transistors and means for directing said equal length, parallel light rays from said second parabolic mirror against said second row of photo transistors;
means for cooling said quartz light ources;
a travel sensor and encoder means which produces recurring signals, each signal corresponding to a preset degree of advancement of said container through said frame;
electronic circuitry means for testing each photo transistor in said first and second rows of photo transistors for its current conducting characteristics every time said encoder produces a signal;
means for detecting and holding in memory the number of photo transistors in each of said first and second rows of photo transistors whIch will fail to conduct a test current during said testing, whereby the number of photo transistors in said first and second rows of photo transistors, respectively, which failed to conduct said test current are representative of the width and height respectively of the portion of the container directly over said first row of photo transistors at the time of each test;
means for detecting and holding in memory the number of pulses produced by said encoder during which there were continuous detection of photo transistors which failed to conduct said test current, said number of pulses being representative of the length of the portion of said container which has passed over the first row of photo transistors;
means for multiplying the signal representative of the instantaneous height of said container by the signal representative of the corresponding instantaneous width of said container and multiplying the product thereof by the signal representative of the distance advanced by said container between consecutive pulses of said encoder to produce a signal representative of the incremental volume of said container;
means for adding the signals representative of the incremental volumes to produce a signal representative of the total volume of said container; and
means to register or display the computed volume of said container.
0 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A device for measuring and recording the length, width, height, and volume of a container as it moves along a conveyor system comprises two rows of photo transistors upon which respective curtains of parallel light rays are directed. The container intersects a portion of each curtain of light as it moves along the conveyor, and an encoder means produces recurring signals corresponding to a preset increment of advancement of the container through the curtains of light. Each signal from the encoder activates means for counting the number of darkened photo transistors in each row thereof at that instant. A computer determines the height, width, length, and volume of the container.
40 Citations
3 Claims
-
1. A device capable of sensing and recording the length, width, height and volume of a container as the container passes through said device on a conveyor system, said device comprising:
- a rectangular frame member having a top, two sides and a bottom and being open at its ends;
means for conveying a container through said frame member at a preset velocity;
a first and second row of photo transistors with the first row of photo transistors mounted on the bottom or top of said frame member and the second row of photo transistors mounted on one of the side of said frame member;
two elongate, parabolic mirrors with the first parabolic mirror mounted along the top or bottom of said frame opposite said first row of photo transistors and the second parabolic mirror mounted along the side of said frame opposite said second row of photo transistors;
a first and second quartz light source and means for directing the light produced by said first quartz light source against the first parabolic mirror and means for directing the light produced by said second quartz light source against the second parabolic mirror whereby the light reflected by said parabolic mirrors is in equal length, parallel light rays;
means for directing said equal length, parallel light rays from said first parabolic mirror against said first row of photo transistors and means for directing said equal length, parallel light rays from said second parabolic mirror against said second row of photo transistors;
means for cooling said quartz light ources;
a travel sensor and encoder means which produces recurring signals, each signal corresponding to a preset degree of advancement of said container through said frame;
electronic circuitry means for testing each photo transistor in said first and second rows of photo transistors for its current conducting characteristics every time said encoder produces a signal;
means for detecting and holding in memory the number of photo transistors in each of said first and second rows of photo transistors whIch will fail to conduct a test current during said testing, whereby the number of photo transistors in said first and second rows of photo transistors, respectively, which failed to conduct said test current are representative of the width and height respectively of the portion of the container directly over said first row of photo transistors at the time of each test;
means for detecting and holding in memory the number of pulses produced by said encoder during which there were continuous detection of photo transistors which failed to conduct said test current, said number of pulses being representative of the length of the portion of said container which has passed over the first row of photo transistors;
means for multiplying the signal representative of the instantaneous height of said container by the signal representative of the corresponding instantaneous width of said container and multiplying the product thereof by the signal representative of the distance advanced by said container between consecutive pulses of said encoder to produce a signal representative of the incremental volume of said container;
means for adding the signals representative of the incremental volumes to produce a signal representative of the total volume of said container; and
means to register or display the computed volume of said container.
- a rectangular frame member having a top, two sides and a bottom and being open at its ends;
-
2. A device as claimed in claim 1, wherein means are provided for registering or displaying the measured length, width and height of the container.
-
3. A device as claimed in claim 2 wherein the data corresponding to the length, width, height and volume are generated and held in memory in the form of pure binary numbers, the pure binary numbers are converted to binary coded decimal numbers which in turn are converted to decimal numbers in said means for registering and displaying the computed values, said binary numbers being converted to binary coded-decimal numbers by means of comprising (1) a reentrant shift register whose register is divided into sections with each section having 4 positions and each position capable of holding one binary digit, the first section being the 4 positions to the far right of said rigister and the last section being the 4 positions to the far left of said register, (2) a sensor and (3) and adder, wherein said binary number signals are stored in said shift register, said shift register shifts said signals to the right until the three most significant digits of said binary number occupy the first three positions in said shift register, said three digits are then removed from said shift register and forwarded to said sensor, the sensor analyzes said three digits, if the three digits represent a binary number equal to 4 or less, the three digits are returned to their respective position in said shift register, if the three digits represent a binary number greater than 4, the three digits are transferred to said adder where a binary three is added to the three digits resulting in a four digit binary number, the four digit binary number is then forwarded to the first section of said register in said shift register, the shift register then shifts the signals contained therein including the four digits in the first section thereof one position to the left, the digits in the first section of the shift register are removed and sent to said sensor, the sensor then analyzes the four digit number, if the 4 digits represent a binary number equal to 4 or less, the 4 digits are returned to their respective positions in said shift register, if the 4 digits represent a binary number greater than 4, the 4 digits are transferred to said adder where a binary three is added to the four digits, the binary number resulting from this addition is reentered in said shift register in the first section thereof, the second, third and subsequent sections of said register are each in turn removed from said shift register and sent to said sensor, the sensor then analyzes each Section in turn, if the 4 digit binary number of each section being analyzed is equal to or less than binary 4, that section is reentered in its respective position in said shift register, if the 4 digit binary number of any of said sections being analyzed is greater than binary 4, the 4 digits thereof are forwarded to said adder where a binary three is added to the 4 digits, the binary number resulting from this addition is then reentered in said shift register in its corresponding section, after all sections of said register have been analyzed and those whose 4 binary digits are greater than binary 4 have had a binary three added thereto, the shift register again shifts the signals contained therein one more position to the left, the four digits of each of the sections of said shift register are again analyzed by said sensor and if the four binary digits of each section represent a binary number equal to 4 or less, the four digits are reentered in their respective section of said shift register, if the four digits represent a binary number greater than 4, the four digits are transferred to said adder where a binary three is added to the four digits and the binary number resulting from this addition is then reentered in the corresponding section of said shift register, this shift wise shifting of said shift register by one position at a time to the left, followed by analyzing each section of said register and adding a binary three to any section whose four digit number is greater than four is repeated until the shift register hao shifted to where the least significant digit of said binary number is in the first position of said shift register and all the sections of said register corresponding to such a position have been analyzed and had a binary three added thereto if the four digit binary number theeof is greater than binary four, the signals remaining in the register of said shift register after this final shift and analysis has been made represents the binary coded decimal number equivalent to the original binary number.
Specification