JPH0717024B2 - Fiber reinforced plastic molding equipment - Google Patents

Description

Description: TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a fiber-reinforced plastic molding apparatus, and more specifically, to a resin-impregnated long fiber that is automatically wound to form a three-dimensional fiber-reinforced plastic. The present invention relates to a device for molding.

(Prior Art) A filament winding method is well known as a method for winding a long fiber impregnated with a resin to form a fiber-reinforced plastic. In this method, long fibers such as carbon fibers and glass fibers are impregnated with a synthetic resin such as polyester resin and epoxy resin, and the resin is continuously wound around a molding die to have a predetermined shape. By the way, the molded product by the filament winding method is generally cylindrical,
It has a simple shape such as a ring shape. In this case, the forming die (mandrel) is rotated, and the resin-impregnated long fiber guide jig is moved along the rotating forming die to automatically wind it. (For example, JP-A-55-115117).

However, if the molded product has a three-dimensional shape, such as a steering wheel core material, the resin-impregnated long fibers must be wound in a very complicated path (pattern). Winding became difficult, and I had to rely on manual winding, so-called manual winding.

FIGS. 17 and 18 show such a manual winding device, which includes a rotatable bobbin receiver 53 for supporting a bobbin 52 in which long fibers 51 are bundled and a bobbin for accommodating a molten resin 54.
An impregnation tank 56 including a guide roller 55 that guides the long fibers 51 drawn from 52 into the molten resin 54, and a resin impregnated long fiber 57 drawn from the impregnation tank 56 (for steering wheels, for example). ) A molding die 58, a driving device 59 that supports and rotatably drives the molding die 58, a control device 60 of the driving device 59, and a foot switch 61. As a result, the worker 62 can check the resin-impregnated long fibers 57 drawn from the impregnation tank 56.
While pulling by hand with the hand, the foot switch 61 is depressed to rotate the proper timing molding die 58 in the forward and reverse directions, and the resin-impregnated long fiber 57 is wound around the molding die 58 in a predetermined winding pattern.

(Problems to be Solved by the Invention) However, according to the above-described conventional molding apparatus, the productivity is low due to the work by human being, and the quality of the finished molded product is not stable, Since the winding pattern of is complicated, it is difficult to remember it, and moreover, the number of windings must be checked during the work, which puts a heavy burden on the worker. It worsens the environment and costs a lot to deal with it,
There was a problem such as.

The present invention has been made to solve the above conventional problems, and enables automatic winding of a resin-impregnated long fiber into a three-dimensional shape by organically combining an industrial robot and a rotary table, An object of the present invention is to provide a fiber reinforced plastic molding device that can contribute to the improvement of productivity and quality.

(Means for Solving the Problems) Therefore, the present invention provides an impregnation tank for impregnating long fibers with a resin, and a rotary table to which a molding die for winding the resin-impregnated long fibers withdrawn from the impregnation tank is fixed. A robot having a guide jig, which is installed between the impregnation tank and the rotary table, for supporting the resin-impregnated long fibers at an arm tip, and a control means for controlling the rotary table and the robot in synchronization with each other, The present invention is characterized in that it comprises a tension applying means for applying tension to the resin-impregnated long fibers guided to the molding die.

(Operation) In the molding apparatus of the fiber reinforced plastic having the above-mentioned configuration,
Since the mold is placed on the rotary table and the robot has a guide jig, the resin-impregnated long fibers can be automatically wound into any shape with any winding pattern, improving the productivity of fiber reinforced plastics. And quality can be stabilized, and safety and hygiene can be improved by unmanning.

Further, the winding operation can be accurately reproduced by simply inputting data into the control device, and the fiber-reinforced plastic can be easily molded. Moreover, since the movements of the rotary table and the robot are controlled in synchronization, it becomes possible to wind the resin-impregnated long fibers around the molding die with a small movement of the robot arm, and as a result, the excess of the resin-impregnated long fibers is caused. It is possible to prevent unnecessary bending and drawing and prevent the resin-impregnated long fibers from being broken or fuzzing during winding. Further, the resin-impregnated long fibers can be wound up without slack by means of applying tension, and the obtained molded article has increased denseness and improved strength.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention is described based on an accompanying drawing.

FIG. 1 shows the entire structure of a fiber-reinforced plastic molding apparatus according to the present invention. This embodiment shows an example of an apparatus for molding a steering wheel core material of an automobile. An impregnation tank 3 for continuously impregnating long fibers 2 drawn from a bobbin 1 with a synthetic resin, and an impregnation tank 3 A rotary table 6 having a molding die 5 for winding the resin-impregnated continuous fibers 4 mounted on a main shaft 6 ', and a resin-impregnated continuous fiber tree 4 drawn from the impregnation tank 3 to the molding die 5. A multi-joint (6-axis) robot 8 having a guide jig 7 for guiding the arm, a controller 9 for controlling the operation of the rotary table 6 and the robot 8, and the impregnation tank 3
And a tensioner 10 which is provided adjacent to and which applies a predetermined tension to the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 guided to the molding die 5. In addition, 11 is a guide member for bundling a plurality of resin-impregnated long fibers 4 drawn out from the impregnation tank 3,
12 is a tray for receiving the molten resin dropped from the mold 5, 13
Is an input device including a keyboard and a CRT for inputting data and programs to a control device described later, and 14 is a teaching box.

As shown in FIG. 3, the impregnation tank 3 has a tank 16 containing a molten resin 15 and the long fibers 2 wound around the tank 16.
It has a plurality of guide rollers 17, 17 ... Further, the tensioner 10 is, as shown in FIG.
A guide roller 18 arranged on the inlet side, a two-stage guide roller 19 arranged on the outlet side, and a free roller positioned between the guide rollers 18 and 19 and hung on the resin-impregnated long fiber 4.
It is composed of 20 and can apply tension to the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 in consideration of the own weight of the free roller 20 and the frictional resistance of the two-stage guide roller 19. Further, as shown in FIG. 4, the guide jig 7 comprises a rod-shaped main body portion 21 provided with a hole 22 through which the resin-impregnated long fiber 4 is inserted, and is provided in advance at the arm tip of the robot 8. It is attached to the flange plate 23 with bolts 24.

On the other hand, the molding die 5, as shown in detail in FIGS. 5 and 6,
A disk-shaped first winding die 25 fixed to the main shaft 6'of the rotary table 6, a ring-shaped second winding die 26 fitted and attached to the first winding jig, and First winding die 25
A pillar 27 that is erected on the main shaft 6a with its axis aligned with the main shaft 6a;
It consists of a boss metal fitting 28 attached to the upper end of 27.
A groove having a semicircular cross section is formed in each of the peripheral portions of the first and second take-up dies 25 and 26, and a peripheral groove 29 having a U-shaped cross section is formed between them in the above-mentioned combined state. Are formed. Further, the second winding die 26 has three notch grooves in the circumferential direction.
30 are formed. As a result, by rotating the rotary table 6 and appropriately driving the robot body 8, the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 are wound around the circumferential groove 29, and the circumferential groove 29 is transferred to the boss fitting 28 and the boss fitting 28 is moved to the circumferential groove 29. If wrapped around, ring part W1, spoke part W2, boss part W3 including boss metal fitting 28
The steering wheel core material W having the above is integrally formed.

Further, as the control device 9, the one described in detail in JP-A-60-193016 is used. The control device 9 has a structure as shown in FIG. In the figure, 30a, 30b ... 30f are servomotors for the respective axes of the robot 8, and 30g is a servomotor for the rotary table 6. 31g and potentiometers 32a, 32b ... 32f for detecting the rotational position of each servo motor are provided for each axis. Servo units 33a, 33b to each servo motor ...
A drive pulse is applied from 33g, respectively, while data relating to the current position detected by the encoder and potentiometer is sent to each servo unit.

A central control unit 34 is an input / output port (I / O) that receives data from the input unit 13 and outputs control signals to the servo units 33a, 33b ... 33g in addition to the central processing unit (CPU) 35. ) 36, a memory 37 for storing data from the input device, teach data, etc., an interpolation circuit 38 for performing locus interpolation during playback, rotating an interpolation point on a rotary table coordinate, or rotating a point after rotation. A coordinate conversion circuit 39 for converting the table coordinate system to the absolute coordinate system of the robot body 8 is built in.

With the control device 9 having the above-mentioned configuration, the rotary table 6 is now fixed, and the teaching box 14 (Fig. 1) is operated to move the guide jig 7 to perform teaching. The position and orientation data of the coordinate system is converted into the coordinate system of the rotary table 6 and stored in the memory 37 as teaching data.
At the time of playback, the stored teaching data is linearly interpolated by the interpolation circuit 38 in the rotary table coordinate system, and further, the coordinate conversion circuit 39 determines the rotation angle component of each interpolation point, and the rotated point is the absolute coordinate. Converted to system values. The coordinate-converted value is the servo unit 33.
a, 33b…… incorporated into 33f. The servo unit calculates the number of pulses on each axis of the robot, and the encoders 31a, 31b ...
… Compared with the current number of pulses for each axis taken from 31f,
The drive of the servomotors 30a, 30b ... 30f is controlled by the difference. On the other hand, 33g of servo unit for rotary table
Calculates the number of pulses corresponding to the rotation angle component, compares it with the number of pulses fetched from the encoder 31g, and controls the drive of the servomotor 30g based on the difference. In this way, the rotary table 6 and the robot 8 can operate in perfect synchronization in accordance with the continuously output interpolation point command values, and the movement of the arm tip of the robot 8 is minimized by linear interpolation. Will be suppressed to.

With such a configuration, the input device 13 is operated in advance to input necessary data such as the winding pattern and the number of windings to the control device 9, and the teaching box 14 is operated to teach the robot 8. Next, the long fibers 2 are drawn out from the bobbin 1, guided to the forming die 5 through the impregnating device 3, the tensioner 10 and the guide jig 7, and one end thereof is fixed to the forming die 5. After that, when the control device 9 is started, the rotary table 6 is rotated, and further, the robot is driven in synchronization with this, the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 are sequentially wound around the molding die 5, and finally the steering wheel having a predetermined shape is formed. The core material W (FIGS. 5 and 6) is completed. The winding pattern is such that the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 are entangled with each other, for example, as shown in FIG. 8 and FIG. 9, patterns P1 and P2 for turning from the ring portion to the boss portion and from the boss portion to the ring portion Preferably.

In this way, since the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 are automatically wound up by utilizing the operation of the rotary table 6 and the robot 8, not only the reinforced plastic can be manufactured with high efficiency and high accuracy, but also due to unmanned operation. It is possible to improve safety and hygiene. Further, since the rotary table 6 and the robot 8 operate in synchronization with each other, the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 can be wound around the molding die 5 by the movement of a small robot arm, and as a result, the resin with the guide jig 7 interposed therebetween can be wound. The crossing angle of the impregnated long fibers 4 is suppressed as small as possible, so that the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 can be prevented from being broken or broken. Further, tension is applied to the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 from the tensioner 10, so that the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 will not be loosened even when the guide jig 7 is operated, and dense winding is possible. The strength of the obtained stealing wheel core material W is also improved.

In the above embodiment, the common control device 9 is used to synchronize the operations of the rotary table 6 and the robot 8, but instead of this, as shown in FIG.
By separately providing the control device 40 and the control device 41 of the robot 8 and interposing the sequence control device 42 between them, the signals are exchanged between the control devices 40 and 41.
The rotary table 6 and the robot 8 can be synchronized. However, in this case, since it is necessary to exchange signals in a fine motion unit between the rotary table 6 and the robot 8, the motion time is generally longer than that in the case of the above embodiment, and the productivity is slightly inferior. .

Further, in the above-mentioned embodiment, one molding die 5 is attached to one rotary table 6 so that the steering wheel core materials are molded one by one.
As shown in FIG. 12 and FIG. 12, a plurality of molding dies 5A, 5B, 5C are mounted on the rotary table 6, and robots 8A, 8B, 8C corresponding to the respective molds are equally arranged around the rotary table 6. However, it is possible to control the operations of the rotary table 6 and the plurality of robot bodies 8A, 8B, 8C in synchronization with one control device 9 '. As a result, not only the productivity can be improved, but also the equipment cost can be reduced by sharing the rotary table 6 and the control device 9 '.

Further, in the above-mentioned embodiment, the two-stage guide roller 19 or the free roller is used as a means for applying a tension to the resin-impregnated continuous fiber 4.
Although the tensioner 10 in which 20 is arranged is used, one of the two-stage guide rollers 19 therein may be connected to the driving device 42 as shown in FIG. 13, for example. The drive device 42 is, for example, a cylinder.
43, a motor 45 fixed to the tip of a rod 44 extending from the cylinder 43, and a belt 46 for transmitting the rotation of the motor 45 to the guide roller 19, and actuated by a signal from the controller 9. To do. As a result, the cylinder 43 is actuated to lower one of the guide rollers 19, and the resin-impregnated long fiber 4 is appropriately pressed against the other guide roller.
By driving 45, the feeding speed of the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 can be adjusted by following the movement of the guide jig 7. That is, when excessive tension is applied to the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 as in the case where the guide jig 7 moves toward the boss fitting 28 of the molding die 5 in the above-described embodiment, the tension is weakened by the drive, It is possible to prevent the resin from being squeezed out by the jig 7 and the fluffing of fibers from occurring.

Contrary to the above mode, one of the two-stage guide rollers 19 is connected to the brake 47 as shown in FIG.
As shown in the figure, the compression spring 48
Alternatively, the brake 47 or the cylinder 49 may be appropriately braked by a signal from the control device 9, so that the guide jig 7 is guided along the cutout groove 30 of the forming die 5. When the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 try to swell, such as when the direction is changed, the tension is increased by the braking, and the denseness of the branched portion is increased.

Further, the tension adjusting mechanism for the resin-impregnated long fibers 4 may be provided separately and independently from the two-stage guide roller 19 in the tensioner 10 instead of the embodiment shown in FIGS. At that time, as shown in FIG. 16, a pair of brake shoes 50 are provided along the moving line of the resin-impregnated long fibers 4.
It is also possible to provide a fixed brake 50 in which a is arranged and one of them is fixed to the rod end of the cylinder 50b.

(Effects of the Invention) As described in detail above, in the molding apparatus for fiber-reinforced plastic according to the present invention, the molding die is placed on the rotary table and the robot is provided with the resin-impregnated long fiber guide jig. Therefore, the resin-impregnated long fibers can be automatically wound into an arbitrary three-dimensional shape, and the productivity of the fiber-reinforced plastic can be significantly improved and the quality can be stabilized. We have achieved improvement.

In addition, since the operation of the rotary table and the robot can be controlled in synchronization, it is possible to wind the resin-impregnated long fibers around the mold with the movement of a small robot arm. It was possible to prevent blistering and improve yield and appearance quality.

Further, since the means for applying tension to the resin-impregnated long fibers is provided, it becomes possible to follow the movement of the resin-impregnated long fibers with the operation of the guide jig, and it is possible to perform dense winding without waste. The strength of the molded product was improved.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing the overall structure of a molding apparatus for fiber reinforced plastics according to the present invention, and FIGS. 2 to 4 show a part of the impregnation tank, tensioner and guide jig, respectively. Schematic diagrams, FIGS. 5 and 6 are plan and side views showing the same molding die, FIG. 7 is a block diagram showing the same control device, and FIGS. 8 and 9 are resin-impregnated long fibers. FIG. 10 is an explanatory view showing a winding pattern, FIG. 10 is a block diagram showing another embodiment of the control device, FIGS. 11 and 12 are schematic diagrams showing other embodiments of the rotary table and the robot, and FIG. Fig. 16
FIGS. 17 and 18 are schematic views showing other embodiments of means for applying tension to the resin-impregnated continuous fiber, and FIGS. 17 and 18 are schematic views showing a conventional fiber-reinforced plastic molding apparatus. 2 ... Long fiber, 3 ... Impregnation device 4 ... Resin-impregnated long fiber, 5 ... Mold 6 ... Rotating table, 7 ... Guide jig 8 ... Robot, 9 ... Control device 10 ... Tension Granting means (tensioner)

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of front page (72) Inventor Yasuhiro Tsuchiya 1 Toyota Town, Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture, Toyota Motor Corporation (72) Inventor Shinji Koike 1, Toyota Town, Aichi Prefecture, Toyota Motor Corporation ( 72) Inventor Maki Terada 1 Toyota Town, Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture Toyota Motor Co., Ltd.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. An impregnation tank for impregnating long fibers with a resin, a rotary table on which a mold for winding the resin-impregnated long fibers withdrawn from the impregnation tank is fixed, and between the impregnation tank and the rotary table. A robot having a guide jig installed at the tip of the arm for supporting the resin-impregnated long fibers, and a control means for controlling the rotary table and the robot in synchronization with each other;
A molding device for fiber reinforced plastic, comprising a tension applying means for applying tension to the resin-impregnated long fibers guided to the molding die.