Page 25 - MetalForming December 2015

Maintaining repeatability of carrier-tape positioning pre- sented a significant challenge to Zierick’s design team. The tape is positioned using a stepper motor with a 20-tooth sprocket. The sprocket teeth engage the pilot holes of the car- rier tape in a similar way that many tape feeders do. The plas- tic carrier tape is vacuum-formed which dictates rather gen- erous tolerances. If the position of the tape is slightly off, it can cause the part to become lodged into the cavity. To avoid this type of insertion error and others, the team added a thru-beam sensor to detect tape position.
The thru-beam transmits through a single pilot hole in the tape. The PLC program sends pulse signals through a step- per drive to a stepper motor, causing it to rotate in 0.018-deg. micro-step increments. This pulsing occurs until approxi- mately 80 percent of the transmitted light is received by the sensor and the other corresponding I/O conditions are met.
The machine program stores on a Panasonic FPX series PLC. A combination of standard IEC-61131-3 sequential function charts and ladder logic control machine operation. The program controls all standard operations and also allows for the machine to respond to several different circumstances and continue run- ning without human intervention.
Use of the PLC also reduces setup and reload times, by automatically leading-in and trailing-out the tape reel with the correct number of unpopulated cavities, as required for the cus- tomer’s pick-and-place machines. The machine can detect
when a part fails to fully
insert into the cavity of the tape.
If this situation arises, the machine will take a corrective action by actuating an insertion plunger above the cavity that helps move the part down into the bottom of the cavity.
The Process Control Award, sponsored by Link Systems, Nashville, TN, promotes the application of electronic-analog closed-loop process controls in the metalforming process by rec- ognizing innovative electronic solutions implemented by a North American manufacturing company, which have result- ed in significant quality, cost reduction and/or productivity improvements. MF
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