In a customer’s production, small metal valve plates must be reliably detected and correctly positioned. The plates have a diameter of only 25 mm and a material thickness of 1 mm. Three different variants with different patterns are together in one magazine.
The company was looking for a solution that would uniquely identify each individual valve plate during handling – including variant differentiation and lateral position – before it is placed in the correct position in the compressor.
The solution: Image processing for reliable differentiation of valve plates: The Smart Camera B60 enables reliable variant and side control
The valve plates are removed individually from the magazine with a small vacuum gripper. The gripper then holds the component in front of a Smart Camera B60, which takes an image for evaluation.
The challenge:
Especially with reflective metal surfaces and small structures, high-performance image processing is crucial.
The Smart Camera B60 takes care of the entire image processing directly in the device. With the help of integrated image processing tools, characteristic features of the respective variant are checked.
Among other things, the following can be used:
are evaluated and compared with each other. In addition, it detects which side of the valve plate points to the sensor. This ensures that the component is processed in the correct orientation.
The test is carried out immediately after removal from the magazine. Even before the valve plate is positioned in the compressor, the test result is determined. If an incorrect variant or an incorrect lateral position is detected, an immediate reaction can be taken, e.g. by ejecting the component, removing it again, placing it in a targeted position at a defined position. This creates continuous quality control directly in the pick-and-place process.
Valve plates are central functional elements in piston compressors. For example, they sit in intake valves (suction valves) and open during the intake stroke when air or gas flows into the cylinder. They are also found in pressure valves (exhaust valves). Here they open at the compression stroke when the compressed gas is expelled.
Valve plates work like spring-loaded check valves: they open due to a pressure difference, close automatically due to their spring force and reliably prevent the gas from flowing back.
By using the Smart Camera B60, the customer receives a compact and powerful solution for variant and position recognition directly in the process.
wenglor thus offers an efficient solution for the automated component classification of small metal components – precisely, quickly and fully integrated inline.
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