JPH0450834B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION (Field of Industrial Application) The present invention relates to an automatic pachinko ball launcher that uses a laminated electrostrictive actuator to launch pachinko balls.

(Prior art) In a conventional automatic pachinko ball launcher, a cam is fixed to the rotating shaft of a motor, the cam is brought into contact with a batting rod, and the batting rod is oscillated at a constant cycle to fire pachinko balls. There was a motor type, or a solenoid type that fired pachinko balls by connecting a batting rod to the tip of a solenoid shaft that oscillated and rotated at a constant cycle using control pulses from an electric circuit.

(Problem to be solved by the invention) Pachinko ball launchers are regulated to fire 100 shots in 60 seconds (by Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department ordinance), and the interval between each operation is 600 m.
sec, and the response speed was not an issue in the prior art. At the moment when a pachinko ball is hit with a mallet, there is a difference in flying force between when the force of the mallet is applied when the ball is stationary and when the force is applied when the pachinko ball is vibrating, and when the ball is repeatedly operated. However, in the conventional device, there was a problem that the player could not aim the landing point of the pachinko balls because the flying distances were different.

Furthermore, since all of the above conventional technologies use coils, it is necessary to flow a large amount of current, even if only momentarily.
When converting to AC24V, a 300VA to 600VA transformer was used. Therefore, there were problems in that equipment costs and electricity costs became high, and the external dimensions of the launcher became large.

(Means for Solving the Problems) The present invention aims to solve the above problems, and includes a laminated electrostrictive actuator constructed by laminating a predetermined number of piezoelectric elements, which is arranged and fixed at the base of the launch rail. The present invention is characterized in that one pachinko ball is supplied to the laminated electrostrictive actuator, an electric field is applied to the electrostrictive actuator to generate distortion, and the distortion causes the balls to be fired.

(Example) Hereinafter, a detailed explanation will be given based on the illustrated example. FIG. 1 shows a first embodiment. Reference numeral 1 denotes a stacked electrostrictive actuator in which n piezoelectric elements 1a are stacked, and is fixed to the base of the launch rail 3 of the pachinko ball 2. 4 is a hammer fixed to the piezoelectric element 1a at the tip; 5 is a power supply applied to the electrostrictive actuator 1;
Reference numeral 6 denotes an electronic control circuit device that controls the number of balls fired and the flight distance.

In the laminated electrostrictive actuator, the amount of mechanical displacement is small with one piezoelectric element, so by stacking n piezoelectric elements, the force for generating the amount of mechanical displacement can be increased by n times as shown in FIG.

In this case, although the amount of displacement is small, the generated force is large and the response speed is fast. As an example, when a 2 x 3 x 9 mm stacked electrostrictive actuator made of stacked piezoelectric elements 1a is driven at a drive voltage of 150 V, a power consumption displacement of 7.5 (μm), a maximum stress of 20 kg, and a response speed of 5 m sec are obtained.

Therefore, a pachinko ball 2 is placed at the upper end of the laminated electrostrictive actuator 1 in which a predetermined number of piezoelectric elements 1a are laminated.
By applying a predetermined electric field, pachinko balls can be thrown a predetermined distance. As shown in FIG. 2, the flight distance of the ball can be adjusted by adjusting the applied electric field.

FIG. 3 shows a second embodiment, in which a rocking body 1 swings on a spring fulcrum 11 by a laminated electrostrictive actuator 10.
By pressing the upper protrusion 13 of 2, the hammer 14 on the upper part of the swinging body 12 knocks down the pachinko balls 16 on the rail 15. Reference numeral 17 represents a power source, and reference numeral 18 represents an electronic control circuit device that controls the number of shot balls and flight distance.

(Effects) According to the present invention, a laminated electrostrictive actuator constituted by laminating a predetermined number of piezoelectric elements is arranged and fixed at the base of a firing rail, and one pachinko ball is supplied to the laminated electrostrictive actuator, An electric field is applied to the strain actuator to generate strain, and the strain causes the ball to be fired, so the response speed of the mallet is 5m.
sec, which is extremely fast compared to conventional devices, so the moment the mallet hits the ball, it is the same as a stationary state, and the ball does not fly unevenly, allowing the player to aim for the falling point of the ball.

Further, the laminated electrostrictive actuator is small and stationary, so there is no fear of wear, and there is no change in flight force due to mechanical wear due to aging, making it possible to obtain flight stability.

In addition, power consumption can be reduced to a few tenths of that of conventional solenoid machines, the back side of the pachinko machine has a simple structure, the depth of the machine body can be made thinner, and the entire machine can be made more compact. Can be done.

Furthermore, since the laminated electrostrictive actuator can be incorporated into the base of the launch rail and the rail and launch device can be integrated, there is no need for the troublesome work of adjusting the positions of the rail and launch device as in the past.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is a cutaway front view of the main parts of the entire pachinko machine according to the first embodiment of the present invention, Fig. 2 is a diagram showing the displacement and force of the laminated electrostrictive actuator of Fig. 1, and Fig. 3 is the invention of the present invention. FIG. 2 is a front view of a second embodiment of the invention. 1,10...Laminated electrostrictive actuator, 2,
16... Pachinko ball, 3, 15... Rail, 4,
14... Hammer, 5, 17... Power supply, 6, 18
...Electronic control circuit device.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A laminated electrostrictive actuator constructed by laminating a predetermined number of piezoelectric elements is arranged and fixed at the base of the firing rail, one pachinko ball is supplied to the laminated electrostrictive actuator, and an electric field is applied to the electrostrictive actuator. An automatic pachinko ball firing device using a laminated electrostrictive actuator that generates strain and fires balls by the strain.