JPH08236251A - Terminal crimping method and device - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) Abstract: In a terminal crimping device, a sufficient crimping strength is obtained while maintaining a high speed of terminal crimping, and further suitable for downsizing, and a crimp height can be easily adjusted. And A method of crimping a terminal to an exposed conductor of an electric wire by a crimper (14) that can be raised and lowered and an anvil (17) facing the crimper, which is used to reduce the rotation of a servomotor (4) and to rotate the disk. 7 is rotated to convert the rotation of the disk into a linear movement, and the linear movement causes the ram 11 having the crimper mounted thereon to move up and down. The crankshaft provided on the disk 7 that constitutes the piston-crank mechanism rotates in the range of 0 to 180 ° by the drive of the servomotor.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an improvement in a terminal crimping method and apparatus for producing an electric wire with a terminal which constitutes a wire harness or the like.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As a terminal crimping device of this type, a device using a flywheel as shown in FIG. 9 has been used for many years. In this device, a flywheel 101 is rotated at a constant speed in an arrow direction by driving a motor (not shown), and a crank rod 103 pivotally attached to an eccentric pin 102 is used as a support shaft 10.
Swing about 4 as a fulcrum. The crank rod 103 is connected to the ram 107 by the pin shaft 106 via the connecting rod 105.
Is swung in the vertical direction, and the crimper 108 integrated therewith is moved up and down. This gives the crimper 108 and the anvil 1
09 and the barrel c of the terminal C on the exposed conductor w of the end of the electric wire W.
Is crimped and crimped.

In the flywheel type caulking mechanism described above,
Since the crimper 108 moves up and down at a high speed, it is suitable for mass production. However, since the crimper 108 instantaneously passes through the bottom dead center (bottom dead center passage type), the crimping may be performed in an instant, and the tensile strength of the terminal crimp may not be sufficient.
FIG. 11 shows the relationship between the time and the crimper position, and the contact time t ₀ for crimping the crimper 108 and the terminal C is only a moment. In addition, the press depth (crimp height) is determined by the size of the flywheel 101, the running cost of the motor is high, and it is difficult to detect an abnormality during crimping.

Therefore, in Japanese Utility Model Publication No. 6-25911, as shown in FIG. 10, a ram 107 'and a crimper 10 are used.
It has been proposed that the ball screw 110 is rotated to move the 8'up and down. 111 is a servo motor, 1
Reference numeral 12 is a main vehicle, 113 is a driven vehicle, and 114 is a timing belt.

[0005]

However, in the above-mentioned ball screw method, a large load is apt to be obtained at the time of crimping, the size tends to be large, the productivity is not improved due to the slow operation, and the lead of the ball screw is required to be speeded up. If it is large, there is a problem that the size is further increased. Further, in crimp height adjustment during terminal crimping, since the bottom dead center of the crimper is uniquely determined in the flywheel type, it is necessary to adjust the height of the terminal crimping machine itself, and also in the ball screw method. Fine adjustment is difficult because of the screw structure.

The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned problems, and a terminal crimping method and apparatus which can obtain sufficient crimping strength while maintaining high-speed terminal crimping and which is suitable for downsizing are provided. To provide. Another object of the present invention is to provide a terminal crimping method and device that can easily adjust the crimp height.

[0007]

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the terminal crimping method of the present invention, as set forth in claim 1, uses a crimper which can be raised and lowered and an anvil facing the crimper, and In the method of crimping a terminal to an exposed conductor, when the crimper is moved up and down, the rotation of a servomotor is decelerated to rotate a disk, the rotation of the disk is converted into a linear movement, and the crimper is mounted by the linear movement. Characterized by raising and lowering the ram. The crankshaft provided on the disk for converting the rotation of the disk into the linear movement is rotated in the range of 0 to 180 ° by the rotation of the servomotor as described in claim 2. (Claim 2). According to a third aspect of the invention, the lowest position of the crimper is regulated by the rotation angle of the disc or the crankshaft, and the crimp height of the terminal is adjusted by the rotation angle. The rotation angle of the disc or the crankshaft that regulates the lowest position of the crimper is 150 to 180 ° C.
Is preferred (claim 4).

An apparatus for carrying out the above method is a terminal crimping apparatus for an electric wire, comprising a vertically movable crimper for crimping a terminal to an exposed conductor of the electric wire, and an anvil facing the crimper. The crimper elevating means comprises a piston-crank mechanism for elevating and lowering a ram equipped with the crimper, and a servomotor connected to a disk of the piston-crank mechanism via a speed reducer. . The crank shaft provided on the disc of the piston-crank mechanism is driven by the servo motor to drive the crankshaft to zero.
Rotate in the range of 180 ° (claim 6).

According to the present invention, the crimper can be moved up and down at a high speed through the piston-crank mechanism by driving the servomotor that rotates in the forward and reverse directions. Therefore, the terminal crimping can be performed at a high speed and high productivity can be obtained. be able to. Also,
Unlike the conventional flywheel type and ball screw type, it is easy to miniaturize, and the crimp height is adjusted by the rotation angle of the disk or crankshaft, which determines the lowest position of the crimper. This can be easily done by changing the corners. Further, it is possible to temporarily stop the servo motor at the terminal crimping position, which prevents springback of the terminal barrel, has a high crimping strength, and can provide a high quality product. Further, by controlling the descending speed of the crimper when the terminals are actually crimped, it is possible to eliminate the impact noise as in the conventional case.

[0010]

1 and 2, reference numeral 1 denotes a casing of a terminal crimping device A according to the present invention, which comprises a substrate 2 and side plates 3 and 3 on both sides thereof. A servo motor 4 having a speed reducer 5 is fixed to the upper rear part. A disk 7 having an eccentric pin (crank shaft) 8 is mounted on the output shaft 6 of the speed reducer 5, and a ram 11 is attached by a pin shaft 10 to a lower end of a crank rod 9 whose upper end is pivotally attached to the eccentric pin 8. The ram 11 is pivotally mounted, and is vertically slidably mounted on ram guides 12, 12 provided on the inner surfaces of both side plates 3, 3, and the disc 7, the crank rod 9, the ram 11, and the ram guide 12 are piston-mounted. It constitutes the crank mechanism B.

The ram 11 has an engaging recess 13 at the lower end,
An engaging convex portion 16 of a crimper holder 15 to which a crimper 14 is attached is detachably attached to the engaging concave portion 13, and an anvil 17 is directly below the crimper 14 and faces the engaging convex portion 16.
It is fixed to. A guide plate 18 for the crimper holder 15 is fixed to the inner surface of the side plate 3 via a bracket (not shown).

The servomotor 4 rotates in the forward and reverse directions to lower and raise the ram 11, that is, the crimper 14, which is pivotally attached to the crank rod 9 by the piston crank mechanism B, and controls the drive of the motor 4. Driver 34
It is connected to the. The reference data input device 22 is connected to the driver 34, and the reference data such as the terminal standard (or size), the corresponding electric wire size, the crimp height (the lowest descent position of the crimper), and the load (current) applied to the servo motor is displayed. It is designed to be entered. The rotary encoder 3 is attached to the output shaft (not shown) of the servo motor 4.
3 is attached, and the crimper 14
34 that detects the position of the
Feedback to. A height sensor 32 detects the height of the crimper 14 at the time of crimping the terminal and inputs it to the driver 34 to determine whether the crimping of the terminal is good or bad. Reference numeral 31 is a temperature sensor that measures the temperature of the coil of the servomotor 4.

FIG. 3 is a functional block diagram of the driver 34 for driving the servomotor 4. As shown in the figure, the driver 34 is incorporated as a control circuit such as a central processing unit, and includes a data storage unit 23 and a speed control unit 2.
4, current control unit 25, determination unit 26, amplification unit 27, current value detection unit 28, interface (I / O) 29 (29-1)
29-8) and a microprocessor (M
PU) 30. Before explaining the operation of the embodiment, the operation principle of the embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS. 6 and 7.

6 (A) to 6 (C) are explanatory views of the operation of the terminal crimping device, FIG. 7 (A) is a graph showing the relationship between the crimper time and the ascending / descending speed, and FIG. 6 (B) is also the time and motor. It is a graph which shows the relationship of an electric current value. In addition, in FIG.
Correspond to FIGS. 6A, 6B, and 6C, respectively.
FIG. 6A shows a state where the crimping process is started, the eccentric pin 8 of the disk 7 is at the uppermost position, that is, the crimper 14 is at the top dead center, and at this time, as shown in FIG. The descending speed is 0 and the load current of the servomotor 4 is 0. Figure 6
(B) shows a state in which the disk 7 rotates in the direction of the arrow, the eccentric pin 8 moves downward, and the crimper 14 descends at a high speed to contact the barrel c of the terminal C, that is, the caulking start position. . Before the contact, the descending speed of the crimper 14 is reduced and the load current is also reduced. In FIG. 6 (C), the disc 7 rotates in the direction of the arrow, the eccentric pin 8 moves to the vicinity of the bottom dead center, and the crimper 14 and the anvil 17 substantially perform the caulking, and after the caulking, The temporary stop state which the crimper 14 stopped at the crimping position is shown. At this time, since the crimper 14 is stopped (stop time t), the speed is 0, but the crimper 1
No. 4 is in a state where the barrel c of the terminal C is pressed and sandwiched and continues to press against the spring back of the terminal barrel c, so that the load current reaches the maximum value and shows a hill shape. The barrel c is pressed and pinched by this suspension.
The spring back of is prevented and a strong crimping strength is obtained. After crimping the terminals, reverse the servo motor 4 and
In (C), the disc 7 is rotated in the direction opposite to the arrow. The crimper 14 rises and returns to the state of (A).

In FIG. 7, at the caulking start position,
Since the descending speed of the crimper 14 is made sufficiently smaller than the speed from the uppermost position of the crimper 14 to the contact with the barrel of the terminal to the caulking start position, the impact noise unlike the conventional flywheel type does not occur. It also helps prevent noise and improve the working environment.

Therefore, referring back to FIG. 3, before operating the terminal crimping device A, the I data is input from the reference data input device 22.
The data for operating the device A, the data for determining the quality of the terminal crimping, and the like are stored in advance in the data storage unit 23 via / O29-7. That is, the data for operating the terminal crimping device A is as shown in FIG.
As shown in, the acceleration after the motor starts to rotate in the positive direction, the position of the crimper 14 when the motor rotates and the crimper 14 descends, and the rotation becomes uniform speed,
The position and deceleration of the crimper 14 which is decelerated from the constant speed rotation by, the position of the crimper 14 when the crimping is started by, the drive current for driving the motor for a fixed time t and a fixed time, and the reverse rotation after the completion of the crimping The acceleration of the motor when the motor is moved up, the position of the crimper 14 when the speed is made constant, the position when the deceleration is started, and the stop position are stored. The position of the crimper 14 is the rotary encoder 33 attached to the servomotor 4.
It is stored as a value corresponding to the output value of.

These data are obtained in advance by experiments or the like for each terminal to be crimped, and the obtained data are stored.
The data corresponding to a plurality of terminals may be stored and the corresponding data may be read during operation.
The position of the crimper 14 is the output value of the rotary encoder,
That is, since the disk 7 is stored with a value corresponding to the rotation angle of the disk 7, it is not necessary to change the height of the anvil 17 as in the conventional case even if the terminal to be crimped is changed, and it is possible to deal with it immediately. It is easy to adjust the crimper position at the start of crimping.

The data for determining the quality of the terminal crimping will be described in detail later, but for example, FIG.
The current values I _U and I _L as shown in (B) are stored. That is, in FIG. 7 (B), I is a standard value when a certain terminal and wire size are normally crimped, I _U and I _L are upper and lower limits thereof, and upper limit I _U and lower limit I _L are tested in advance. You can go and decide. If I is between I _U and I _C , it means normal crimping. The upper limit value I _U and the lower limit value I _C are determined by conducting a test in advance.

Next, the operation of the driver 34 will be described with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5 are operation flowcharts of the driver. In step S1, the speed control unit 24 determines whether or not a signal for starting the terminal crimping operation has been input via the I / O 29-8, and if the determination is NO, waits until YES.

In step S2, the speed control unit 24 reads the acceleration for rotating the servomotor 4 in the positive direction from the data storage unit 23 and sets the I / O 29 so that the read speed is reached.
The signal is output to the amplification unit 27 via -1, and the amplification unit 27 amplifies the power to supply a current to the servo motor 4.

The rotational acceleration of the motor is obtained by reading the output value of the rotary encoder 33 through the I / O 29-3, differentiating the read value to obtain the speed, and further differentiating the speed to obtain the acceleration. There is. In step S3, the speed control unit 24 determines whether or not the output value of the rotary encoder 33 input via the I / O 29-3 has reached the constant speed rotation position stored in the data storage unit 23, If the determination is NO, the acceleration in step S2 is continued, and if the determination is YES, the process proceeds to step S4 to perform constant speed rotation.

When the decelerated rotation position is detected in step S5, the speed controller 24 decelerates the rotation of the motor in step S6, and when the terminal is in the crimped position in step S7, the current control is performed. Notify the section 25.

In step S8, the current control section 25 reads the current value I, which is stored in the data storage section 23 and is supplied to the servo motor 4 at the time of crimping the terminals, and then proceeds to step S9 to execute the I / O 29-4. Correction is performed according to the temperature value input from the temperature sensor 31 so that the torque of the servo motor 4 becomes a specified value, and the process proceeds to step S10 and I /
Output via O29-1.

In step S11, the judgment section 26 records the judgment data in a memory (not shown). The data for the determination will be described in detail later. Step S
12, the current control unit 25 supplies the current I to the servo motor 4.
Is supplied for t time, and if the determination is NO, the process proceeds to step S10 and the steps S10 and S11 are continued.

In step S13, the speed controller 24
The step motor 4 is accelerated to rotate in the opposite direction to the specified acceleration, and when it is determined in step S14 that the constant speed rotation value is reached, the process proceeds to step S15 to rotate in the constant speed direction and decelerates in step S16. When it is determined that the rotational position is reached, the process proceeds to step S17 to perform deceleration rotation, and when the rotational position is reached at step S18, the rotation is stopped.

In step S19, the determination unit 26 determines whether or not the caulking is normal based on the data recorded in step S11. Then, the process proceeds to step S20 to display the result on the crimping monitor 21 and, in the case of a defect, Raise an alarm if necessary.

The determination as to whether or not the caulking is normal is made in FIG.
As shown in (A), in the recording of the data in step S11, the current value (driving value) flowing through the servo motor detected by the current value detecting unit 28 is recorded at constant time intervals. FIG.
7A shows the drive current supplied to the motor at the time of crimping shown in FIG. 7B. The current control unit 25 is controlled to supply the constant current stored in the data storage unit 23 to the motor. A constant current is supplied when the motor is stopped, but when the motor rotates due to caulking, the control balance is lost and the drive current changes. When crimping a wire without crimping or stripping the wire when crimping a terminal, the supply current may be higher or the total supply current may be smaller than when a normal wire is crimped. . Therefore, in the present invention, the determination as to whether it is normal or not is made based on the change in the supplied current.

FIG. 8B shows the height sensor 3 when the terminals are crimped.
2 shows the output, of course, when the core wire of the wire is not crimped or the wire without peeling is crimped, the clamp height becomes low, and a different height value from the normal time is output. . Therefore, in the present invention, the determination as to whether it is normal is made based on the change in the height value.

As shown in FIG. 8 (A), the first method of judgment is to extract the maximum value of the drive current values recorded in step S11 from the recorded values within the set time, and to extract the maximum value. It is determined whether the maximum value is within the range of the values stored in the data storage unit 23. If the maximum value is out of the range, it is determined to be defective, and within the range, it is determined to be normal. In the second method, the reference value within the set time is recorded in the data storage unit 23, the difference between the time series data value recorded in step S11 and the reference value is obtained, and the obtained difference is set. If it is within the range, it is determined to be normal, and if it is out of the range, it is determined to be defective.

In the third method, the total of the data recorded in the constant time in step S11 within the set time is obtained, and when the total value is within the set range, it is normal, and when it is out of the range, it is defective. To determine. In the fourth method, as shown in FIG.
As shown in (B), the height sensor 32 in which the data recording in step S11 is input via the I / O 29-5.
The output value is recorded, the minimum value is extracted from the recorded data, and when the extracted minimum value is within the set range, it is determined to be normal, and when it is outside the range, it is determined to be defective.

In the fifth method, the recorded output value of the height sensor is compared with the reference value in time series within the set time, and when the difference is within the set range, the normal value and the range are set. When outside, it is determined to be defective. Alternatively, the determination may be made using both the drive current value and the height value.

As is clear from the above embodiment, the crankshaft (eccentric pin 8) is rotated in the range of 0 to 180 °, and the crimp height (the lower limit position of the crimper 14) is adjusted by the angle. The adjustment of the angle can be arbitrarily controlled by specifying the rotation speed of the servo motor 4 by the driver 34. Further, the quality of crimping, that is, the quality of the product can be determined while crimping by monitoring the load (load current I) applied to the servomotor 4 or by monitoring the height of the crimper 14. Furthermore, by providing the temporary stop time t during crimping, springback of the terminal barrel can be eliminated, crimping quality can be improved and stabilized, and a highly reliable product can be obtained.

Although the above description has been given of the example in which the servomotor 4 for vertically moving the crimper 14 is used for reverse rotation, the hydraulic servo may be used.

[0034]

As described above, according to the present invention,
The crimper can be moved up and down at a high speed through the piston-crank mechanism by driving the servomotor that rotates in the forward and reverse directions. Therefore, terminal crimping can be performed at a high speed and high productivity can be obtained. Also, unlike the conventional flywheel type and ball screw type, it is easy to miniaturize, and the crimp height can be easily adjusted by changing the rotation speed of the servomotor, that is, by changing the rotation angle of the disc or the crankshaft. it can. In addition, it is possible to temporarily stop the servo motor at the terminal crimping position, which prevents springback of the terminal barrel and has a high crimping strength.
High quality products can be obtained. Further, by controlling the descending speed of the crimper when the terminals are actually crimped, it is possible to eliminate the impact noise as in the conventional case.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a front view of a terminal crimping device showing an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a side view of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a functional block diagram showing a control system of the terminal crimping device of FIG.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing the operation of FIG.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the operation of FIG.

6 (A) to 6 (C) are operation explanatory views of the terminal crimping device of FIG. 1.

7A is a graph showing the relationship between the crimper time and the ascending / descending speed in the terminal crimping process of FIG. 3, and FIG. 7B is a graph similarly showing the relationship between the time and the motor current value.

FIG. 8A is a diagram illustrating a determination based on a motor starting current, and FIG. 8B is a diagram illustrating a determination based on a crimper height.

FIG. 9 is an explanatory diagram of a conventional terminal crimping device.

FIG. 10 is an explanatory view of another conventional terminal crimping device.

FIG. 11 is a typical example of a graph showing the relationship between the crimping position and the time when the terminal is crimped by the conventional terminal crimping device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 A Wire terminal crimping device B Piston-crank mechanism 4 Servo motor 5 Reducer 7 Disc 8 Eccentric pin (crank shaft) 9 Crank rod 11 Ram 14 Crimper 17 Anvil 23 Data storage 24 Speed controller 25 Current controller 26 Judgment Part 28 current value detection part 30 microprocessor 32 height sensor 33 rotary encoder

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A method of crimping a terminal to an exposed conductor of an electric wire by a crimper that can be raised and lowered and an anvil that faces the crimper, in which the rotation of a servomotor is reduced to rotate a disc. The terminal crimping method is characterized in that the rotation of the disk is converted into a linear movement, and the ram having the crimper mounted thereon is moved up and down by the linear movement. 2. A crankshaft provided on the disk for converting the rotation of the disk into a linear movement is rotated in the range of 0 to 180 ° by the rotation of the servo motor. The terminal crimping method according to claim 1. 3. The lowermost position of the crimper is regulated by the rotation angle of the disc or the crankshaft, and the crimp height of the terminal is adjusted by the rotation angle. The terminal crimping method described. 4. The terminal crimping method according to claim 3, wherein the rotation angle of the disc or the crankshaft that regulates the lowermost position of the crimper is 150 to 180 ° C. 5. A terminal crimping device for an electric wire, comprising an ascendable and descendable crimper for crimping a terminal to an exposed conductor of an electric wire, and an anvil facing the crimper, wherein the crimper elevating means moves a ram to which the crimper is mounted. Ascending / descending piston-crank mechanism and the piston-
An electric wire terminal crimping device comprising a servomotor connected to a disk of a crank mechanism via a speed reducer. 6. A crankshaft provided on a disk of the piston-crank mechanism is driven by the servomotor to drive the crankshaft to zero.
4. Rotating in the range of 180 degrees.
Terminal crimping device according to.