US3596086A - Automatic conveyor block system - Google Patents

Automatic conveyor block system Download PDF

Info

Publication number
US3596086A
US3596086A US821760A US3596086DA US3596086A US 3596086 A US3596086 A US 3596086A US 821760 A US821760 A US 821760A US 3596086D A US3596086D A US 3596086DA US 3596086 A US3596086 A US 3596086A
Authority
US
United States
Prior art keywords
conveyor
busses
bus
trackway
pair
Prior art date
Legal status (The legal status is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the status listed.)
Expired - Lifetime
Application number
US821760A
Other languages
English (en)
Inventor
Guenther Etter
William G Pestalozzi
Current Assignee (The listed assignees may be inaccurate. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation or warranty as to the accuracy of the list.)
MDT Corp
Raytheon Co
Original Assignee
Sybron Corp
Priority date (The priority date is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the date listed.)
Filing date
Publication date
Application filed by Sybron Corp filed Critical Sybron Corp
Application granted granted Critical
Publication of US3596086A publication Critical patent/US3596086A/en
Assigned to SC ACQUISITION CORP., NO. 1, A NEVADA CORP. reassignment SC ACQUISITION CORP., NO. 1, A NEVADA CORP. ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST. Assignors: SYBRON CORPORATION
Assigned to CASTLE COMPANY reassignment CASTLE COMPANY CHANGE OF NAME (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS). EFFETIVE JULY 28, 1986 Assignors: SC ACQUISITION CORP. NO. 1
Anticipated expiration legal-status Critical
Assigned to SANTA BARBARA RESEARCH CENTER, GOLETA, CA., A CA CORP., MDT CORPORATION, A DE CORP. reassignment SANTA BARBARA RESEARCH CENTER, GOLETA, CA., A CA CORP. ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST. Assignors: CASTLE COMPANY
Expired - Lifetime legal-status Critical Current

Links

Images

Classifications

    • B—PERFORMING OPERATIONS; TRANSPORTING
    • B61—RAILWAYS
    • B61L—GUIDING RAILWAY TRAFFIC; ENSURING THE SAFETY OF RAILWAY TRAFFIC
    • B61L23/00—Control, warning or like safety means along the route or between vehicles or trains
    • B61L23/002—Control or safety means for heart-points and crossings of aerial railways, funicular rack-railway
    • B61L23/005—Automatic control or safety means for points for operator-less railway, e.g. transportation systems
    • B—PERFORMING OPERATIONS; TRANSPORTING
    • B61—RAILWAYS
    • B61L—GUIDING RAILWAY TRAFFIC; ENSURING THE SAFETY OF RAILWAY TRAFFIC
    • B61L3/00—Devices along the route for controlling devices on the vehicle or train, e.g. to release brake or to operate a warning signal
    • B61L3/02—Devices along the route for controlling devices on the vehicle or train, e.g. to release brake or to operate a warning signal at selected places along the route, e.g. intermittent control simultaneous mechanical and electrical control
    • B61L3/14—Devices along the route for controlling devices on the vehicle or train, e.g. to release brake or to operate a warning signal at selected places along the route, e.g. intermittent control simultaneous mechanical and electrical control to cut-off the power supply to traction motors of electrically-propelled vehicles

Definitions

  • a conveyor as it moves along the track supplies a ground signal to the block section which is in the uptrack direction from its present location. Additionally the second block bus in any section is continuously tested for electrical ground and if a ground signal is present, by reason of a conveyor being present in the next downtrack block, the ground signal will operate the conveyor switching means to remove power from the conveyor drive motor.
  • Monorail conveyor systems of this nature have, in recent years found increasing use in hospitals where they are used to convey laundry, meals, supplies etc. from the laundry, kitchen, or supply room to and from the various floors on which patients are located.
  • each conveyor is supplied with a stored address code and this code is recognized at the appropriate destination where a container carried by the conveyor is removed and emptied and then dispatched at a later time.
  • each conveyor which responds to the presence of a signal on one of the two block system busses. Additionally a brush on each conveyor provides a signal to the switching means on the conveyor and prevents it from traveling on the trackway if the signal is present.
  • FIG. l is an electrical schematidrawing of the block system of our invention.
  • FIG. 2 is a schematic illustration of the manner in which the sections may be insulated from one another.
  • FIG. 3 is an illustration similar to FIG. 2 showing an alternative construction which may be used.
  • FIG. 4 is a schematic illustrationsimilar to FIG. 2 showing a modification of the circuit of the block system for stopping the conveyor at a specific location.
  • FIG. I shows, in schematic form, the busses associated with a conveyor together with the electrical apparatus on the conveyor itself used in conjunction with the block system. As shown, four power busses are used to provide three phase power to operate the drive motor on the conveyor. These busses are indicated by the reference characters 10, l2, l4, and 16. As shown in the drawings, the bus 10 is the neutral bus for the three phase system.
  • a pair of block section busses are provided, the upper of these busses being identified by the reference character 18 and the lower by the reference character 20.
  • Brushes 22, 24, 26 and 28 ride on the power busses l0--l6 to supply power to the conveyor.
  • the brush 30 rides on the bus 18 and the brush 32 rides on the bus 20. It will be observed that the bus 18 and the bus 20, the block section busses, are interrupted by insulating sections and that at these insulation sections a connection is made from the bus 20 to the bus 18'as indicated at 34 and 36.
  • the conveyor itself whose illustrated circuitry is enclosed within the dotted line 38 includes a drive motor 40 which is connected through the contacts of a pair of relays 42 and 44 to the busses l2, l4 and 16.
  • the relay 42 is operated the contacts 42a, 42b and 420 are closed to cause the motor to drive in a first direction.
  • the contacts 44a 44b and 440 are closed to cause the motor to drive in a direction opposite to that in which it turns when the relay 42 is operated.
  • Each of the relays 42 and 44 includes a contact 44d and 42d which is in series with the operating circuit for the other relay.
  • a direction control relay 46 is also provided having two contacts, contact 460 being normally closed and 46b being normally open. This is a latching type relay and is operated from the conveyor control system generally indicated at 48 when it is desired to have the transporter reverse direction.
  • the conveyor control system generally indicated at 48 is supplied with energy from the neutral bus 10 and from one of the phase busses, inthis case bus 14.
  • the control system 48 supplies the phase voltage on the lead 50 to operated either the relay 42 or 44 and to cause the drive motor 40 to rotate.
  • the direction control relay 46 to the relay 42 or 44 to energize the drive motor it must pass through the normally closed contact 52a of the relay 52.
  • the coil of the relay 52 is connected at all times to the phase voltage supplied by-the brush 26 from the bus 14.
  • the other side of the coil of the relay 52 is connected to the brush 30 which rides on the bus 18.
  • the brush 32 is connected to the system neutral supplied by the brush 22 from bus 10. It will be apparent, that if relay 52 is operated neither of the relays 42 or 44 can operate since power from the conveyor control system 48 to these relays will be interrupted by the opening of the contact 52a.
  • relay 52 will be operated at any time that the brush 30 picks up a neutral voltage from the bus 18.
  • the brush 32 is applying a neutral voltage to the bus 20 in the block section in the center of FIG. 1 between the transitions between block sections represented by the leads 34 and 36.
  • the brush 32 will apply a neutral potential to the bus 18 of the block section at the left-hand side of the paper, only a portion of whose busses are shown.
  • the brush 32 of that conveyor would be applying a neutral potential to the bus 20 which would be carried by the jumper 36 to the bus 18 in the block section illustrated.
  • This neutral would be picked up by the brush 30, operate the relay 52, which would open the normally closed contact 52a and remove power from the drive motor. Accordingly, the presence of a conveyor in a given block section blocks the next preceding section.
  • the relay 52 is provided on the conveyor to sense the presence of a neutral on the bus 18. Because the bus 18 in each section serves to inhibit motion of the conveyor if a neutral voltage is present on it, it is termed the inhibit bus. Similarly, since the function of the bus 20 is to announce to the up track block section that a conveyor is present in the next down-track section, it is called the announce" bus. As shown, at each transition between block sections, there is an electrical connection between the announce bus of the downtrack block and the inhibit bus 18 of the next uptrack block section.
  • FIG. 2 illustrates a typical construction for the transition between block sections. As shown, the two sections of the bus 18 are separated by an electrical insulator 54 and similarly the two sections of the bus 20 are separated by an electrical insulator 56. An electrically conducting jumper wire 58 is interconnected between the downtrack side of the insulator 56 and the uptrack side of the insulator 54.
  • the brushes 30 and 32 are shown as staggered along the trackway in FIG. I, in practice, they usually engage the two busses at the same location along the track. Also, in practice, the brushes are of substantial length as compared to the length of the insulating sections and generally several separate brushes are used in parallel to provide reliable operation.
  • the inhibit brushes cross the insulator 54 and engage the bus 18 in the next block section before the announce brushes cross the insulator 56 to engage the next announce bus if the insulators are staggered as shown in FIG. 2. If any of the inhibit brushes are engaging the inhibit bus in the uptrack block section when one of the announce brushes is simultaneously engaging the announce bus in the block section being entered, there will be at least momentary operation of the relay 52 and at least temporarily interruption of the drive motor. If the insulators at a transition between block sections were placed at the same location along the track, a conveyor moving at full speed would probably move through the transition between block sections by reason of the inertia associated with it even though the leading edge of the announce brush caused operation of the inhibit relay and interruption of motor power. However, if a conveyor were stopped across such a transition, it would not be possible to start it.
  • a conveyor when stopped on entering a particular block section, prevent entrance only into the next uptrack block of the system. For example, and referring to FIG. 2, if a conveyor crossed the insulated transition provided by the insulator 54 and the brushes 32 associated with that conveyor picked up a signal from the bus 18 in the right-hand block section of FIG. 2, the conveyor would come to a halt. If it came to a halt in the position such that the announce" brushes were across the transition provided by the insulator 56, then the brushes on the right-hand side of the transition 56 would block the next uptrack block section by reason of the neutral supplied through the jumper wire 58 as previously described. However, the neutral carried by these brushes would also be applied to the uptrack announce bus 20 in FIG.
  • an additional insulator 60 is provided in the inhibit bus 18 a short distance downtrack from the insulator 54. This insulator 60 completely insulates a short section 18a of the inhibit bus at the entrance to the block section.
  • the block system of our invention was designed particularly for use with monorail conveyor systems and more particularly for use with monorail conveyor system adapted for automatic operation.
  • the invention is not limited to conveyors of this type but is applicable generally to electrically driven conveyors moving in a single direction along a trackway whether it be a monorail, dualrail or etc.
  • FIG. 4 we have illustrated a modification of the block system of our invention which is arranged to stop a following conveyor at a particular location within a block section when the next downtrack block is occupied. Such an arrangement is useful in a situation where relatively short block sections are used for purposes of "parking" a number of conveyors,
  • the jumper 58 is connected from the bus 20 on the downtrack side of insulator 56 to the bus 18 on the uptrack side of insulator 54 through the normally open contacts of a switch 62.
  • the switch 62 is mechanically operated by engagement with a cam 64 carried by the conveyor and the mechanical location of the switch 62 along the track may be varied. Assume that the downtrack block is occupied so that a neutral potential is applied to the bus 20 on the downtrack side of the insulator 56 in FIG. 4. As a conveyor approaches the transition shown in FIG. 4, the brush 30 of the conveyor which engages the bus 18 will not pick up this neutral potential and cause the relay 52 to operate until the cam 64 operates the switch 62.
  • the relay 52 upon operation of the switch 62, the relay 52 will be immediately operated, removing power from the conveyor drive motor. It will be apparent that by adjusting the location of the switch 62 along the trackway, the location at which the conveyor stops may be precisely determined. Further such location can be selected so that the problem discussed in connection with FIG. 3 will be obviated.
  • a drive and block system for use with electrically driven conveyors operating in one direction along an elongated trackway comprising in combination, a plurality of busses for carrying electrical energy located beside said trackway, a plurality of brushes mounted on said conveyor and adapted to engage said busses, an electric drive motor on said conveyor adapted when energized to drive said conveyor along said trackways, switch means operable to electrically connect said brushes and said drive motor, a second pair of busses mounted beside said trackway, each of said second pair of busses being interrupted by electrical insulators to form separated electrically insulated sections of a length equal to the desired block length, means electrically connecting the downtrack side of each insulated section of said first bus and the uptrack side of each insulated section of said second bus across corresponding sets of insulators, brush ensembles mounted on said conveyor and engaging each of said second pair of busses, the brush ensemble engaging said first bus supplying an electrical signal thereto and the brush ensemble engaging said second bus supplying an electrical signal received therefrom to said motor switching means to thereby control movement of said conveyor each
  • a drive and block system for use with electrically driven conveyors operating in one direction along an elongated trackway comprising in combination, a plurality of busses for carrying electrical energy located beside said trackway, a plurality of brushes mounted on said conveyor and adapted to engage said busses, an electric drive motor on said conveyor adapted when energized to drive said conveyor along said trackway, switch means operable to electrically connect said brushes and said drive motor, a second pair of busses mounted beside said trackway, each of said second pair of busses being interrupted by electrical insulators to form separated electrically insulated sections of a length equal to the desired block length the insulators in said busses at each transition between block section being staggered along said trackway with respect to each other, whereby all the insulators in the first of said busses are positioned farther down the trackway than the corresponding insulators in the second of said busses, means electrically connecting the downtrack side of each insulated section of said first bus and uptrack side of each insulated section of the second bus across the insulators at each transition, brushes
  • a drive and block system for use with electrically driven conveyors operating in one direction along an elongated trackway comprising in combination, a plurality of busses for carrying electrical energy located beside said trackway, a plurality of brushes mounted on said conveyor and adapted to engage said busses, an electric drive motor on said conveyor adapted when energized to drive said conveyor along said trackway, switch means operable to electrically connect said brushes and said drive motor, a second pair of busses mounted beside said trackway, each of said second pair of busses being interrupted by electrical insulators to form separated electrically insulated sections of a length equal to the desired block length, means electrically connecting the downtrack side of each insulated section of said first bus and the uptrack side of each insulated section of said second bus across corresponding sets of insulators, brush ensembles mounted on said conveyor and engaging each of said second pair of busses, the brush ensemble engaging said first bus supplying an electrical signal thereto and the brush ensemble engaging said second bus supplying an electrical signal received therefrom to said motor switching means to thereby control movement of said conveyor means electrically

Landscapes

  • Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
  • Mechanical Engineering (AREA)
  • Transportation (AREA)
  • Health & Medical Sciences (AREA)
  • Heart & Thoracic Surgery (AREA)
  • Control Of Conveyors (AREA)
US821760A 1969-05-05 1969-05-05 Automatic conveyor block system Expired - Lifetime US3596086A (en)

Applications Claiming Priority (1)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
US82176069A 1969-05-05 1969-05-05

Publications (1)

Publication Number Publication Date
US3596086A true US3596086A (en) 1971-07-27

Family

ID=25234242

Family Applications (1)

Application Number Title Priority Date Filing Date
US821760A Expired - Lifetime US3596086A (en) 1969-05-05 1969-05-05 Automatic conveyor block system

Country Status (3)

Country Link
US (1) US3596086A (de)
CH (1) CH512382A (de)
DE (1) DE2021291A1 (de)

Cited By (3)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
EP0023443A1 (de) * 1979-07-23 1981-02-04 FATA S.A. Société anonyme dite Automatische Geschwindigkeitsauswahlvorrichtung für ein selbsttätig bewegliches Fahrzeug
US4688487A (en) * 1986-02-19 1987-08-25 Acco Babcock Inc. Vehicle transportation system
US5149024A (en) * 1989-08-09 1992-09-22 Yamaha Hatsudoki Kabushiki Kaisha Conveyor carriage control system

Families Citing this family (1)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
DE3922007C2 (de) * 1989-06-30 1994-07-21 Mannesmann Ag Schleifleitungsanordnung

Cited By (4)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
EP0023443A1 (de) * 1979-07-23 1981-02-04 FATA S.A. Société anonyme dite Automatische Geschwindigkeitsauswahlvorrichtung für ein selbsttätig bewegliches Fahrzeug
FR2461627A1 (fr) * 1979-07-23 1981-02-06 Fata Sa Dispositif de selection automatique de la vitesse d'un mobile automoteur
US4688487A (en) * 1986-02-19 1987-08-25 Acco Babcock Inc. Vehicle transportation system
US5149024A (en) * 1989-08-09 1992-09-22 Yamaha Hatsudoki Kabushiki Kaisha Conveyor carriage control system

Also Published As

Publication number Publication date
DE2021291A1 (de) 1970-11-19
CH512382A (de) 1971-09-15

Similar Documents

Publication Publication Date Title
US3575594A (en) Automatic train dispatcher
US3646613A (en) Automatic carrying system
US3596086A (en) Automatic conveyor block system
CN110294002B (zh) 轨道车辆和设施及自动管理轨道车辆在线路上行驶的方法
US2902945A (en) Material handling system
US3451350A (en) Automatic conveyor system
US2372130A (en) Conveyer system and control therefor
US2084879A (en) Conveyer block system
US1934377A (en) Conveyer system
US2307712A (en) Central station dispatching control system for conveyers
US2925787A (en) Automatic dispatch
US2833376A (en) Dispatch machine failure circuit
US2057048A (en) Signal control system
US3476889A (en) Control system for automotive car
US1948748A (en) Elevator-dispatching system
US2860728A (en) Elevator controls
US2523112A (en) Control system for switch devices
US3054889A (en) Railway signaling apparatus
US1981601A (en) Elevator control system
US3054890A (en) Railway route control system
US1208060A (en) Electrical transportation system.
US1229807A (en) Automatic electric-railway system.
US2441340A (en) Control for electric track switches
US2681985A (en) Highway crossing signal control system
US1844546A (en) Signal system for elevators and other conveyers

Legal Events

Date Code Title Description
AS Assignment

Owner name: SC ACQUISITION CORP., NO. 1, A NEVADA CORP., STATE

Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNOR:SYBRON CORPORATION;REEL/FRAME:004607/0079

Effective date: 19860711

Owner name: SC ACQUISITION CORP., NO. 1, A NEVADA CORP.

Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST.;ASSIGNOR:SYBRON CORPORATION;REEL/FRAME:004607/0079

Effective date: 19860711

AS Assignment

Owner name: CASTLE COMPANY

Free format text: CHANGE OF NAME;ASSIGNOR:SC ACQUISITION CORP. NO. 1;REEL/FRAME:004741/0707

Effective date: 19860725

AS Assignment

Owner name: SANTA BARBARA RESEARCH CENTER, GOLETA, CA., A CA C

Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST.;ASSIGNOR:CASTLE COMPANY;REEL/FRAME:005036/0117

Effective date: 19890221

Owner name: MDT CORPORATION, A DE CORP.

Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST.;ASSIGNOR:CASTLE COMPANY;REEL/FRAME:005036/0117

Effective date: 19890221