Metal Flattening Machine Automatic Distance Adjustment Mechanism

Technical Field

The invention relates to the innovation made in metal flattening machines used in the metal processing industry, which flatten the metal parts to be processed by removing deformities.

In particular, the invention relates to an automatic distance adjustment mechanism that prevents sharp edges, corners and edges from getting stuck and crushed during the first contact with the machine when metal workpieces whose flat form is damaged due to falling, crushing, melting etc. are passed through the metal flattening machine to bring them into flat form, and protects the thickness and body integrity of the metal workpiece.

State of the Art

In metal flattening machines, irregularly shaped metal workpieces entering the machine via the product feeding belt conveyor pass through metal rollers where the curved form is transformed into a flat form by applying pressure from the bottom and top. When metal workpieces have geometric shapes such as square, rectangle, circle, etc., they undergo acceptable deformation within the tolerance values when entering the machine, depending on the thickness and strength of the piece. When the product has a different geometric shape, such as the letters U, V, Z, one or more thin corners/edges and pointed ends are formed. For this reason, since the strength is low, especially in the pointed parts, these parts may be crushed and damaged while the workpiece is caught simultaneously from the bottom and top in contact with the first row of rollers. The body thickness of the workpiece and the thickness of its end edges change and the body integrity is disrupted, making the parts unusable.

Although some changes have been tried to be made in state of the art to eliminate these disadvantages, the desired success has not been achieved. Even though the contact speed with the first rollers was reduced by reducing the entry speed of the metal workpieces, the result did not change because there was similar amounts of deformation. Another method was applied by reducing the size of the rollers at the entrance of the machine and gradually increasing the diameter dimensions of the rollers towards the interior of the machine, but the desired result was not achieved. Depending on the height of the workpieces, the interspaces of the lower and upper rollers are determined by the operator. For example, the operator defines to the machine that a workpiece with a height of 10 mm will enter the band, and the upper and lower gaps of the roller are adjusted manually. Here, it is not possible to adjust the distances of the rollers independently or to define them automatically by the system.

As a result, due to the negativities described above and the inadequacy of existing solutions on the subject, it has become necessary to work on the automatic distance adjustment mechanism in metal flattenning machines.

The Aim of the Invention

The invention is inspired by current situations and aims to solve the above-mentioned drawbacks.

The main aim of the invention is to provide an automatic distance adjustment mechanism in which the upper rollers, which are automatically positioned depending on the height of the workpiece entering the machine over the belt, remain in the open position without pressure until the entire workpiece enters the roller line, the distance between the rollers being automatically changed to ensure that the curved workpieces of different geometric shapes entering the metal flattening machine are flattened in a way that preserves the integrity of the body and does not cause them to become unusable such as crushing, breaking or thinning,

Another aim of the invention is that said automatic distance adjustment mechanism comprises at least one inductive sensor that detects the first contact with the workpiece and the cease of contact. Said sensor may consist of using one or more sensors with different working principles such as infrared, ultrasonic, laserometer, microwave radar, photoelectric, etc., which are capable of reading the movement of the mechanism roller. Another aim of the invention is to provide movement of the entire and/or part of the roller line, by means of the automatic distance adjustment mechanism that can be applied to different roller types, which may vary depending on the machine type. The movement defined here may be such that the entire upper roller group rises and does not put pressure on the workpiece until the whole enters the roller line, or one or more rollers in the first rows of the upper roller group in the entry direction of the line rise and move independently and do not put pressure on the workpiece.

Another aim of the invention is to obtain an automatic distance adjustment mechanism for the movement of the roller group by using the algorithm of calculating the time that the workpiece will contact the roller line and the time that it will all enter the roller line by processing the workpiece contact data received from the inductive sensor and proportioning it to the operating speed of the line.

Another aim of the invention is that said automatic distance adjustment mechanism comprises a cylindrical rotating roller that moves upwards during contact and is detected by the sensor, and when the workpiece enters the machine, it ceases contact with the workpiece and returns to its previous position, in order to identify the metal workpieces.

Another aim of the invention is to comprise at least one pressure spring, preferably positioned at both ends of the roll, which allows it to come to its closed position by applying pressure to said roll.

Another aim of the invention is to ensure that the automatic adjustment mechanism can work automatically at variable line speeds and variable part heights by automatically calculating the variables depending on the speed of the line.

The structural and characteristic features and all the advantages of the invention will be understood more clearly thanks to the detailed explanation based on the figures and explanations given below, and therefore the evaluation should be made by taking these figures and detailed explanation into consideration. Figures to Help Understand the Invention

Figure 1 shows a perspective overview of the adjustment mechanism that is the subject of the invention.

Figure 2 shows a detailed view of the adjustment mechanism that is the subject of the invention with element numbers.

Figure 3 shows a cross-sectional view of the metal flattening line to which the adjustment mechanism of the invention is connected.

Figure 4 shows the closed, passive state of the roll on the adjustment mechanism that is the subject of the invention.

Figure 5 shows the active, open state of the roll on the adjustment mechanism that is the subject of the invention.

Description of Part References

A. Adjustment mechanism

1 . Conveyor

2. Upper roller

2.1 Lower roller

3. Inductive sensor

3.1 Sensor nut

3.2 Sensor plate

4. Compression spring

4.1 Spring plate

4.2 Spring shaft

4.3 Spring ring

4.4 Spring bolt

4.5 Spring connection plate

5. Roll

5.1 Roll shaft

5.2 Bearing 5.3 Roll plate

5.4 Roll nut

5.5 Roll ring

6. Roll connection plate

7. Body mounting plate

The drawing are not necessarily scaled and the details that are not essential to understand the present invention may have been omitted. Apart from this, elements that are at least substantially identical or have at least substantially identical functions are shown with the same reference numbers.

Detailed Description of the Invention

The present invention relates to the adjustment mechanism (A) that meets the above- mentioned requirements, eliminates all disadvantages and provides some additional advantages.

In this detailed description, the preferred embodiments of the adjustment mechanism (A) that are the subject of the invention are explained only for a better understanding of the subject.

Figure 1 shows a perspective general view of the adjustment mechanism (A) that is the subject of the invention. Said adjustment mechanism (A) works by being fixed to the roll connection body (6). The roll connection body (6) is positioned at the entrance of the metal flattening machine, at the end point of the transport conveyor (1), and is fixed to the machine with the help of the body mounting plate (7).

Figure 2 shows the detailed view of the adjustment mechanism (A) that is the subject of the invention. In the figure are seen the roll (5), which has a cylindrical rotating structure, moving upwards by gaining rotational motion without applying pressure to the metal part, with the contact of the work pieces coming from the conveyor (1), the bearing (5.2) positioned at both ends that provides the rotating ability to said roll (5) and the roll ring (5.5) for fixing the bearing, at least two roll plates (5.3) used to fix the roll (5) and compression spring (4) at both ends, the roll shaft (5.1) that passes through the roll (5) and supports the rotation movement, and the roll nut (5.4) which fixes the roll shaft (5.1) to the roll plate (5.3) by being fitted into the grooves at the ends of said roll shaft (5.1). The compression spring (4) that performs the downward movement of the roll (5) when it is in passive position, the spring shaft (4.2) that supports said pressure spring (4), the spring plate (4.1), which is used to fix the inclined end part of the pressure spring (4) by placing it in the channel on the roll plate (5.3) and fixing it when its location is determined, the spring ring (4.3) and the spring bolt (4.4) used to fix said spring plate (4.1), and the spring connection plate (4.5) used to fix the spring shaft (4.2) and therefore the spring (4) to the body mounting plate (7) are shown. The roll plate (5.3), which moves up and down with the movement of the roll (5), is fixed to the body mounting plate (7) with the sensor plate (3.2) and the sensor nut to detect when it approaches the inductive sensor (3).

Figure 3 shows a cross-sectional view of the metal flattening line to which the adjustment mechanism of the invention is connected. Conveyor (1) allowing the entrance of the metal workpieces into the metal flattening machine, upper roller (2) and lower roller (2.1) group, which are used to obtain flattened parts by correcting curved forms by applying pressure to metal workpieces, and the position of the body mounting plate (7) on the machine, where the adjustment mechanism (A) is fixed to the machine, are shown.

Figure 4 shows the closed, passive state of the roll on the adjustment mechanism (A) that is the subject of the invention. While the adjustment mechanism (A) is passive, the roll (5) is pressed downwards by the spring (4), showing the remote position of the roll plate (5.3) at a distance that the inductive sensor (3) cannot read.

Figure 5 shows the active, open state of the roll on the adjustment mechanism (A) that is the subject of the invention. While the adjustment mechanism (A) is active, the roll (5) is lifted by the metal workpiece of any thickness passing through the conveyor (1) by pushing it upwards, and the roll plate (5.3) is shown close to the distance where it can be read and activated by the inductive sensor (3).

Working Principle

In the metal flattening machine, the workpiece enters the machine through the product feeding conveyor (1) fixed on the chassis, after the user loads the workpiece. The upper roller (2) group moves linearly up and down, according to the metric thickness value specified before the workpiece entering the metal flattening product inlet. The corner/edge parts of the workpiece containing pointed ends reach the adjustment mechanism (A) located between the conveyor (1) and the lower roller (2.1) group at the entrance of the machine. The workpiece first contacts the roll (5) and provides upward movement with the rotation of the roll (5) which is in passive position. Said roll (5) makes its rotation movement through a roll shaft (5.1) positioned inside and at least two bearings to which they are connected. When said roll (5) lifts up and becomes active, it also activates the roll plate (5.3) to which it is attached. The inductive sensor (3), fixed adjacent to the roll plate (5.3), magnetically detects the presence of the roll plate (5.3) approaching it and gives the command to the machine that it is active. With the command “active”, depending on the line speed of the machine, how long it will take for the workpiece to reach the lower roller (2.1) and upper rollers (2) is calculated in linear motion, and thus the upper roller (2) is moved upwards so that it does not hit the ends of the workpiece. When the workpiece contact with the roll (5) ends, it is pushed downwards to its former passive position by the compression spring (4), which is connected to the roll plate (5.3) and applies pressure, and the inductive sensor (3) leaves the reading area and gives the command “passive” to the machine that the product passage is over. Metal workpiece that does not encounter any resistance as there is no contact at the entrance to the upper rollers (2) applies equal pressure to the entire body of the workpiece when the upper rollers (2) move downwards in accordance with the position data calculated when it enters the machine by calculating the speed of the line and the passive command of the inductive sensor (3) depending on the same algorithm. In this way, the sharp edges are prevented from being crushed, broken, and the corners and edges are abraded, and the parts are made ready for use by flattening.