EP2101926B1 - Coating system and method for the series coating of workpieces - Google Patents

Description

The invention relates to a coating system and a portal construction for serial coating of workpieces such as in particular vehicle bodies according to the preamble of claim 1 and a corresponding method.

In contrast to stationary standing paint robots, which are typically used in practice for relatively small workpieces, paint robots in vehicle body coating systems are usually linearly parallel to the conveyor path of the bodies movable on mounted on the side walls of the spray booth guide rails (driving axis or "axis 7") , In most of today's plants, the bodies are conveyed through the booth during painting in synchrony with the linear motion of the robots, but they can also stand still.

While the guide rails were in the vicinity of the cabin floor or next to the bodies, especially in most of the earlier systems ( US 4,342,536 . US 4,721,630 . EP 0 084 523 . EP 0 192 338 . EP 0 216 482 . EP 1 277 521 etc.), the arrangement of the robot guide rails above the conveyor and in particular above the bodies may be more convenient for various reasons, especially because the robot arranged elevated have a correspondingly improved freedom of movement and arranged on the cabin floor robot because of the necessary Lackierabstands of the body and electrostatic Lackierung because of the necessary high-voltage insulation distance require much wider cabins. Also, the Painting vertical surfaces such as in particular the bow and tail areas of the bodies facilitated. Other reasons are that the elevated guide rails there less affect the view through the side wall of the cabin and the accessibility to the bodies and / or less polluted by O-spray, which is dissipated by the usual air flow in the cabs down. Furthermore, increased-mounted robots may have the advantage of less disturbing the airflow flowing down from the cabin ceiling along the body sides into the cabin floor than the robots located on the floor adjacent to the body, which narrow the airway directly to the body, causing undesirable elevation can lead to the flow velocity.

At out WO 2004/037430 and EP 1 609 532 known painting systems for vehicle bodies are each a plurality of painting robots on two parallel guide rails, which in turn arranged on a arranged in the interior of the cabin frame with four similar to the known portal robot designs ( European standard EN ISO 8373, 1996 D, page 7 "Gantry robot "; DE 4111889 ; etc.) are connected by transverse struts interconnected legs. An advantage of these gantry stands is that they can be easily installed in existing paint booths, without the need for significant new or modifications of the cabin are necessary.

Out WO 01/68267 Furthermore, a painting zone is known in a painting cabin for vehicle bodies with air supply through the upper ceiling wall and two on the side walls vertically stacked accessible control areas, which are arranged above the conveyor arranged robotic guide rails in modular prefabricated side wall panels of the cabin. The support structures of the guide rails are contrary to the frame after WO 2004/037430 or EP 1 609 532 separated in the cabin interior, thus avoiding their cross struts in the cabin interior. At the bottom of this known paint booth, which is formed as usual by a grid construction for dissipating the vertical air flow, additional guide rails for other robots are mounted below the raised guide rails next to the lower control area, where it is at the robots of the lower level to painting robot and the top robots are door or hood openers. Further coating zones with guide rails for painting and / or handling robots arranged above the bodies are disclosed in the patent application EP 06010550.9 described.

Paint booths for vehicle bodies with robot guide rails mounted vertically on top of one another on the cabin walls and with a plurality of painting zones arranged one behind the other along the transport path of the conveyor are out of order EP 0745429 known.

Furthermore, it is off US 5 014 644 known to provide several non-movably mounted robot for painting various surface areas of vehicle bodies.

An object of the invention is to provide a coating system for vehicle bodies and a corresponding method, which require less construction, investment, tax and operating costs than before.

This object is solved by the features of the claims.

The invention is based on the recognition that by dispensing with the mobility of the robots (ie the "gantry robot") arranged on the portal construction, extremely narrow spray booths can be realized or used. For the painting of car bodies, for example, the cabin width can be reduced to about 4 to 4.5 m.

The robots can typically be coating robots, in particular painting robots, to which reference will be made below. But it may also be robots for other purposes, in particular handling robots such as door and / or hood manipulators, which may possibly also be placed next to a coating robot. Accordingly, the tool may in particular be atomizers for the coating material or an opener tool for the doors or hoods of vehicle bodies.

In the case under consideration of painting robots, the cabin width required transversely to the conveying path of the bodies is reduced by the fact that fixed painting robots are not mounted with their basic body on the cabin floor, but on the portal construction, ie much higher and preferably above the body roofs, so that the top mentioned problems in terms of sufficient Lackierabstand the atomizer from the body surfaces and high voltage insulation can be reduced. The elevated arranged painting robots have a much better workspace than in a known manner next to or below the bodies arranged stand robot. In addition, however, an even narrower cabin is made possible by the fact that the relatively wide guide rails of the known gantry robots and the necessary for the mobility wide energy chains with movable control and supply lines omitted.

Narrow spray booths, in turn, have significant advantages not only in terms of construction and investment costs, which depend on the size and space requirements of the cabin, but also in terms of operating costs, which are required by the known reasons in the cabin to a substantial extent Air flow is determined. In addition to the correct flow rate, the cabin air must meet strict quality conditions with regard to purity, temperature and humidity, and the required outlay depends on the required air volume. This effort is reduced by the invention, since the air flow per unit time is smaller in a narrower cabin than in a wider cabin.

By dispensing with the movability of the robot according to the invention, the associated construction costs and, moreover, the control effort of known painting installations required for the linear movements of the robots are avoided.

On the other hand, the invention has the principal advantage that portal structures with robots can be easily installed or installed in already existing or with minimal construction costs and in particular without massive load-bearing walls spray booths.

In a preferred embodiment, the supports and side members of the gantry structure are arranged on the outside of the paint booth, so that the robots are only with their own body within the cabin and the inside of the cabin at the relevant point around the body is free of other components (so-called clean wall design). This arrangement has the additional advantage that the cables and hoses leading to the robot can be completely outside the paint booth. The installation of the supports, side members, wiring and tubing and the control pulse is usually easier outside the paint booth and especially advantageous if the portal construction according to the invention for an existing cabin should be installed and possibly replace their existing machine technology.

The illustrated advantages of the invention are all the more important as a typical vehicle body coating line according to the present invention includes not only one but multiple paint zones with respective spray booths that are separate from one another and in which the bodies are each painted by robots.

Fig. 1

den Querschnitt einer Lackierkabine mit stationär auf einer Portalkonstruktion montierten Lackierrobotern; und

Fig. 2

eine Draufsicht auf die Roboteranordnung in zwei aufeinanderfolgenden Lackierkabinen gemäß Fig. 1.

The invention is explained in greater detail by way of example in the drawing, which is partially simplified but substantially to scale. Show it:

Fig. 1

the cross section of a spray booth with stationary mounted on a portal construction painting robots; and

Fig. 2

a plan view of the robot assembly in two successive Lackierkabinen according to Fig. 1 ,

In the in Fig. 1 Spray booth 1 shown, the paint application is carried out on vehicle bodies 2 under the required climatic conditions. The spray mist produced during painting is picked up by the air flowing vertically through the cabin and led to leaching. The air supply to the cabin is provided by a supply air system. The fresh air sucked in from outside with fans is filtered, heated and moistened in several stages, introduced uniformly into the cabin via a pressure chamber through a filter cover with a defined air sink rate and discharged through the grid floor 3. Such paint booths, transported by the bodies of a bottom conveyor 4 are known to those skilled in the art (see, for example DE 20313854 U1 ).

The coating of the bodies 2 is carried out by arranged on the two side walls 5 and 5 'of the car 1, for example, four or more painting robots, of which in Fig. 1 the painting robots 6 and 7 are visible. These painting robots can likewise be of a known type, ie in each case have a basic body 8 which carries the usual multi-axis arm construction of an articulated robot with the illustrated two arms and the atomizer 9 mounted on a wrist, usually an electrostatic rotary atomizer or air atomizer. The main body 8 of the robot can be arranged according to the representation approximately at the height of the roof of the conveyed through the paint booths 2.

The side walls 5 and 5 'of the car 1 can od of relatively thin material with glass windows. Like. Exist and are not even intended or able to hold the high-level painting robots 6 and 7 and wear. For holding the painting robot rather a specially provided portal construction is present, which consists essentially of a standing near the four corners on legs horizontal rectangular frame. As legs, the two serve in Fig. 1 visible vertical supports 11 on the outer sides of the side walls 5 and 5 'and two of them in the conveying direction of the bodies 2 spaced further (not visible) supports. The frame of the portal construction consists of two in the illustrated example in the side walls 5 and 5 'built or preferably mounted on the outside of the side wall side rails 12 which extend in the conveying direction of the bodies 2 and each rest on two spaced apart in the conveying direction supports 11, and two the two longitudinal members 12 preferably at their ends and in the vicinity of the supports 11 firmly interconnecting transverse struts 13, of which in Fig. 1 only one is visible. The cross struts are provided in the illustrated example with obliquely down to the longitudinal members 12 leading end portions and extend above the bodies 2 transverse to the conveying direction through the car 1 from one side wall 5 to the other side wall 5 '. Possibly. Deviating from this particular embodiment, the portal construction can in principle from itself WO 2004/037430 . EP 1 603 532 and EN ISO 8373. In contrast to this prior art, however, the longitudinal members 12 have no guide rails for moving the painting robots 6 and 7, which, according to the invention, are fixed rigidly to the respective longitudinal member 12 with their basic body 8. As a result of this stationary robot arrangement, the invention makes it possible to realize a cabin with a width between the insides of the side walls, which not only can be considerably lower than with stationary arrangement of the robots on the cabin floor next to the bodies, but also lower than those with the usual Verfahrschienen providing known portal constructions. For the painting of the different bodies of typical passenger vehicles, for example, a cabin width of 4.6 m measured between the insides of the vertical side walls 5 and 5 'is sufficient. The length of the cabin 1 measured in the conveying direction can be, for example, approximately 7 m.

As shown (see also Fig. 2 ) can be on the outside of the side walls 5 and 5 'expediently between the longitudinal direction of the conveying direction spaced supports 11 the usual switching and control cabinets 14 for the robot controller and for the application technology, etc. are.

Above the supports 11 and longitudinal members 12, the cabin can be provided on its outer side with additional usable areas, which can also be walked on to observe the painting operation. Furthermore, in Fig. 1 the range curves (working space or "working room kidney") of the painting robots 6 and 7 to illustrate their respective freedom of movement.

The invention is not limited to those in Fig. 1 illustrated - but preferred - portal construction between the two side walls 5 and 5 'limited. For example, it would also be conceivable to arrange only one longitudinal carrier in a raised position in the two side walls of the spray booth and to stabilize it outside the cabin by supporting elements extending transversely to the conveying direction. Such possibilities are, inter alia, in the aforementioned patent application EP 06010550.9 described. Further, less or more than the illustrated two stationary robots may be provided on a cabin side.

Fig. 2 shows two in a painting line in the conveying direction 20 successively arranged spray booths 1 and 1 'according to Fig. 1 , Each of these spray booths 1 and 1 'forms one of the various painting zones, into which a painting line is usually divided, and each contains a portal construction, as described above, ie with the two side rails 12 and 12' and the two transverse struts 13 and 13 '. The side members 12 and 12 'can be shown extending over the entire length of the car 1 and 1' between their respective front ends, where the cabins usually by thin, mechanically non-viable, eg transparent end walls ("silhouettes") except for openings can be closed for the bodies. The two spray booths 1 and 1 'and thus the two portal constructions can be closely adjacent along the conveying direction; As shown, the distance may be, for example, about 1 m or less.

The painting robots 6 and 7 or 6 'and 7' of the spray booths 1 and 1 'are distributed along the conveying direction 20 to appropriate positions between the two transverse struts 13 and 13', wherein each of these four robots a car each have a different surface area of the bodies coated as the other three robots. The arrangement of the two painting robots 6 and 6 'on one side and the other two painting robots 7 and 7' on the other side of the spray booth is chosen in accordance with the respective painting concept of the system so that in the cabin preferably the entire outer surface of the Bodies are easiest and can be painted with as little mutual obstruction of the robot and, above all, in a very short time. For these reasons, it may also be expedient that the painting robots such as 7 on the longitudinal member 12 of a side wall of the spray booth other distances from each other and / or from the cross struts 13 than the painting robot 6 on the longitudinal member 12 of the other side wall. In particular, according to the illustration, two painting robots lying opposite each other on opposite sides of the car can be offset from each other along the conveying direction 20, ie have different distances from the transverse struts 13. As in Fig. 1 can be seen, for example, one of the robots can be used specifically for painting the bow or tail area of the bodies.

When the bodies in the conveying direction 20 of the conveyor 4 ( Fig. 1 ) are transported through the spray booths 1 and 1 '; is first applied in the spray booth 1 on the body a first coat of paint. Since this one layer is not sufficient in typical cases, then in the spray booth 1 ', a second lacquer layer is applied, wherein the Painting robots for the same movements as in the first cabin can be programmed and controlled and therefore can be distributed in the same arrangement along the conveying direction. Thus, robots corresponding to one another in terms of their position in the spray booths 1 and 1 'then paint the same surface areas of the bodies.

The application of the two layers in two separate spray booths 1 and 1 'has u. a. the advantage that in the event of a fault in one of the two painting zones, the automatic painting operation can continue in the respective other zone and the then missing other paint coat can be applied in another way.

In other cases, the arrangement of a second spray booth 1 'following the first booth 1 separated from it by the respective end walls may have the purpose of isolating two coating zones having different air buds from each other, such as a zone for electrostatic application with rotary atomizers from a zone Air purifiers in which different Lufttsinkgeschwindigkeiten are required. It may also be expedient in such or other systems, instead of the example described above, if the robots in one cabin paint other surface areas of the bodies than the robots of the other cabin and / or be arranged at other positions along the conveyor track.

It can also be provided two (or more) parallel operated Lackierlinien, in the example considered topcoat (topcoat) lines. In this case, for example, spatially parallel next to the in Fig. 2 shown spray booths 1 and 1 'two with them with respect to the features described here matching further paint booths (not shown) be present, so that doubling the inventive savings in installation and operating costs.

Claims (13)

1. A coating plant for the series coating of workpieces (2) such as, in particular, vehicle bodies, having a or determined for a spray booth (1) through which a conveyor (4) transports the workpieces (2) on a conveying path parallel to the side walls (5, 5') of the spray booth (1);
   the plant having a gantry structure that
   includes at least two vertical supports (11) which, spaced apart from each other lengthwise of the conveying path, adjoin one of the two side walls (5, 5') of the spray booth (1) or are incorporated therein, and a longitudinal beam (12) which interconnects said supports (11) parallel to the conveying path, likewise adjoins the side wall (5, 5') or is incorporated therein, said longitudinal beam being arranged at a height extending beyond the upper face of the workpieces (2) in the spray booth (1) or at least to the proximity of the upper face thereof,
   and the gantry structure further including at least one cross support member (13) arranged across the conveying path and fixedly connected to the longitudinal beam (12);
   and the plant having at least one robot (6, 7), which has a base body (8) mounted on the gantry structure and has a multi-axis arm arrangement supported by the base body, and also a tool (9),
   characterised in that the base body (8) of the robot (6, 7) is rigidly secured to the longitudinal beam (12) of the gantry structure.
2. The coating plant according to claim 1, characterised in that the at least one cross support member (13) of the gantry structure extends above the upper face of the workpieces (2) between the two side walls (5, 5') of the spray booth.
3. The coating plant according to claim 1 or 2, characterised in that the gantry structure adjoins each of the two side walls (5, 5') of the booth (1) with two vertical supports (11) and one longitudinal beam (12) or is at least in part incorporated in the two side walls.
4. The coating plant according to claim 3, characterised in that at least one robot (6, 7) is secured in a stationary manner to each of the longitudinal beams (12) provided on the two booth sides.
5. The coating plant according to one of the preceding claims, characterised in that at least two robots (6, 7) are each rigidly secured by their base body (8) to the or to each longitudinal beam (12) of the gantry structure.
6. The coating plant according to claim 5, characterised in that, lengthwise of the conveying path of the workpieces (2), the base bodies (8) of the two robots (6, 7), which bodies are secured to the longitudinal beam (12), are spaced apart from each other and spaced apart from the cross support member (13) closest thereto.
7. The coating plant according to claim 6, characterised in that the robots (6) on the longitudinal beam (12) of the one side wall (5) of the spray booth (1) are spaced apart from each other and/or spaced apart from the cross support members (13) by distances different from the coating robots (7) on the longitudinal beam (12) of the other side wall (5').
8. The coating plant according to one of the preceding claims, characterised in that the vertical supports (11) and/or the longitudinal beams (12) are arranged on the outer face of the side wall (5, 5') of the spray booth (1).
9. The coating plant according to one of the preceding claims, characterised in that the conveying path of the workpieces passes through at least two spray booths (1, 1') which are adjacent in the conveying direction and each of which includes a gantry structure having at least one robot (6, 7; 6', 7') rigidly secured to the longitudinal beam (12) thereof.
10. The coating plant according to one of the preceding claims, characterised in that the workpieces are transported on at least two mutually parallel conveying paths through one spray booth or two spray booths which are adjacent in the conveying direction, and each of these mutually parallel spray booths includes a gantry structure having at least one robot rigidly secured to the longitudinal beam thereof.
11. A method for the series coating of workpieces (2) such as, in particular, vehicle bodies, in a spray booth (1), through which the workpieces are transported by a conveyor (4) on a conveying path parallel to the side walls (5, 5') of the spray booth (1),
    a gantry structure being provided that,
    on one or both sides of the spray booth (1), includes at least two vertical supports (11) which, spaced apart from each other lengthwise of the conveying path, adjoin the side wall (5, 5') of the spray booth or are incorporated therein,
    includes a longitudinal beam (12) which interconnects said supports (11) parallel to the conveying path, likewise adjoins the side wall (5, 5') or is incorporated therein, and is arranged at a height extending beyond the upper face of the workpieces (2) or at least to the proximity of the upper face thereof,
    and further includes at least one cross support member (13) arranged across the conveying path and fixedly connected to the longitudinal beam (12),
    characterised in that the workpieces (2) are coated by at least two coating robots (6, 7), the base body (8) of each of which is rigidly secured to a longitudinal beam (12) of the gantry structure,
    with each coating robot (6, 7) coating different surface regions of the workpieces (2) from the other robot or the other robots.
12. The method according to claim 12, characterised in that the workpieces (2) are each coated by at least two coating robots (6, 7) rigidly secured on the two booth sides to respective longitudinal beams (12) of the gantry structure, with each of these four coating robots coating a different surface region of the workpieces (2) from the other coating robots.
13. The method according to claim 12 or 13, characterised in that, in the spray booth (1), a first layer and then, in a similar second spray booth (1') likewise including a gantry structure having coating robots (6', 7') secured in a stationary manner to the longitudinal beams (12), a second layer is applied to the surface of the workpieces (2).

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