WO2018104078A1 - Wiring harness fabrication and apparatus for wiring harness fabrication - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to a method and to an apparatus (1) for monitored wiring harness fabrication of a wiring harness (100), comprising a plurality of defined components (101), cables, and/or leads (102) to be connected to one another, comprising a cable forming board (10), at least one image acquisition system (20) that can be moved by several degrees of freedom above the cable forming board (10) and tracking a working process, a control system (30) for controlling and detecting the movement of the image acquisition system (20) during the assembly of the wiring harness (100), wherein at least the assembly and the assembled or plugged in-state of at least one mounting pair comprising at least one component (101) and/or a cable (102) is monitored and, depending on the acquired data, a condition report (Z) is output, depending on whether the assembly was correct or faulty.

Description

 Harness manufacturing and equipment for harness manufacturing

Description:

The invention relates to a device for evaluating a cable harness during or after the harness manufacturing and a device for monitorable harness production.

Due to increasingly complex work steps in harness manufacturing, the demands on quality assurance, especially for manual assembly and manual production steps, are increasing. Wiring harnesses are always - -

More complex and their quality inspection requires additional steps to determine whether the elements of the wiring harness are in the correct mounting position and especially in the case of high-pin connectors, the wires are correctly mounted correctly in position, orientation and contacting.

A common approach, by which in particular safety-critical and quality-relevant work is supported, is that monitoring personnel monitor the assembly process of a person or worker individually. Furthermore, test tables and test benches are used to check the various assembly processes for correctness and function. All of these measures are complex, expensive and prone to error. In some cases, there is a great deal of reworking work, on the one hand to detect the errors and, on the other hand, to remedy the errors.

Depending on the application or complex assembly procedure, there is often the problem, especially in the case of exclusively manual assembly, of ensuring that all planned assembly steps have actually been carried out.

With regard to the relative positioning of mounting parts, the use of, for example, radio-based localization systems is appropriate. The 3D position in the detection room or in the room spanned by the transmitters is tracked via radio measurement systems.

In environments with a high metallic content, such. As the engineering or vehicle construction, this method is relatively inaccurate and unsatisfactory due to disturbing reflections. Furthermore, this solution can not be transferred to harness manufacturing, in which many wires must be plugged not only in their absolute position, but also in the correct contact chamber. Interchanging wires of a wire harness is not detectable with such a method.

It has also been attempted to locate camera-based workpieces mounted on cameras mounted in the workspace. However, such systems have the disadvantage that, depending on the current situation, including the camera - -

perspective, the use of the tool, the environmental conditions and / or the posture of the employee who is currently performing the assembly, the tool or workpiece is partially or completely obscured. Thus, it is practically inevitable that use only for each installation step, which follows a typically fixed movement pattern, a camera surveillance.

From DE 10054095 A1 a method for data acquisition in manual operations in production processes is known, in which again only fixed positions of components of a workstation with respect to a given coordinate system are entered into a data processing system. One or more involved in the operation tools and / or at least one executing body part of a person performing the operation are provided with one or more elements of a position measuring device. The positions of the elements are recorded continuously or at short intervals during the working process. From the detected positions of the elements, the movement of the tools and / or the body part relative to the components of the workstation in the data processing system is calculated and recorded. The method is cost effective in improving quality assurance and providing data for capacity planning at manual or hybrid workstations.

As a result, the foregoing systems are not transferable to use cases for manufacturing a complex wiring harness. When manufacturing a cable harness, in addition to a multiplicity of states and positions, further factors must be assessed which can only be detected at the test station. Intermediate positions during assembly are locally out of focus in the work space, as each person moves the cable to be mounted and its wires during assembly differently and also the order of assembly of z. B. several lines and their cores can be performed differently, but each with a correct identical result. Thus, the imaging detection systems currently known in the art are not suitable for harness fabrication.

The invention is therefore based on the object to overcome the aforementioned disadvantages and an improved, universally applicable solution of a monitored cable - -

Baumfertigung and a device for harness manufacturing comprehensive to suggest a quality monitoring.

This object is achieved by the combination of features according to claim 1 and 8. A first aspect of the present invention is to provide a device for non-conductive monitoring of a harness condition during or after wire harness fabrication of a wiring harness, i. H. to evaluate a wiring harness consisting of a plurality of defined, interconnected or connected components, cables and / or lines, wherein the device comprises a cable form board and at least one movable by several degrees of freedom and possibly a work process trackable imaging system, which is formed to detect at least one spatial position detection of the components and / or lines and their course, and a controller for controlling the movement of the image acquisition system on the one hand and the evaluation of spatial position data, history data of the lines and features of the components and / or lines of the Image detection system be detected, wherein at least the assembly and / or the assembled or mated state regarding the position data and / or the characteristics of a plurality of mounting pairs monitored and / or evaluated and depending on the data collected a certain condition Depending on whether the installation is correct or faulty.

In a further advantageous embodiment it is provided that the image acquisition system is equipped so that both absolute and relative position data of the components and / or lines can be detected to each other.

It is also advantageous if the image acquisition system is further equipped such that colors and / or color characteristics of the individual lines are detected directly by the image acquisition system.

In a further advantageous embodiment of the invention, it is provided that the image acquisition system represents a 2D and / or 3D acquisition system, which - -

can detect spatial position data of the components and / or lines in a mounting plane and / or in space, wherein the image acquisition system preferably comprises a camera and / or a laser scanner system.

Another idea in the use of the invention is that not (only) the mounting sequence and not (only) to monitor the absolute positions of the components or capture, but with a spatially movable camera or an image acquisition system a defined mounting space dynamically to detect an assembly time interval, this assembly space are each assigned to be mounted assemblies. Thus, not absolute mounting positions of z. B. a cable and a connector to be connected thereto monitored, but defines permissible mounting areas in the mounting space, which monitors each of the mitbewegbaren in space camera. According to the invention, one or more compact cameras are provided above a cable molding board for this purpose, which are divided into correspondingly large monitoring zones depending on the number of components to be mounted together and their permissible relative positional tolerances on the cable molding board. However, it can also be provided that only individual areas of the harness to be manufactured are monitored on the cable form board and therefore only individual monitoring zones according to the proposed solution.

A further idea of the present invention is to dynamically track the image acquisition systems, whereby if the zone to be monitored is lost (for example by covering with one hand when mounting), the camera is tracked dynamically until, as it were, a clear view of the area to be detected is restored.

Another idea of the present invention is to monitor quality-relevant installation conditions and their occurrence during the assembly process by selecting the relative mounting position of a first component of a cable harness to a defined permissible mounting position and mounting position of a component to be connected to this component within a monitoring zone. - -

rend and after assembly is detected and the recorded data is continuously or discretely compared with each stored in a memory setpoint correlation data. The setpoint correlation data defines a set of data representative of defined target mounting parts (eg (3-pole cable, red, green, yellow, 10-pin socket, contact chamber 1, 2, 4) and their intended correlation to each other (eg B. red - 1, green - 2, yellow - 4).

Consequently, this means z. Example, in an exemplary assembly step, in which such a three-core cable with 3 wires in z. B. the wire colors red, green and yellow, which in three defined contact chambers z. B. 1, 2 and 4 of a 10-pin socket are inserted, neither the absolute mounting position nor the mounting sequence are detected, but the set of setpoint correlation data. It is first detected by the image capture device, if the correct mounting parts are present in the monitored assembly zone, then during assembly,. whether the wires are plugged with the appropriate colors in the correct contact chambers of the 10-pin socket and whether after installation of the assembled state of assembly coincides with the target mounting state and the mounted connection is within the surveillance zone.

Accordingly, a fitter changes the assembly order and assembles z. If, for example, the vein in the color "yellow" is first introduced into the contact chamber 4, then the image acquisition device would be tracked dynamically in the space (eg on a free robot arm) by means of dynamic tracking, and the correct correlation between contact chamber Nos. 4 and If the two other cores are correctly mounted, regardless of the order of assembly, a different assembly sequence would have been carried out, but the result to be produced, ie the correlation of the components and subcomponents (subcomponents) with each other, would be compensated by the Setpoint correlation data is rated as correct.

A first aspect of the present invention accordingly relates to an apparatus for supervised harness fabrication of a wiring harness comprising a plurality of defined components to be interconnected (and sub-elements thereof), cables and / or wires comprising a cable form board and at least one above the cable form board movable to a plurality of degrees of freedom and - -

beitsprozess trackable image acquisition system, a controller for controlling and detecting the movement of the image acquisition system during assembly of the wiring harness, wherein at least the assembly and the assembled or mated state of at least one manually mounted pair of mounting consisting of at least one component (including its sub-elements, such as contacts, contact chambers, etc.) and / or a cable, and in response to the acquired data, a condition avoidance "Z" is output depending on whether the assembly was correct or faulty.

In an advantageous embodiment of the invention it is provided that a monitoring device is further provided, which includes data processing to compare each recorded within an assembly period data with each stored for the respective assembly partner correlation data and depose depending on a condition avoidance display and / or issue.

Particularly advantageous is the use of a freely movable robotics system, in particular on a robot arm of such a system to which the image acquisition system (s) are respectively mounted. It is further preferred if the image acquisition system can detect colors and color separations of the lines, cores and components and these are used in the evaluation in order to monitor the correct assembly states.

In a further advantageous embodiment of the invention, it is provided that the cable form board is divided into corresponding monitoring zones depending on the respective harness to be mounted and the monitoring zones respectively allowable mounting conditions in the form of correlation data of the components arranged therein and their sub-elements for the pre-assembly, at least one intermediate mounting state and the final assembly state.

It is also advantageous if the correlation data in each case comprises a set of stored data, which includes all permissible permutations of permissible intermediate mounting states, all of which have a desired setpoint value. - -

Final assembly state match. In this way it can already be recognized during assembly, regardless of the specific order, whether or not an intermediate assembly step can lead to a desired final result. If, in fact, a stranded wire is mounted in the wrong contact chamber in a high-pole connector, this could already be clearly detected in this state with the method according to the invention before the final assembly state is established. The same applies to the mating of not specific connectors of connectors.

It is also advantageous if a detection of the contact distance of a connector to be mounted, in particular a miniaturized connector and high-poled connectors with a small contact distance by means of the image capture system takes place and the resolution and / or the image section of the image acquisition system via a distance control function of the respective contact distance he follows. This also allows mounting conditions to be recorded with very small assembly distances during a manual assembly step.

In a likewise advantageous embodiment of the invention, it is provided that, in addition, a gripping and manipulation tool is provided in order to carry out at least partial steps in the assembly of the cable harness, wherein the gripping and manipulation tool is systemically integrated in the device such that it receives dynamic commands, obtained from the data captured by the imaging system. In this way, the gripping and manipulation tools work "hand in hand" with a person and the image capture system, so to speak.

Preferably, a display or output device is further provided, preferably provided with a display to permanently display the mounting state and its current assessment from the target-actual data comparison as faulty or correct. So z. B. the captured images of the mounting state are displayed on the displays, and the individual colored strands of a stranded conductor and their correct assignment in the contact chambers of a connector with a - -

green LED, while an erroneous assignment by means of a red LED provides a simple way state information.

A further aspect of the present invention relates to a method for the monitored assembly of a cable harness, in particular in a series production of several pieces of identical cable harnesses, in which at least one assembly process to be monitored is performed manually by a person, comprising the steps of: a. Detecting a surveillance zone on a cable forming board by means of a controlled image capture device movable in space in position and orientation; b. Detecting the components and / or sub-components and / or sub-elements within the surveillance zone (s) with the image capture device; c. Detecting relative position values and / or assembly states of the components and sub-components to be connected to each other in temporally successive steps and outputting the detected position values and / or assembly states to a monitoring device; d. Compare the actual data stored in the monitoring device

Setpoint data of mounting conditions to determine if the mounting was correct or faulty.

The method according to the invention can therefore advantageously be carried out using a device as described above.

It is particularly advantageous if the acquired actual state data of the data acquired in each case for the respective assembly partners within an assembly period, which are currently connected or mounted with each other, is stored with stored correlation data. - -

be compared and dependent on a status message about the state of installation is issued.

The method is particularly advantageous if, depending on the particular cable harness to be mounted, the cable-forming board is automatically divided into monitoring zones deposited for this cable harness or harness type, in each of which a manual operation is to be monitored, wherein the respective monitoring zones each have mounting states in the form of correlation data of the therein and components to be assembled and their sub-elements are assigned for each of the pre-assembly state, at least one intermediate mounting state and the final assembly state.

Accordingly, the invention also relates to a manufacturing method for the production and simultaneous monitoring of manufacturing processes in harness manufacturing, in particular in a series production of multiple quantities of the same harnesses, in which at least one to be monitored operation is performed manually.

According to the method according to the invention, those position data of the components to be interconnected (cables, plugs, etc.) are detected and preferably stored or compared directly with defined correlation values in order to immediately obtain state information in the assembly process, so that reworking can be prevented.

The monitoring device preferably comprises a plurality of cameras or image acquisition systems, which are each attached to a robot arm, preferably end such that the respective camera along 5 degrees of freedom (ie along x, y, z axes and two times rotatory about two axes of rotation) above a cable board within a defined range of motion is movable.

Furthermore, a controller may be provided which coordinates the image acquisition systems with one another, so that in each case the image acquisition system is moved, - -

which performs the least number of movements along the defined degrees of freedom to detect a specific work area.

Other advantageous developments of the invention are characterized in the subclaims or are shown in more detail below together with the description of the preferred embodiment of the invention with reference to FIGS.

Show it:

Fig. 1 is a schematic view of a device according to the invention and

2 shows a flow chart of the method according to the invention.

In the following, the invention will be described in more detail with reference to FIGS. 1 and 2 with reference to an exemplary embodiment, wherein the same reference numbers refer to the same functional and / or structural features.

1 shows a schematic view of a device 1 according to the invention for supervised harness production of a wiring harness 100. The schematically illustrated wiring harness 100 is or will be made of a plurality of defined, to be interconnected components 101 (such as connectors, connectors, contacts, etc.) and Cable and / or lines 102 are assembled, on which the components 101 are mounted.

Shown is an exemplary cable molding board 10 and a multi-degree movable and frame tracking system 20 at the end of a robotic arm, a controller 30 for controlling and detecting the movement of the imaging system 20 during assembly of the wiring harness 100 and the components in FIG the surveillance zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ).

With the image acquisition system 20, the assembly as such and the assembled or mated condition of at least one pair of components (eg plug and socket or cable and plug) consisting of at least a first component 101 and / or a cable 102 and a second Component 101 monitors and, depending on the acquired data, a status message Z on the display of the - -

display or output device 70 depending on whether the assembly was correct or faulty. By way of example, for a component pairing X1, Y1, Z1 of components in one of the monitoring zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ), the state value Z = ok is indicated, indicating a correct mounting state.

Furthermore, a monitoring device 40 is shown, which includes data processing in order to compare the data (actual data Kxy) recorded within an assembly period with correlation data K _xy (nominal data Kxy) stored for the respective assembly partner and a status message dependent thereon Z on the display of the display or output device 70 output.

It can also be seen in FIG. 1 that the cable shaping board 10 for the illustrated wiring harness 100 is divided into a plurality of monitoring zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) and the monitoring zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) each have mounting states in the form of desired correlation data Kxy therein arranged components and their sub-elements for the pre-assembly state, at least one intermediate mounting state and the final assembly state are assigned.

FIG. 2 shows a flow chart of the method according to the invention with the steps a to d. In step a), a monitoring zone (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) is detected on the cable forming board 10 by means of the controlled image acquisition device 20 which is movable in position and orientation in space. In step b) the existing components 101, 102 and / or sub are detected Components within the monitoring zone (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) with the image capture device 20. In the following step c), the detection of relative position values and / or state values of the components to be interconnected 101, 102 and their sub-components in time to each other following steps with subsequent outputting of the detected position values and / or relative state values to the monitoring device 40. Thereafter, the step d) is carried out by comparing the acquired actual data with setpoint data stored in the monitoring device 40, each defining a desired state to determine whether the components 101, 102 and their subcomponents in their relative n correlation are correctly mounted to each other. - -

The invention is not limited in its execution to the above-mentioned preferred embodiments. Rather, a number of variants is conceivable, which makes use of the illustrated solution even with fundamentally different types of use.

Claims

claims 1. A device (1) for monitoring a harness state during or after the wiring harness manufacturing of a wiring harness (100), consisting of a plurality of defined, to be interconnected components (101), cables and / or lines (102) comprising a cable forming board (10 ), at least one movable by several degrees of freedom and a work process  trackable imaging system (20) adapted to detect at least one spatial location detection of components and / or lines and their course, and a controller (30) for controlling the movement of the imaging system (20) and the evaluation of spatial position data and features of the components and / or lines detected by the image capture system (20), wherein at least the assembly and / or the assembled or mated state regarding the position data and / or the features of a plurality of mounting pairs consisting of at least one component (101) and / or a cable (102) is monitored and / or evaluated and depending on the data collected a status message (Z) is issued depending on whether the assembly is correct or faulty. 2. Device (1) according to claim 1, characterized in that the image acquisition system (20) is equipped so that both absolute and relative position data of the components and / or lines can be detected to each other. 3. Device (1) according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the image acquisition system (20) is further equipped so that colors and / or color characteristics of the individual lines are detected by the image acquisition system. 4. Device (1) according to one of the preceding claims, characterized shows that the image acquisition system is a 2D and / or SD acquisition system that can detect spatial position data of the components and / or lines in a mounting plane and / or in space. 5. Device (1) according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the image capture system a camera and / or a  Laser scanner system represents. 6. Device (1) according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that there is further provided a monitoring device (40) which comprises data processing in order to compare the data acquired in each case with correlation data (Kxy) stored for the respective assembly partner and thereof Dependent on a status message (Z). 7. Device (1) according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the cable forming board (10) or the wiring harness (100) is divided depending on the respective harness to be mounted (100) in corresponding monitoring zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) and the Monitoring zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) are each assigned position states in the form of correlation data (Kxy) of the components arranged therein and their sub-elements for the preassembled state, at least one intermediate mounting state and the final mounting state. 8. Device (1) according to one of the preceding claims 6 to 8, characterized in that the correlation data (Kxy) each comprise a set of stored data, which includes all allowable permutations of permissible intermediate mounting states, all of which coincide with a desired target final assembly state , 9. Device (1) according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that further comprises a detection of the contact distance of a connector to be mounted, in particular a miniaturized connector with a small contact distance by means of the image acquisition system (20) takes place and the resolution and / or the image section of the image acquisition system (20) via a distance control in dependence on the respective contact distance. 10. Device (1) according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that further comprises a gripping and manipulation tool (60) is provided to undertake at least partial steps of the assembly of the wiring harness (100), wherein the gripping and manipulation tool (60) dynamically Obtains commands obtained from the data acquired by the image acquisition system (20). 11. Device (1) according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that further comprises a display or output device (70) is provided, preferably with a display to permanently the mounting state and its current assessment from the target-actual data comparison as faulty or to represent correctly. 12. A method for assessing a mounting state of a wire harness (100) consisting of lines and components (101, 102), in particular from a series production of several quantities of the same harnesses (100), in which at least one mounting state is judged, comprising the steps: a. Detecting the spatial course of at least one line and at least one component (101, 102) and / or sub-component and / or sub-elements with an image capture device (20), which is formed at least one spatial position detection of the components and / or lines and their To detect course; b. Comparing the acquired actual data with setpoint data stored in the monitoring device (40) from at least one mounting state to determine whether the mounting was correct or erroneous. 13. The method according to claim 12 using a device (1) according to claims 1 to 11. 14. The method according to claim 12 or 13, wherein the detected actual state data of each detected for the respective assembly partners within an assembly period data that are currently connected to each other, with stored correlation data (Kxy) are compared and depending on a state message (Z ) is discontinued over the respective mounting state. 15. The method according to any one of the preceding claims 12-14, wherein depending on the respective harness to be mounted (100) the cable forming board (10) or the wiring harness (100) automatically in for this wiring harness (100) deposited monitoring zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) in each of which a manual operation is to be monitored, wherein the respective monitoring zones (ΔΧ, ΔΥ, ΔΖ) respectively assembly states in the form of correlation data (Kxy) arranged therein and to be mounted components and their sub-elements for each of the pre-assembly state, at least one intermediate mounting state and the final mounting state are assigned.