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US 12,110,189 B2Granted
Article transport facility
AssigneeDaifuku Co., Ltd.
InventorsWataru Kiyokawa, Daisuke Katagiri
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A transfer operation control unit changes, according to an operating state index indicating a level of an operating state of a plurality of transport vehicles (1) present on a travel path, a setting of a transfer operation such that a required transfer time (Tr) from start to completion of the transfer operation is increased as the level of the operating state is reduced, while maintaining at least one setting of a traveling speed of the transport vehicles (1).
Claims7
An article transport facility, comprising:
- a plurality of transport vehicles configured to travel along a predetermined travel path and each comprising a first transferrer configured to transfer a target article;
- transfer stations installed at a plurality of locations adjacent to the travel path;
- a second transferrer included in on each of the plurality of transfer stations and configured to transfer the target article to and from each of the first transferrers;
- and
- a transfer operation control unit configured to control a transfer operation when transferring the target article between each of the first transferrers and each of the second transferrers,
- wherein the transfer operation control unit changes, according to an operating state index indicating a level of an operating state of the plurality of transport vehicles present on the travel path, a setting of the transfer operation such that a required transfer time from start to completion of the transfer operation is increased as the level of the operating state is reduced, while maintaining at least one setting of a traveling speed of the transport vehicles,
- wherein the operating state index is an index determined based on an operation rate of the plurality of transport vehicles present on the travel path such that the level of the operating state indicated by the operating state index is reduced as the operation rate is reduced.
4 more elements
An article transport facility, comprising:
- a plurality of transport vehicles configured to travel along a predetermined travel path and each comprising a first transferrer configured to transfer a target article;
- transfer stations installed at a plurality of locations adjacent to the travel path;
- a second transferrer included in on each of the plurality of transfer stations and configured to transfer the target article to and from each of the first transferrers;
- and
- a transfer operation control unit configured to control a transfer operation when transferring the target article between each of the first transferrers and each of the second transferrers,
- wherein the transfer operation control unit changes, according to an operating state index indicating a level of an operating state of the plurality of transport vehicles present on the travel path, a setting of the transfer operation such that a required transfer time from start to completion of the transfer operation is increased as the level of the operating state is reduced, while maintaining at least one setting of a traveling speed of the transport vehicles,
- wherein one or more or all of the plurality of transfer stations are each provided with an article count detector configured to detect the number of target articles held by the transfer station, and
- wherein the operating state index is an index determined based on the number of target articles detected by each of the article count detectors such that the level of the operating state indicated by the operating state index is reduced as said number is reduced.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.