Machine for winding a fibrous material enabling alignment and off-centering control by image analysis

A machine for winding a fiber texture onto an impregnation mandrel, the machine comprising:

• a take-up mandrel for storing and unwinding a fiber texture, the take-up mandrel having a substantially horizontal axis of rotation;
• an impregnation mandrel for receiving superposed layers of the fiber texture unwound from the take-up mandrel, the impregnation mandrel having an axis of rotation that is substantially horizontal and parallel to the axis of rotation of the take-up mandrel;
• a camera mounted in a light box that is adjusted to a profile of said impregnation mandrel and placed as close as possible to said fiber texture for avoiding ambient parasitic lighting, and directed towards the fiber texture and the impregnation mandrel in order to examine passage of warp tracer yarns and weft tracer yarns present in the fiber texture;
• an image-analysis module for initially determining positions of intersections of warp tracer yarns with successive weft tracer yarns and then comparing the determined positions with corresponding theoretical positions for the intersections of reference warp and weft tracer yarns and, for determining an offset value for the fiber texture for each of these intersections;
• electric motors for driving the take-up and impregnation mandrels in rotation about their respective axes of rotation;
• and
• a control unit for controlling the electric motors for driving rotation of the take-up and impregnation mandrels and adjusting one or more parameters of the machine to correct the offset value.