Elscint recently manufactured a machine for feeding, laser marking and vision Inspection for a plastic component called Seal. It was a small plastic part with a single leg below and a arrow on the top. The arrow had to be oriented in one particular way, which was a major challenge. Secondly, the requirement was for 240 parts per minute, which too was very high. Hence, Elscint proposed 2 vibratory bowl feeders with two outlets each, feeding at a speed of 60 parts per minute per row (60 x 4 = 240). Two bowl feeders, one clockwise and one anti-clockwise were used for this purpose. The seals were then taken onto a single linear vibrator with 4 tracks to transfer them to an indexing table. A pneumatic singulator and pusher was kept at the end of the linear tracks to ensure that the arrows do not collide against each other. The singulated single seal was then transferred onto the 6 station indexing table.

The first station was used for feeding of the seals an laser marking equipment was mounted on the second station for laser marking. After laser marking, a vision camera was mounted on the third station for checking whether the marking was proper. The forth station was blank. At the fifth station, any wrongly laser marked seal was removed by an air jet. At the sixth station, all the remaining seals were removed by air jet.

Elscint used a Siemens PLC and HMI for this application. The complete equipment was mounted on a stand made of aluminium extrusions. The bowl feeders were mounted on a separate aluminium extrusion stand to ensure that the vibrations do not interfere with the laser marking. The indexing area was totally covered with polycarbonate sheets to prevent dust and for safety. The control panel too was housed on a separate stand.

The equipment was delivered by air freight to the customers place in Romania. You can watch the video of this bowl feeder for feeding of the plastic bush.