Patent ID: 11951697
Assignee: THE BOEING COMPANY
Field: Handling (Mechanical engineering)
Classification: CPC B  G | IPC B  G

Claim 14:
15. A method for picking up a ply in a material handling process for composite manufacturing, the method comprising the steps of:
providing a scalable area gripper system comprising:
a scalable area gripper having a structural frame and a plurality of variable vacuum zones coupled to the structural frame, each variable vacuum zone comprising:
(i) three or more vacuum ports;
(ii) two movable barrier elements that are closed and impermeable, and nonintersecting; and
(iii) an actuator assembly configured to move each of the two movable barrier elements across the three or more vacuum ports, to cause the three or more vacuum ports to go between a closed state and an open state, and wherein a number of the three or more vacuum ports is greater than a number of the two movable barrier elements; and

a control system coupled to the scalable area gripper;

coupling the scalable area gripper to a vacuum system and to an end effector attached to a robot;
identifying, with the control system, a plurality of sections of the ply;
identifying, with the control system, a start portion and an end portion of each identified section of the ply, based on ply boundaries of the ply;
adjusting one or more of the plurality of variable vacuum zones, to each provide an adjusted vacuum zone that corresponds to its corresponding identified section of the ply, and the two movable barrier elements are moved by the actuator assembly to the start portion and to the end portion, respectively, to adjust the adjusted vacuum zone;
positioning the adjusted vacuum zone adjacent to its corresponding identified section of the ply;
activating the adjusted vacuum zone to provide air flow, with the vacuum system, through the three or more vacuum ports along the adjusted vacuum zone; and
picking up the ply, with the scalable area gripper, from a work surface, during the material handling process for the composite manufacturing.