Patent ID: 11858011
Assignee: FANUC CORPORATION
Field: Chemical engineering (Chemistry)
Classification: CPC B  G | IPC B  G

Claim 4:
5. A method of determining whether or not it is necessary to clean a work area of a machine tool, the method comprising:
imaging first image data of the work area by an imaging device before the machine tool machines a workpiece in the work area;
imaging second image data of the work area by the imaging device after the machine tool machines the workpiece in the work area;
generating, by a processor, third image data including pixels, each of the pixels having brightness corresponding to a degree of change between brightness of a pixel of the first image data and brightness of a pixel of the second image data which corresponds to the pixel of the first image data, wherein the degree of change between the brightness of the pixel of the first image data and the brightness of the pixel of the second image data is caused by a presence of foreign matter on the work area after the machine tool machines the workpiece;
determining, by the processor, whether or not to clean the work area based on a histogram statistically indicating a relationship between the brightness of the pixels of the third image data and the number of the pixels of the third image data; and
cleaning the work area:
when a rate of the number of pixels having brightness being within a predetermined range with respect to a total number of pixels in the histogram is equal to or lower than a predetermined threshold value, or
when a rate of the number of pixels having brightness being out of the predetermined range with respect to the total number of pixels in the histogram is equal to or larger than a predetermined threshold value.