Patent Publication Number: US-2021170573-A1

Title: Container handling system

Description:
The invention refers to a container handling system for the handling of containers, in particular bottles or cans. 
     During the operation, maintenance or conversion of container handling systems, especially in the beverage industry, there are various tasks for which it is intended and advantageous that they are carried out manually by an operator, but which, at least for some operators, represent a body burden that is too high from an ergonomic or health point of view. In particular, these are tasks in which loads are lifted. Typical tasks are, for example, the exchange of system elements, the provision or exchange of working material or the conversion of the system, for example during a format change, where the system is changed over to a different container format. 
     It is known to provide lifting or hoisting tools as an aid to the operator to relieve the strain on the operator. However, due to the lack of fine motor skills that are available when the operator is performing the task immediately, such tools cannot be used for all tasks. Furthermore, such aids are often configured for specific tasks. If this is the case, different aids must be provided for different tasks. The use of such aids is also only possible to a limited extent or not at all, for example, depending on the accessibility of the affected system part. 
     Furthermore, it is known to perform tasks completely with robots. In this case, very specialized robots can be used, but as with the above mentioned tools, this means that different robots must be provided for different tasks. Alternatively, more versatile robots can be used. However, these are more complex both in design and in control and are therefore expensive, maintenance-intensive and prone to errors. 
     The invention is thus based on the object of providing a container handling system which enables various tasks to be carried out at comparatively low cost without excessive body burden and health hazards for operators of the system. 
     The object is solved by the subject matter of claim  1 . In particular, the object is solved by the fact that the container handling system comprises an exoskeleton which is configured in such a way that it supports movements performed by an operator of the container handling system for lifting and/or lowering objects, in particular system parts or working material. 
     The exoskeleton is a device that can be worn on the body. The device may comprise, for example, struts, joints and/or weights which may be configured and arranged to imitate a part of a human skeleton. In particular, the exoskeleton may be an independent part of the container handling system. In other words, the exoskeleton may be usable without physical connection to other parts of the container handling system. The exoskeleton may be connected to other parts or units of the container handling system, in particular to one or more control devices of the container handling system, by means of one or more data links. The exoskeleton may also be physically connected to other parts of the container handling system. 
     The fact that the exoskeleton supports movements for lifting and/or lowering means that the operator only lifts a part of the mass of the object to be lifted by his own force at most. In other words, at least part of the force required for lifting and/or lowering, in particular all of the force required for lifting and/or lowering, is provided by the exoskeleton. 
     The movements may be movements the operator carries out for procedures to be performed manually during operation and/or set-up and/or maintenance of the container handling system. 
     The provision of such an exoskeleton thus makes it possible to protect the operator and, at the same time, to ensure high flexibility at low cost, because basically a wide variety of operations can be carried out by a human, so that no specialized tools or robots are needed for different operations. The exoskeleton is a universal tool that can be used largely independent of the task and at the same time prevents the operator from being subjected to excessive strain. 
     The container handling system may include, for example, labeling machines, printing machines, packing machines, palletizing machines, filling machines, blowing machines, and/or transport equipment. The tasks requiring movements for lifting and/or lowering may include, for example, inserting and/or removing working materials, exchanging modules, retrofitting for different container formats and/or removing and installing individual elements, for example drives or wearing parts. The containers can be bottles or cans, for example. 
     The exoskeleton can be configured to be attachable to one or both arms and optionally to the operator&#39;s torso. For example, the exoskeleton can strappable to the operator. 
     The exoskeleton may include at least one actuator, for example an electric motor, to assist lifting, and at least one traction element that allows power transmission from the actuator such that the power assists the lifting motion. Optionally, the exoskeleton may also comprise at least one deflection element, for example one or more pulleys and/or one or more joints. The exoskeleton may also include counterweights configured and arranged to stabilize the operator. 
     The exoskeleton may be configured in such a way that it allows the operator himself to grip the object to be lifted and control all or part of the lifting and/or lowering movements. 
     For example, the exoskeleton can be configured in such a way that it merely provides relief for the operator and the operator controls without restrictions the movement, in particular the direction of movement and the distance covered during the movement. Alternatively, the exoskeleton may be configured to guide or control the movements of the operator at least partially. 
     In such a case, for example, the operator can specify the basic direction of movement and, by means of appropriate design and/or control, the exoskeleton can only support and/or allow movement in this direction within a certain interval and outside this interval it cannot support and/or counteract the movement. This can be done, for example, by means of a control device which controls the drive(s) of the exoskeleton accordingly. 
     In the present application, the control device may be part of the exoskeleton or may constitute a separate part of the system or be integrated into another part of the system, in particular a central control system. 
     In principle, it is advantageous if the operator controls the movement at least partially by himself, because this allows great flexibility with regard to the tasks to be performed, especially the possibility to react to unforeseen situations. However, limiting the scope of movement can be used to protect the operator from injury and/or to protect system elements. 
     The exoskeleton may also be configured in such a way that it is possible to switch between an operating mode in which the movement is controlled entirely by the operator himself and an operating mode in which the movement is controlled partly by the operator and partly by the exoskeleton. 
     The exoskeleton may be configured to be adaptable to the operator, especially automatically. 
     The exoskeleton can be adaptable to an operator, for example, by adjusting the force to be exerted by the exoskeleton. In addition, the arrangement of individual elements such as attachment elements for attaching the exoskeleton to the operator or a counterweight can be adaptable to the operator. 
     This has the advantage that the same exoskeleton can be used for different operators, thus reducing acquisition costs. An automatic adjustment has the advantage that it is usually faster and more precise than a manual adjustment. In addition, operating errors during adaptation can be prevented. 
     For automatic adaptation, the respective operator can be identified, for example by means of the control device(s), whereby the control device can then control in particular one or more drives of the exoskeleton in such a way that the adaptation takes place. In particular, the control device can set the drive, for example the power of the drive, and/or a transmission ratio of the force between the drive and the traction element. 
     The identification of the operator can, for example, be based on a login process via input elements or on an automatic recognition of the operator. Such automatic recognition can be carried out, for example, by means of face recognition, a retina scanner and/or a fingerprint reader. 
     The exoskeleton may be configured in such a way that it is adaptable to the operator&#39;s physique, in particular to the height, leg length, torso length and/or arm length, and/or to the constitution of the operator, for example, proportion of muscle mass and/or strength in the torso and/or arms. 
     The adaptability of the exoskeleton to the physique may include the ability to change the arrangement of individual elements of the exoskeleton, such as fasteners for attachment to the operator and/or counterweights. In particular, the arrangement may be adjustable so that the exoskeleton can be properly attached to the operator and/or the center of gravity can be adjusted with the counterweight. 
     The adaptability of the exoskeleton to the physique may alternatively or additionally involve adjusting the force applied by the exoskeleton based on the physique. This can be done by adjusting the drive or transmission. For example, in the case of longer arms, due to the longer lever, it may be advantageous for the exoskeleton to apply more force than in the case of shorter arms. 
     The exoskeleton may be configured such that the arrangement of attachment elements for attachment to the body is manually adjustable and that the adjustment of the attachment elements by sensors is detected and used to adjust the force applied by the exoskeleton accordingly. 
     This ensures an optimal support effect for each operator. 
     The exoskeleton can be controllable by a control device in such a way that task-specific support is provided. 
     This means that the exoskeleton can be operated in different modes, adapted to the tasks to be performed. 
     Task-specific support can include, for example, that a certain force is applied by the exoskeleton depending on the task to be performed. In particular, the amount and direction of the force may vary depending on the task. For this purpose, the control device can be used, for example, to set the power of the drive element and/or a transmission ratio to the traction elements and/or a deflection of the force. In particular, the force can be controlled as a function of time. This ensures that no jerky movements take place, which can cause injury and increase the risk of collisions with other system parts. 
     Such task-specific support has the advantage that the operator can use the exoskeleton universally and optimally for different tasks and can be optimally supported. This is also particularly suitable for preventing operating errors that can occur, for example, due to inexperience or lack of concentration or because the task is complex. 
     The container handling system may comprise an input device with which the task to be performed can be settable by the operator, in particular by means of manual input or speech input, and/or a task recognition device which is configured in such a way that it automatically recognizes the task to be performed, in particular on the basis of the operator position relative to system parts of the container handling system and/or on the basis of pattern recognition in which movements of an operator are detected and automatically analyzed and the task to be performed which is assigned to the movement pattern is identified on the basis of a movement pattern recognized in the analysis. 
     Operator input may also involve setting a series of tasks to be sequentially performed. Alternatively or in addition, a sequence of tasks may be stored in the control device and the operator may, by setting and/or activating one of these tasks, activate the whole sequence of tasks so that he does not need to explicitly set or activate the tasks following the first task. 
     Automatic recognition of the task to be executed can be context-dependent. In particular, it is possible, for example, to recognize in which area of the system the operator is located and/or to recognize with which part of the system the operator is working by means of a movement pattern. With the help of stored data it can then be determined which task the operator is performing and the exoskeleton can be controlled so that movements corresponding to this task are supported. 
     The task to be performed may include one or more of the following tasks: Changing the blow mold on a blow molding machine for blow molding containers; changing modular units on modular machines, for example printing machines for printing containers or labeling machines; changing the vacuum cylinder for holding and transporting labels in labeling machines; changing format-dependent container transport devices and/or container lifting devices, in particular dividing stars, lifting stars and/or lowering stars; inserting and/or changing rolls of film in packaging machines, for example rolls of shrink film; inserting cardboard boxes in packaging machines; inserting intermediate layers in palletizing machines; emptying collecting containers; replacing rotary distributors and/or drives and/or gears. 
     All of the above processes are physically demanding, but can be carried out manually by an operator with good motor skills and quickly, so that support is particularly advantageous here. 
    
    
     
       Further features and advantages are shown in the FIGURE. 
       The FIGURE shows a schematic and non-scaled representation of a container handling system with an exoskeleton attached to an operator. 
     
    
    
     The FIGURE shows an example of a container handling system  1  in the form of a labeling machine, whereby the object to be lifted here comprises a system part  2  to be lifted, here a vacuum cylinder for holding and transporting labels. However, it can also be any other type of container handling system and the objects to be lifted can also be other system parts and/or working materials. 
     Furthermore an exoskeleton  3  is shown, which is attached to an operator. In this example, the exoskeleton is attached to both arms and to the trunk of the operator, for example in the form of rails and buckles. However, it is conceivable that the exoskeleton is attached to only one arm and the torso, or only to one or both arms and not to the torso. Other attachment mechanisms are also conceivable. 
     In this example, the exoskeleton comprises two drives  5  (because of the perspective only one of the drives is visible in the FIGURE), each of which is assigned to one of the arms. However, it is also conceivable that only one drive is provided. In this case, the force can be transferred to different parts of the exoskeleton, if necessary, by appropriate redirection. 
     The exoskeleton also includes traction elements  6 , which transmit the force from the actuators to the respective arm. The traction elements can be in the form of belts or rods, for example. The exoskeleton can also have deflector elements  7 , as shown here, which are configured to adjust the direction of the force. For example, these can be joints. 
     The container handling system may also include a control unit  8  configured to control the drive(s) of the exoskeleton. Where appropriate, appropriate data links may also be provided between the control device and the drives. 
     Furthermore, an input device  9  may be provided, for example in the form of a touch screen, by means of which the operator can identify himself/herself and/or set the task to be performed. 
     The control device and the input device can each be separate from the exoskeleton, as shown here. However, it is also conceivable that one or both are part of the exoskeleton. 
     Furthermore a weight  10  is shown here, which serves as a counterweight to stabilize the operator. 
     For example, the exoskeleton can help the operator to lift the system part to be dismounted in order to remove it, and to set it down again at another location. Especially the lifting and lowering movements can be supported. The exoskeleton can also support the operator in lifting and setting down the system part to be inserted. 
     It goes without saying that as an alternative or in addition to support for moving system parts, the exoskeleton can also support the movements of the operator when moving working material, for example cardboard boxes, or the containers. 
     In particular, the invention is not limited to the features and combinations of the embodiments, especially the FIGURE. Rather, the above features can be combined as desired.