Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US9676551B2/en
Timestamp: 2019-12-07 06:12:08
Document Index: 470614515

Matched Legal Cases: ['Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61', 'Application No. 61']

US9676551B2 - Bot payload alignment and sensing - Google Patents
US9676551B2
US9676551B2 US14/942,717 US201514942717A US9676551B2 US 9676551 B2 US9676551 B2 US 9676551B2 US 201514942717 A US201514942717 A US 201514942717A US 9676551 B2 US9676551 B2 US 9676551B2
US14/942,717
US20160137416A1 (en
2015-11-16 Application filed by Symbotic LLC filed Critical Symbotic LLC
2015-11-16 Priority to US14/942,717 priority patent/US9676551B2/en
2016-02-02 Assigned to Symbotic, LLC reassignment Symbotic, LLC ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS). Assignors: TOEBES, STEPHEN C., BUZAN, FORREST, SULLIVAN, ROBERT
2016-05-19 Publication of US20160137416A1 publication Critical patent/US20160137416A1/en
2017-06-13 Publication of US9676551B2 publication Critical patent/US9676551B2/en
230000032258 transport Effects 0 description 39
This application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 13/327,040, having a filing date of Dec. 15, 2011 (now U.S. Pat. No. 9,187,244 issued Nov. 17, 2015), which is a non-provisional of and claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,220, filed on Dec. 15, 2010, the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.
FIG. 7C is an illustration of the exemplary autonomous transport vehicle in accordance with an aspect of the disclosed embodiment;
In accordance with the embodiments the storage and retrieval system 100 may be substantially similar to that described in, for example, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,381, entitled “STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM” and filed on Apr. 9, 2010, and U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,340 entitled “Warehousing Scalable Storage Structure” with Attorney Docket Number 1127P014551-US (-#1) and filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/326,674 filed on Dec. 15, 2011), the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference herein in their entireties and may operate in a retail distribution center or warehouse to, for example, fulfill orders received from retail stores for case units (where case units as used herein means items not stored in trays, on totes or on pallets, e.g. uncontained or items stored in trays, totes or on pallets). It is noted that the case units may include cases of items (e.g. case of soup cans, boxes of cereal, etc.) or individual items that are adapted to be taken off of or placed on a pallet. In accordance with the embodiments, shipping cases or case units (e.g. cartons, barrels, boxes, crates, jugs, totes, pallets or any other suitable device for holding case units) may have variable sizes and may be used to hold items in shipping and may be configured so they are capable of being palletized for shipping. It is noted that when, for example, bundles or pallets of case units arrive at the storage and retrieval system the content of each pallet may be uniform (e.g. each pallet holds a predetermined number of the same item—one pallet holds soup and another pallet holds cereal) and as pallets leave the storage and retrieval system the pallets may contain any suitable number and combination of different items (e.g. each pallet may hold different types of items—a pallet holds a combination of soup and cereal). In alternate embodiments the storage and retrieval system described herein may be applied to any environment in which case units are stored and retrieved.
The storage and retrieval system 100 may be configured for installation in, for example, existing warehouse structures or adapted to new warehouse structures. In the embodiments, the storage and retrieval system may include in-feed and out-feed transfer stations 170, 160, multilevel vertical conveyors 150A, 150B, a storage structure 130, and a number of autonomous transport vehicles or robots 110 (referred to herein as “bots”). The storage and retrieval system may also include robot or bot transfer stations (as described in, for example, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,220, entitled “STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM” and filed on Apr. 9, 2010, the disclosure of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety) that may provide an indirect interface between the bots 110 and the multilevel vertical conveyor 150A, 150B. The in-feed transfer stations 170 and out-feed transfer stations 160 may operate together with their respective multilevel vertical conveyors 150A, 150B for bi-directionally transferring case units to and from one or more levels of the storage structure 130. It is noted that while the multilevel vertical conveyors are described herein as being dedicated inbound or in-feed conveyors 150A and outbound or out-feed conveyors 150B, each of the conveyors 150A, 150B may be used for both inbound and outbound transfer of case units/items from the storage and retrieval system. The multilevel vertical conveyors may be any suitable lifting devices for transporting case units between levels of the storage and retrieval system. It is noted that while multilevel vertical conveyors are described herein in other aspects the conveyors may be any suitable conveyors or transfer/picking devices having any suitable transport path orientation. Some non-limiting suitable examples of multilevel vertical conveyors can be found in, for example, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,354, entitled “LIFT INTERFACE FOR STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEMS” and filed on Apr. 9, 2010, and U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,298 entitled “LIFT INTERFACE FOR STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEMS”filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. Pat. No. 8,998,554 on Apr. 7, 2015), the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference herein in their entireties and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,220, entitled “STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM,” (previously incorporated by reference). For example, the multilevel vertical conveyors may have any suitable number of support shelves for transporting the case units to a predetermined level of the storage and retrieval system. The support shelves may have slatted supports configured to allow fingers of the bots 110 or in-feed/out-feed transfer stations 170, 160 to pass between the slats for transferring case units to and from the conveyor. It is noted that in the embodiments transfer of case units between the bots and the multilevel vertical conveyors may occur in any suitable manner.
The bots 110 may be configured to place case units, such as the above described retail merchandise, into picking stock in the one or more levels of the storage structure 130 and then selectively retrieve ordered items for shipping the ordered items to, for example, a store or other suitable location. In the embodiments, the bots 110 may interface in any suitable manner with the multilevel vertical conveyors 150A, 150B such as through, for example, extension of a transfer arm or effector of the bot (which may have fingers for interfacing with slatted support shelves of the multi-level vertical conveyors) relative to a frame of the bot. Suitable examples of bots are described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,312, entitled “AUTONOMOUS TRANSPORTS FOR STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEMS” and filed on Apr. 9, 2010, U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,365 entitled “AUTOMATED BOT WITH TRANSFER ARM” filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/326,952 filed on Dec. 15, 2011), U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,388 entitled “AUTOMATED BOT TRANSFER ARM DRIVE SYSTEM”filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/326,993 filed on Dec. 15, 2011), U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,359 entitled “BOT HAVING HIGH SPEED STABILITY” filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. Pat. No. 8,965,619 issued on Feb. 24, 2015), and U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,206 entitled “BOT SENSING POSITION” filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. Pat. No. 9,008,884 issued on Apr. 14, 2015), the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.
Referring also to FIG. 2, an exemplary configuration of the storage and retrieval system 100 is shown. Other suitable exemplary configurations of storage and retrieval systems can be found in, for example, U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,340 entitled “Warehousing Scalable Storage Structure” filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/326,674 filed on Dec. 15, 2011), and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,381, entitled “STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM” and filed on Apr. 9, 2010 (the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference herein in their entireties). It should be understood that the storage and retrieval system may have any suitable configuration. As can be seen in FIG. 2, the storage and retrieval system 200 is configured, for exemplary purposes only, as a single-ended picking structure in which only one side of the system 200 has a transfer section or deck 130B. The single-ended picking structure may be used in, for example, a building or other structure having loading docks disposed only on one side of the building. In the embodiments, the storage and retrieval system 200 includes transfer deck(s) 130B and picking aisles 130A that allow bots 110 to traverse an entirety of a level of the storage structure 130 on which that bot 110 is located for transporting items between any suitable storage locations/picking aisles 130A and any suitable multilevel vertical conveyors 150A, 150B. The multilevel vertical conveyors 150A, 150B provide transport of case units into the storage and retrieval system 200 through input workstations 210 and provide output of case units from the storage and retrieval system 200 through output workstations 220. In the embodiments, the storage and retrieval system 200 includes a first and second storage section 230A, 230B located side by side so that the picking aisles of each section are substantially parallel with each other and facing the same direction (e.g. towards transfer deck 130B). It is noted that the storage and retrieval system may have any suitable number of storage sections arranged relative to each other in any suitable configuration.
Referring to FIGS. 1, 3, 4A and 4B, each of the storage bays 510, 511 of the storage structure 130 may hold the picking stock on storage shelves 600 that are separated by aisle spaces 130A. In the embodiments the storage bays 510, 511 and storage shelves 600 may be substantially similar to those described in, for example, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,220, entitled “STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM,” and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/757,381, entitled “STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM” (both of which being previously incorporated by reference). For example, the storage shelves 600 may include one or more support legs 620L1, 620L2 extending from, for example, the horizontal supports 610, 611, 613 (which are supported by vertical supports 612). The support legs 620L1, 620L2 may have any suitable configuration and may be part of, for example, a substantially U-shaped channel 620 such that the legs are connected to each other through channel portion 620B. The channel portion 620B may provide an attachment point between the channel 620 and one or more horizontal supports 610, 611, 613. It is noted that, each support leg 620L1, 620L2 may also be configured to individually mount to the horizontal supports 610, 611, 613. In the embodiments, each support leg 620L1, 620L2 includes a bent portion 620H1, 620H2 having a suitable surface area configured to support case units stored on the shelves 600. The bent portions 620H1, 620H2 may be configured to substantially prevent deformation of the case units stored on the shelves. It is noted that the leg portions 620H1, 620H2 may have a suitable thickness or have any other suitable shape and/or configuration for supporting case units stored on the shelves. As can be seen in FIGS. 4A and 4B, the support legs 620L1, 620L2 or channels 620 may form a slatted or corrugated shelf structure where spaces 620S between, for example, the support legs 620L1, 620L2 allow for arms or fingers of the bots 110 to reach into the shelving for transferring case units to and from the shelves. It is also noted that transfer of items to and from the multilevel vertical conveyors 150A, 150B (whether the transfer is made directly or indirectly by the bot 110) may occur in a substantially similar manner to that described above with respect to the storage shelves 600. It is noted that the spacing between the case units on the shelves may be any suitable spacing. It is also noted that transfer of case units to and from the multilevel vertical conveyors 150A, 150B (whether the transfer is made directly or indirectly by the bot 110) may occur in a substantially similar manner to that described above with respect to storage shelves 600.
The fingers 1540 of the bot 110 extend laterally relative to the longitudinal axis 6000 of the bot. The fingers 1540 are also capable of movement in the direction of arrow 1673 (e.g. in a direction substantially perpendicular to the direction 1550 of extension and retraction of the fingers). The fingers may be driven by any suitable drive for lifting the pickfaces 1700P over the fence 1510F and into/out of the payload bed 1510 of the bot 110. One example, of a drive unit that may drive the fingers 1540 can be found in U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/423,388 entitled “AUTOMATED BOT TRANSFER ARM DRIVE SYSTEM,” filed on Dec. 15, 2010 (now U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/326,993 filed on Dec. 15, 2011), previously incorporated by reference.
In other aspects, referring to FIG. 7C, the bot 110 may include one or more side blades 1535G mounted to the bot arm 110A. One or more of the blades 1535G may be moved along the longitudinal axis 6000 of the bot 110 in the direction of arrow 1550X for aligning the pickface (e.g. one or more case units 1700A) on the bot arm 110A. The translational movement of the one or more side blades 1535G may allow for the positioning of the bot payload anywhere along the longitudinal axis of the bot within the bot payload area and may provide fine adjustment for case positioning onto the storage shelves 600. It is noted that in this aspect the side blades 1535G may not carry, transport or lift the case units 1700A but may aid in case unit 1700A control during picking and placing the case units. It is noted that one side blade 1535G may be fixed and act as a datum for aligning the case units 1700A.
a payload bed having at least one reference datum surface with respect to a payload storage location; and
wherein the at least one payload justification device being configured to position a payload on the payload bed in substantial contact with the at least one reference datum surface that is arranged relative the payload bed to place each payload so that a payload side is at a repeatable predetermined longitudinal position, independent of a payload size, on the payload bed relative to at least a longitudinal axis of the autonomous transport robot.
2. The autonomous transport robot of claim 1, wherein the at least one reference datum surface includes a first and second reference datum surfaces disposed substantially perpendicular to one another and one of the first and second reference datum surfaces is substantially parallel with the longitudinal axis of the autonomous transport robot.
3. The autonomous transport robot of claim 1, wherein the autonomous transport robot includes a retaining fence disposed at an opening of the payload bed, the autonomous transport robot further including a driven pusher bar movably disposed at least party above the payload bed, the retaining fence and the driven pusher bar being configured to actively grip the payload during transport of the payload on the autonomous transport robot.
7. The autonomous transport robot of claim 1, wherein the at least one justification device includes a first justification device configured to move the payload in a first direction to substantially contact the first reference datum surface and a second justification device configured to move the payload in a second direction, substantially perpendicular to the first direction, to contact the second reference datum surface.
11. An autonomous transport robot for transporting a payload within a storage and retrieval system comprising:
a payload bed having an opening;
an effector for transferring the payload to and from the payload bed at least party through the opening;
at least one sensor disposed adjacent the opening for sensing a first and second edge of the payload and a controller configured to determine a dimension of the payload based at least in part on the sensing of the first and second edge of the payload and compare the determined dimension of the payload with a predetermined dimension of the payload.
12. The autonomous transport robot of claim 11, wherein the controller is configured to generate a fault signal if the detected dimension and the predetermined dimension do not substantially match.
13. The autonomous transport robot of claim 12, wherein the controller is further configured to cause the effector to return the payload to a payload holding area from which it came if the detected dimension and the predetermined dimension do not substantially match.
14. The autonomous transport robot of claim 12, wherein the controller is further configured to verify a position of the autonomous transport robot within the storage and retrieval system if the detected dimension and the predetermined dimension do not substantially match.
15. The autonomous transport robot of claim 11, wherein the at least one sensor comprises sensors for detecting other edges of the payload substantially transverse to the first and second edges and the controller is configured to determine another dimension of the payload that is substantially transverse to the dimension based at least in part on the detection of the other edges.
16. The autonomous transport robot of claim 15, further comprising a payload justification device for moving the payload in a direction on the payload bed substantially transverse to a direction of loading of the payload onto the payload bed, the payload justification device being configured to at least in part facilitate the detection of the another dimension.
providing an autonomous transport robot for transporting a payload within a storage and retrieval system, the autonomous transport robot including a payload bed having an opening and an effector for transferring the payload to and from the payload bed at least partly through the opening;
sensing a first and second edge of the payload with at least one sensor disposed adjacent the opening; and
with a controller of the autonomous transport robot
determining a dimension of the payload based at least in part on the sensing of the first and second edge of the payload, and
comparing the determined dimension of the payload with a predetermined dimension of the payload.
18. The method of claim 17, further comprising generating, with the controller, a fault signal if the detected dimension and the predetermined dimension do not substantially match.
19. The method of claim 17, further comprising causing, with the controller, the effector to return the payload to a payload holding area from which it came if the detected dimension and the predetermined dimension do not substantially match.
20. The method of claim 17, further comprising verifying, with the controller, a position of the autonomous transport robot within the storage and retrieval system if the detected dimension and the predetermined dimension do not substantially match.
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Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNORS:TOEBES, STEPHEN C.;SULLIVAN, ROBERT;BUZAN, FORREST;SIGNING DATES FROM 20160108 TO 20160122;REEL/FRAME:037649/0520