Patent ID: 7677428

Claim:
A motor vehicle body framing apparatus located at a welding station for use in precisely positioning body panels arriving at the welding station for welding along a path defining a longitudinal direction, the apparatus including: a base structure positioned at the welding station and having a longitudinal extent in the direction of body panel movement and a transverse extent; a plurality of upstanding parking structures upstanding vertically from the base structure on either side of the welding station and each having at least one pillar parking device; and a pair of longitudinal side gates each carrying tooling fixtures for engagement with body side panels and each including gate parking devices operative in coaction with the pillar parking devices to precisely position the gates on the parking structures and thereby precisely position the tooling fixtures relative to the body panels, wherein each parking structure includes a plurality of longitudinally spaced pillars upstanding from the base structure and one of the pillar parking devices positioned on top of each pillar for coaction with the one of the gate parking devices on the respective gates, wherein the gate and pillar parking devices coact to position the gates in X (longitudinal), Y (transverse) and Z (vertical) coordinates, wherein each pillar parking device includes a first inboard set of rollers arranged in a circumferential array to define an inboard opening therebetween and each gate parking device includes a pilot pin sized to fit in the inboard opening of a respective one of the pillar parking devices, wherein the first inboard set of rollers includes a pair of longitudinally spaced rollers arranged for rotation about vertical axes and a pair of vertically spaced rollers arranged for rotation about longitudinal axes and each pilot pin extends in a transverse direction orthogonal to the longitudinal direction into a respective one of the openings, and wherein each pillar parking device further includes an outboard set of rollers arranged to define an outboard opening therebetween and each gate parking device further includes a transversely extending guide plate sized to slide transversely into the outboard opening between an outboard set of rollers.