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Laser inspection of various length round rods

Laser inspection of various length round rods

Laser inspection of various length round rods

(OP)
We manufacture fiberglass round rods in various lengths and diameters. My QC department has asked me to design 22 different go/no-go setups to check the lengths of our rods. This is just for starters. They range from 9" to 145" in length and need to be held to +/-.015". The diameter range is from 1/2" dia to 2-1/2" dia. I believe there is a laser inspection system out there that will work in this application, but I have searched Google and such and have not found what I need. We need to achieve 100% inspection and the inspection process is done off line and is not automated, yet. If someone could help recommend a laser inspection system that would work for this, that would be great. Thanks in advance.       

RE: Laser inspection of various length round rods

would a CMM do it for you ?

how long do you expect the measuring to take (per specimen) ?

why go/no go gauges ?  why not just measure them and let the answer tell you good or bad ?  (go/no go gauges suggests to me a mechanical set up (like a hole to measure pin diameters ... if the pin doesn't fit, you must reject).

RE: Laser inspection of various length round rods

KEYENCE has some excellent devices for this, a variety of laser sensors and their laser micrometer come to mind.  Their brochures have many application schematics that are very good idea-kickers.

TygerDawg
Blue Technik LLC
Virtuoso Robotics Engineering
www.bluetechnik.com

RE: Laser inspection of various length round rods

(OP)
I'm looking for just a few seconds a piece. The go/no go gauge would allow multiple rods to be checked at a single time.

Thanks, I will look into Keyence.

RE: Laser inspection of various length round rods

wouldn't the "go/no go" concept imply a mechanical check ... a slot of the maximum tolerance above a slot with the minimum tolerance ... nothing stuck on top is too long, anything that falls through both is too short (these are the "no go"); anything inbetween is just right.

RE: Laser inspection of various length round rods

Don't know much about them but there are some automated "comparators" out there that mya do the job??

RE: Laser inspection of various length round rods

I'd be inclined to look at a v-section support way, and a manual sliding contact arm linked to a DRO, that could report (and/or print) a measured length directly, and an attached old laptop that with a little programming could evaluate the measured length against limits and flash accept|reject|whatever.

A mechanical step gauge (go|not) with a pin- adjustable baseline, sort of like one edge of a jig borer's table, would also work.  I don't think it would be effective for multiple rods unless you provide a way to orient them parallel and present them singly, like a dual chain conveyor fed by a hopper.

I think you'd best think ahead to how you are going to automate the process in the future, and build a subset of that for use now.  Maybe that's where you're going with the laser idea; I don't see a laser bringing much to the party right now.


 

Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

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