Configuration of Noncontact Grip System for Carrying Large Flat Sheets Using Vacuum Air Heads

This paper configured an improved grip system for gripping and transferring large flat sheets in a noncontact manner. The conventional method for changing the direction of large flat sheets in a conveyor system is to turn the system itself. The new configured grip system applied a noncontact pneumatic head in the vertical direction, with the use of an air levitation table, and L-shaped latches, to lift and rotate large flat sheets to change their direction in the conveyor system. The pneumatic heads made efficient use of a vortex flow and an internal flow guide to improve the swirling flow. The gripping force for the improved head with the inner flow guide was 10% higher than that for the conventional head. To construct a rotational grip system, 12 improved noncontact heads and eight pairs of L-shaped latches were used to provide gripping force against an eight generation liquid crystal display (LCD) glass as a 4:6 ratio, each other. With a partial levitation force from the air blow table, the head-and-latch configuration resulted in the overall glass flatness approaching within 3.0 mm on the lower side at a selected grip rotation height of 40 mm.