| CPC B65G 43/08 (2013.01) [B65G 27/32 (2013.01); B65G 33/02 (2013.01); G01G 19/393 (2013.01)] | 8 Claims |
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1. An article conveyance device comprising:
an article discharge container having discharge outlets and configured to discharge articles from the discharge outlets, the articles being held by the article discharge container;
an article conveyance mechanism having plural feeders configured to convey the articles that the plural feeders have received from the discharge outlets, the plural feeders including a first feeder to an n-th feeder;
an article detection mechanism having plural sensors, the plural sensors including a first sensor to an n-th sensor configured to detect presence of the articles in the first feeder to the n-th feeder, respectively; and
a control unit configured to judge whether or not jamming of the articles is occurring in the discharge outlets based on output of the article detection mechanism and increase a conveyance intensity of some feeders for receiving the articles from places where the jamming is occurring in the discharge outlets, wherein
in a case where the article detection mechanism detects that the articles are not being detected during conveyance in just some feeders of the plural feeders and that the articles are being detected during conveyance in the remaining feeders and the control unit judges that the articles are present in the article discharge container, the control unit judges that the jamming is occurring in the discharge outlets that discharge the articles to the some feeders in which the articles are not being detected, and
in a case where it has been checked in regard to all natural numbers equal to or greater than 1 and equal to or less than n that a k-th sensor installed in a k-th feeder has detected the articles in a first period since the k-th feeder started conveyance, the control unit judges that the articles will be present in the article discharge container over a second period.
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