| 主权项 |
1. A postal sorting machine comprising:
a plurality of sorting outlets; a sorting conveyor suitable for transporting postal articles in series past the sorting outlets; and a postal article feed unit including a magazine for storing postal articles to be sorted and a separator that is suitable for injecting the postal articles to be sorted one-by-one from the magazine onto the sorting conveyor while placing the postal articles in series at constant pitch, wherein the magazine includes a platform mounted on an elevator, and wherein the separator includes:
a robotized arm provided with a pneumatic pickup that is steerable in three-dimensional space;a vision sensor suitable for observing a pile of postal articles stored loosely in the magazine to produce image data including a certain postal article to be separated from the pile of loose postal articles in the magazine; anda monitoring and control unit that, on the basis of the image data produced by the vision sensor, is suitable for identifying a non-covered pickup face of the certain postal article so that the postal article can be gripped by the pickup, the monitoring and control unit also being configured to control the robotized arm in such a manner as to come and pick up the certain postal article via its pickup face and inject it onto the sorting conveyor, and wherein the monitoring and control unit is configured to control the elevator in such a manner as to keep the pile of loose postal articles a certain setpoint distance away from the vision sensor, as the postal articles are picked up by the robotized arm. |
