Apparatus for transporting workpieces arranged, in particular, on workpiece carriers

摘要

In the feeding of workpieces to processing devices for further processing or assembly, it is customary to use workpiece carriers (16). After the workpiece has been taken off, the workpiece carriers must be taken off by the continuous conveyor (10) serving to transport the latter, and be transported separately back to the starting position. The invention intends to provide an apparatus by means of which the separate returning of the workpiece carriers (16) becomes unnecessary. The invention proposes to transport the workpiece carriers (16) in a circulating manner on the continuous conveyor (10), as a consequence of which the return transport of the empty workpiece carriers (16) can take place on the lower strand (20) of the continuous conveyor (10). For this purpose the workpiece carriers (16) are produced from an elastically deformable material. The apparatus is suitable, in particular, for the discontinuous feeding of sensitive workpieces to subsequent processing stations. <IMAGE>