Abstract
Recent trends for the miniaturization and weight reduction of portable electronic parts have driven uses of subminiature components. Assembly of the miniaturized components requires subminiature screws of which pitch sizes are micrometer scale. To produce such subminiature screws with high precision threads, not only a precision forming technology but also a high-precision measurement technology is required. The present study covers the development of a vision inspection system for precision screws for the automatic measurement of subminiature screws with high speed and reliability. In this study, the feeding unit that transfers the subminiature screws to the inspection unit is investigated through finite element(FE) analysis. The vibration characteristics of the feeding unit are predicted through FE analyses, from which we can determine whether the subminiature screw can be stably fed into the inspection unit or not. The effects of several design parameters on the vibration characteristics are also discussed.