Rotation of small plastic tubes

[mobster1930]

How could I rotate small plastic tubes (sealed on one end), all in one direction ? They're 65mm long, diameter 8mm and their sealed end is 1mm thick. These tubes must be fed vertically into a machine for montage with their sealed end facing towards the floor.

I've attached 2 pictures of this plastic tube.

 

[MiketheEngineer]

Couple of ideas :

You might blow them into position - assuming the closed end weighs more.

Pick them up and using a "feeler" to find out which end is open/closed and flip if necessary.

 

[ornerynorsk]

Study parts orienting techniques used in vibratory bowl feeders. This part would be a piece of cake.

It is better to have enough ideas for some of them to be wrong, than to be always right by having no ideas at all.

 

[berkshire]

I would second ornerynorsk's idea of a vibratory bowl feeder.
Use a ramp that will shake the part off if it is top heavy.
B.E.


The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[mobster1930]

Thank you for your answers, I had a similiar idea with bowl feeders. Incase anyone's got some more ideas, please let me know.

 

[btrueblood]

Have the pickup be via a rod slid into the open end. If it hits a closed end, the part gets kicked out of the queue, possibly into a device that rotates it and places back into the start of the queue.