Web inspection system and method therefor

Claim 2

An inspection system for web materials that includes electronic means responsive to means scanning the web for detecting a plurality of different nonuniform appearance features of the web, said electronic means comprising: means for electrically discriminating said appearance features as to a predefined class to identify the significant electrical signal components thereof; means for electrically dividing the web into frames; means for counting the number of occurrences of said significant signal components over a series of scans within each of said frames; means for comparing each count of the number of occurrences of said significant signal components within each frame with predetermined values to electrically define nonuniform appearance features according to frame; and means for combining said electrically defined nonuniform features to recognize the occurrence of a visual defect class as it occurs within each said scanned frame.

Claim 3

In an inspection system for web materials that includes electronic means responsive to means scanning the web for detecting a preselected plurality of different nonuniform appearance features of the web to form an extracted single-scan feature set, the improvement comprising: circuit means for dividing the web into separate but overlapping frames aligned in the web motion direction and transverse thereto; circuit means to accumulate in separate sums the respective values of the extracted single-scan features of said preselected plurality occurring in each said overlapping frame; means for discriminating said separate sums; means for composing respective binary lane feature status words from said discriminated sums, wherein each status word has a bit position assignment corresponding to the lane in which a significant appearance feature occurs; means for combining according to lane the bits of said lane feature status words into a predetermined logic statement, said logic statement defining a distinctive defect class; and means for determining the presence of said defect class according to the resultant truth value of said logic statement pertaining to each said frame.

Claim 4

In an inspection system for web materials that includes electronic means responsive to means scanning the web for detecting a preselected plurality of different nonuniform appearance features of the web to form an extracted single-scan feature set, the improvement comprising: circuit means for dividing the web into separate but overlapping frames aligned in the web motion direction and transverse thereto; circuit means to accumulate in separate sums the respective values of the extracted single-scan features of said preselected plurality occurring in each said overlapping frame; means for discriminating said separate sums; means for composing respective binary lane feature status words from said discriminated sums, wherein each status word has a bit position assignment corresponding to the lane in which a significant appearance feature occurs; means for combining according to lane the bits of said lane feature status words into a predetermined logic statement, said logic statement defining a distinctive defect class; and means for determining the presence of said defect class according to the resultant truth value of said logic statement pertaining to each said frame.

Claim 5

In a method of inspecting a web that includes electro-optically scanning the web and generating electrical output signals representative of different nonuniform appearance features of the web and discriminating said output signals to form signals representing extracted single-scan features, the improvement comprising: electrically dividing the web into separate overlapping frames; accumulating in separate sums the respective values of said extracted single-scan features in each said overlapping frame; discriminating said separate sums to form binary lane feature status words; combining the bits of said lane feature status words into a predetermined logic statement, said logic statement defining a distinctive defect class; and determining the presence of said defect class according to the resultant truth value of said logic statement pertaining to each said frame.

Claim 6

In a method of inspecting a web that includes electro-optically scanning the web and generating electrical output signals representative of different nonuniform appearance features of the web and discriminating said output signals to form signals representing extracted single-scan features, the improvement comprising: electrically dividing the web into separate overlapping frames; accumulating in separate sums the respective values of said extracted single-scan features in each said overlapping frame; discriminating said separate sums to form binary lane feature status words; combining the bits of said lane feature status words into a predetermined logic statement, said logic statement defining a distinctive defect class; and determining the presence of said defect class according to the resultant truth value of said logic statement pertaining to each said frame.