Systems and methods for spotting treatment, inspection, and tracking of articles

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11078449-B2
Application number	US-201916683614-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 14, 2019
Priority date	Apr 18, 2019
Publication date	Aug 3, 2021
Grant date	Aug 3, 2021

Abstract

A method of treatment of one or more articles may comprise locating a stain on an article based on a tag on the article; placing the stain on a nose of a spotting board; positioning a steam gun at least two or more inches away from the stain; simultaneously activating a steam supply and a vacuum supply of the spotting board; moving the steam gun in a defined motion relative to the stain for at least 30 seconds; simultaneously activating the vacuum supply and an air supply of the spotting board; moving the steam gun in the defined motion relative to the stain until the article is at least partially dry; and inspecting the stain.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of treatment of one or more articles, comprising:
locating a stain on an article based on a tag comprising a spotting treatment tracker for the article and a treatment name or identifier associated with treatment of the article;
placing a portion of the article comprising the stain on a spotting board having a corrosion-resistant layer;
treating the article with one or both of a wet-side pre-spotting agent and a dry-side pre-spotting agent;
treating the portion of the article comprising the stain with one or both of a steam supply and a vacuum supply of the spotting board;
treating the portion of the article comprising the stain with one or both of the vacuum supply and an air supply of the spotting board until the article is at least partially dry;
inspecting the stain on an inspection surface to determine a status of the stain;
treating the article with a spotting agent treatment based on the determined status of the stain;
re-inspecting the stain on the inspection surface with one or more of a light sensor, a chemical sensor, a humidity sensor, a camera, or an odor sensor;
updating the tag of the article and/or a data record of the article in one or more servers based on one or more results of the re-inspection;
analyzing the updated tag and/or the data record of the article with a machine learning algorithm in accordance with the one or more results of the re-inspection or an additional review; and
displaying treatment information associated with the updated tag and/or data record, according to the results of the re-inspection.

2. The method of claim 1 , comprising treating the portion of the article comprising the stain with a steam supply and a vacuum supply of the spotting board by:
positioning a steam gun at least two or more inches away from the portion of the article comprising the stain; and
moving the steam gun in a defined motion relative to the portion of the article comprising the stain.

3. The method of claim 1 , comprising treating the portion of the article comprising the stain with one or both of the vacuum supply and the air supply of the spotting board by moving one or more of a steam gun, the vacuum supply, and the air supply in a defined motion relative to the stain until the article is at least partially dry.

4. The method of claim 1 , further including laying the article flat on drying racks to dry for at least 30 minutes.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the treatment name or identifier is a name or identifier of a technician or supervisor associated with treatment of the article.

6. The method of claim 3 , wherein the moving the one or more of the steam gun, the vacuum supply, and the air supply comprises moving the one or more of the steam gun, the vacuum supply, and the air supply in the defined motion relative to the stain until the article is fully dry.

7. The method of claim 1 , further including categorizing the stain into one of one or more categories.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the one or more categories include oil stain, dye stain, or tannin stain.

9. The method of claim 8 , where the tannin stain is invisible before being subjected to heat.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the method is performed by a robot.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the tag comprises a barcode.

12. The method of claim 3 , wherein the defined motion is a circular, a rectangular, a triangular, or a linear motion.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein the additional review is performed after placing the article in a designated area associated with the additional review.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein the displayed treatment information includes a prior treatment of the article associated with a spotting treatment history of the article.

Assignees

• Caastle Inc

Inventors

• Jackson Michael Jerome
• Demaray Andrew
• Hoffman Phillip
• Ponte Ericka

Classifications

• D06M2200/01

  Stain or soil resistance · CPC title

• D06F43/002 Primary

  Spotting apparatus · CPC title

• C11D11/0064 Primary

  Chemistry & Metallurgy · mapped topic

• C11D11/0017

  Chemistry & Metallurgy · mapped topic

• C11D2111/12

  Soft surfaces, e.g. textile · CPC title