DK169172B1 - Method and Apparatus for Placing Flexible Foil Packaging Filled with Non-Position Fixed Material in Packaging Containers - Google Patents

Description

in DK 169172 B1

The invention relates to a method of the kind set out in the preamble of claim 1.

In a method known from FR-A-2210540 for the stated purpose, the supply of foil packaging must be interrupted when switching from a filled packaging container to an empty one. In the known method, the conveyor belts of the overlapping foil packaging are stopped shortly before the completion of the filling process and the foil packages still present on the arcuate conveyor section are introduced into the packaging container. Next, the control element is moved out of the packaging container, after which an empty packaging container is placed in a filling position. Only then is the supply of new foil packaging-15 stock continued, thereby initiating a new filling process. To avoid such a nuisance interruption in the introduction of filled foil packages into packaging containers, it is known from GB-A-20 46 711 to work with an acceleration band.

The method known from the latter print is well suited for packaging rigid packaging cartons which are transferred from a first conveyor belt to an upstream conveyor belt which is conveyed at a slower rate than the first, thereby causing the cartons to overlap. When a conveyor belt is placed on the conveyor belt a predetermined number of cartons to be placed in a packaging container, the conveyor belt is accelerated. The cartons lying overlapping on the conveyor belt are introduced at high speed and freely falling into the packaging container. However, this method is unsuitable for foil packaging containing a non-positioned ripple or flowable material because it will shift when it hits the packaging container at high speed so that a high filling density would not be achieved. A sensitive material, e.g.

35 crispy chips would easily be damaged.

DK 169172 B1 2

The present invention has for its object to provide a method of the kind indicated by which flexible, filled foil packages can be packaged tightly and gently for the packaged material in high performance packaging containers and without disruptive interruptions in the supply of the foil packages. This object is achieved by the measures specified in the characterizing part of claim 1.

The invention also relates to an apparatus of the kind specified in the preamble of claim 2 for carrying out the method. The apparatus is peculiar to the characterizing part of claim 2. By overlapping the foil packaging, the dual effect is achieved that the transport speed and consequently the resulting impact forces can be reduced at the end of the conveying path without reducing the transport performance, and that the foil packages control themselves in place in the packaging container. In this way, intermediate sorting in a magazine lapses. While the material to be packaged at undefined speed is impacted against the bottom of the packaging container by the method known from GB-A-20 46711, without the cartons being guided on the front or back, being transported by the method and apparatus of the present invention. Invention, the foil packages 25 have a certain desired speed all the way to the bottom of the packaging container, whereby they are supported both on their front and back, so that the material evenly distributed in the foil packages cannot move to one side. In this way, a tight filling of the packaging container is secured with foil packaging, without exposing their contents to harmful pressure.

It is advantageous when the packaging container during its filling with foil packaging is pushed forward solely by the influence of the foil packaging transported into the container. This should allow the packaging container to be displaced on a stationary surface. In this case, the weight of the container increases as it fills and the damming pressure increases accordingly. This is advantageous because the damming pressure should be as small as possible, as long as only a few foil packages are introduced into the packaging container, because otherwise there will be a risk that the individual foil packages will be compressed too heavily and the packaged material would be damaged thereby. On the other hand, if many foil packages are already placed in the container, there is thus provided a large elastic bolster which compensates for excessive compression of the individual foil packages.

According to the invention, the guide roller for the upper conveyor belt of the apparatus may be adjustable in height and this conveyor belt can according to the invention be passed over a belt bearing and a guide member adjustable in the conveying direction of the belt. The transition from the filling of a packaging container to the next empty packaging container is provided by the transition from the first conveyor section on which the film packaging does not overlap to the conveying section on which the film packaging is made to overlap, at first slowly and then rapidly advancing. a space is provided. As soon as the space between two foil packages reaches the packaging container, the full packaging container can be replaced with an empty e.g. in that the guide means of the arcuate conveyor section which engages in the packaging container over the stacking site thereof is displaced back towards the direction of delivery of the conveyor and in the empty container is again displaced forward. This procedure is necessary if the packaging container can only be displaced in the plane of its bottom wall. If, on the other hand, the packaging container can be lifted and lowered, this method of transfer is not necessary. Nevertheless, even in the latter case, the control means is switched in the conveying direction of the belt, in order to allow the apparatus to be adapted to packaging containers of varying height. As mentioned above, in order to maintain the belt tension, the upper conveyor section of the arcuate conveyor section should pass through a belt stock which then compensates for the varying conveyor length 5 in the region of the arcuate conveyor section, which belt length changes depending on the switching member's changeover or varying load height.

In the following, the invention is explained in more detail by means of the drawing, which schematically shows an embodiment of the apparatus according to the invention. In the illustrated embodiment, the foil packages are flat bags filled with a rice or liquid material.

15 The drawing shows a transport path extending from a machine not shown for filling flexible bags 6 with a rice or liquid material and for closing the bags to a top open packaging container 1 in the form of a folding carton. The conveyor belt consists of three characteristic sections 2, 3 and 4. The conveyor section 2 extends horizontally and consists of an endless conveyor belt 5 on which the bags 6 filled in the filling and closing machine are laid flat and successively in a row. The packaged material in the bags is evenly distributed therein. Following the conveyor section 2, there is also a horizontal conveyor section 3 in the form of an endless conveyor belt 7. However, the section 3 is located somewhat lower than the section 2, and the conveyor belt 7 advances the bags 6 at a lesser speed than the conveyor belt 30 5. Due to the different conveying speed of the two conveyor belts 5 and 7 cause the bags 6 to overlap as they are transferred from the conveyor belt 5 to the conveyor belt 7. By briefly increasing the speed of the conveyor belt 7, a space in the row 8 of overlapping bags 6 can be provided.

DK 169172 B1 5

The conveyor section 4 is curved downwards from horizontal to vertical direction and includes a curved conveyor belt 9 arranged on the inside of the curb, the curvature of which is secured by a guide not shown. On the outside of the curvature arc 5 is arranged a portion 10 of a further conveyor belt which is guided at the front end of the conveyor section 4 around a guide roller 11 adjustable in height with respect to the conveyor belt 9 and at the lower lower end of the track section 4 is guided around a guide member 12 10 with rings. height that can be set in the longitudinal direction of the latter conveyor belt. Between the guide roller 11 and the guide member 12, the active belt portion 10 of the latter conveyor belt is guided by the conveyor belt 9 which is supported by said guide forming members not shown 15, the belt part 10 being supported by the belt 9 via the bags 13 sandwiched between it and the conveyor belt 9. In addition, the latter endless conveyor belt with the belt portion 10 is guided around further guide rollers 14, 15, 16 and 17, of which the guide roller 17 20 is actuated by a spring not shown in such a way that the upper conveyor belt is held taut. The bypass roller 17 eliminates slack in the conveyor belt resulting from excess belt length.

The upper conveyor belt extends down into the packaging container 1 which is affected by a force in the direction of the arrow 18, e.g. the frictional force between the container 1 and its support. However, the container can be displaced on the substrate to the right in FIG. 1 against the effect of force 18. The packaging carton 1 is filled as follows:

Upon transfer from the conveyor section 2 to the section 3, the flat bags 6 are caused to overlap in the manner mentioned above, thereby reducing the conveying speed without reducing the number of bags transported in the unit of time. After advancing a certain number of bags 6 that fit into the vessel 1 tone, the conveyor belt 7 speed increases, so that the bag row 8 is separated from the subsequent bags by forming a space. As soon as the bag row 8 reaches onto the downwardly curved conveyor section 5, the bag is squeezed between the two conveyor belts 9, 10, thereby ensuring that the bags on this downwardly extending section are conveyed at a certain desired speed despite this influencing gravity. . Furthermore, by squeezing and holding the bags between the two conveyor belts, it is ensured that the said distribution of the packaged material in the bags is maintained. The "squeezed" condition of the bags is maintained even after the individual bag has emerged from the operating area of the conveyor belt 9, because the left end wall of the packaging container 1 then takes over the control of the first bag 15 during its introduction into the container, and then the bags 13 already placed in the container take over. controlling the bag being fed at all times during its placement in container 1. The bags 13 are transported at a defined rate even after leaving the belt 20 9 because they are affected by the belt portion 10 of the second conveyor belt until they are in their final position. position in the container 1. Since the conveyor belt portion 10 is unsurprisingly supported, the bags 13 exert a directed pressure opposite the force direction 18 when they are transported into the carton 1, so that as it is filled with bags, it is displaced on its substrate towards right in FIG. 1, i.e. opposite to the force direction 18. In the simplest case, the carton may be arranged on a slide, so that the pressure must be sufficiently large to move the carton.

If this pressure is not sufficiently large or so large that the material in the bags would damage the pressure effect, the container may be affected by an additional pressure in the direction of movement of the container.

As soon as the carton 1 is completely filled with flat bags, the above-mentioned spaces between the two successive bag rows 8, 13 are utilized to pull up the guide member DK 169172 B1 7 12 from the carton and to insert the guide member into a next empty packaging container.

5

Claims (4)

A method of inserting flexible foil packages (6) filled with a non-positioned material, especially flat rags filled with a ripple or flowable material, into packaging containers (1), in which a string (8) overlapping one another foil packaging (6) is first fed horizontally and then over a curved transport web section (4) is inserted vertically into a packaging container (1) which is filled starting from a container end wall, whereby the bag string (8) on the curved transport web section (4) is held between two conveyor belts (9, 10), and each foil packaging in the packaging container (1) abuts one downwardly in this projecting guide member (12) on the conveyor section (4) and the packaging container (1) is moved forward under the pressure from the inserted foil packages, characterized in that non-overlapping foil packages (6) are applied flat in a row one after the other on a first conveyor belt (5) and from this is transferred to a second conveyor belt (7) which is conveyed at a lesser speed than the first, whereby the film packages on the second conveyor belt are formed to form said string of overlapping foil packages that the second conveyor belt (7) after transfer of a predetermined number of foil packages corresponding to the packaging container (1) is accelerated briefly to provide a space after the bag string (8), that the bag string (8, 13) is inserted over the arcuate conveyor section (4) into the packaging container (1); after the completion of the filling process, the control means (12) is withdrawn from the packaging container (1) for the interval of time given by the gap, that the packaging container 35 (1) is transported away and the control means (12) is introduced into a subsequent empty packaging container. DK 169172 B1 9 Apparatus for carrying out the method according to claim 1, including a conveying path for packaging containers (1), mainly horizontal transport path sections (2, 3) with supporting conveyors for supplying foil packaging (6), and an up to the horizontal transport path sections. (2, 3) closing arcuate conveyor section (4) with a lower conveyor belt (9) disposed on the inside of the bow and an upper conveyor belt (10) disposed on the outside of the bow arranged to clamp the foil packaging 10 between them and the upper conveyor belt (10). 10) is guided around a guide roller (11) at a transfer point from the horizontal conveyor section (2, 3), and around a guide member (12) at a vertical end portion of the arcuate conveyor section (4), known in that: a first conveyor belt (5) is arranged on the horizontal conveyor section (2, 3) for supplying in a row one after the other without flat overlap foil packaging (6) and adjacent to this conveyor belt a slightly lower positioned 20 and less speed driven second conveyor belt (7) for receiving the foil packaging from the first conveyor belt to form a string (8) of overlapping packaging bags, and that the intermediate conveyor belt ( 7) is adapted to be capable of being briefly switched 25 at an increased rate to provide a gap in the bag string (8). Apparatus according to claim 2, characterized in that the guide roller (11) for the upper conveyor belt (10) of the curved conveyor section (4) is adjustable in height. Apparatus according to claim 2 or 3, characterized in that the upper conveyor belt (10) is passed over a belt bearing (17) and about a guide member (12) adjustable in the longitudinal direction of the conveyor belt.