EP1544109A1 - Method and apparatus for conditioning tyres in stacks. - Google Patents

Abstract

The procedure, in which tyres (P) of the same dimensions are aligned, compressed and held under tension while straps are applied, is performed by machine with rotating rollers (200, 201) to align tyres. After alignment the rollers are halted and tyres compressed by compression plates (300, 301), and held under tension while fastening straps are fitted with the aid of guide rails. The procedure, in which tyres (P) of the same dimensions are aligned, compressed and held under tension while straps are applied, is performed by machine with rotating rollers (200, 201) to align tyres, at least one of the rollers being driven. After alignment the rollers are halted and tyres compressed by 10-15% by compression plates (300, 301) with low friction surface coatings or rollers, and held under tension while plastic or metal fastening straps are fitted with the aid of guide rails.

Description

The present invention relates to the technical sector of the packaging of pneumatic tires, and more precisely tire casings not mounted on a rim, for carrying out the transport or storage of said envelopes.

The constant search for productivity gains, coupled with a constant desire to improve the working conditions of the operators in this sector led the various actors of the industrial sector, to optimize the supply chain by acting on the conditions warehousing, transportation, loading and unloading, as well as on the production of easily identifiable and mobile lots according to the needs of delivery or optimization of storage areas. These Optimizations must also not be detrimental to the integrity of the tires.

A first solution is to use pallets specially sized to to be able to receive envelopes of various sizes and diameters. For exemple, a pallet commonly used in warehouses is described in application US 5,259,325, wherein the envelopes are stored in stack or in roller. Pallets of this type have the advantage of constituting homogeneous batches envelopes, to be arranged on top of one another on great heights, may be handled by mechanical means of the forklift type, to offer good protection of envelopes against external aggression. They are in less suitable for transport, particularly on long journeys, because the small number of tires they contain in view of their bulk, and management of returns of empty pallets.

For transport over long distances, we will try to bring in the largest number of envelopes in a given volume which can be indifferently a trailer truck, a shipping container or a railway car.

Another commonly used solution is to arrange the envelopes on each the others with a particular arrangement said in "fishbone" and put the volume thus formed in compression so as to optimize loading. These methods are described, for example, in US Pat. No. 5,092,106. Very effective in optimizing the the volume to be loaded, they nevertheless have the disadvantage of having to be part manually, especially during unloading operations, which is a limiting factor from an ergonomic point of view because of the size and weight of envelopes that can be manipulated. Moreover, this solution is revealed particularly inefficient in a storage warehouse because of the difficulty in handle and move the batches thus produced, because it imposes a break in conditioning in the supply chain upstream and downstream of the transport operation, and that it is likely to cause mixtures, in case of several dimensions envelopes would be packaged in the same load. Finally, she is not without influences on the integrity of the tires because of the deformations that the latter can suffer.

For this purpose it is remarkable to note that each of the solutions mentioned above represents an optimal solution for a particular area such as shopping or transport, but rarely the same technical solution is proving to be advantageous on the entire logistics chain. This leads to the introduction of additional handlings, which partly ruin the gains made by the choice the most suitable solution for a particular point of said chain.

This is why intermediate solutions have been developed for the purpose to find a global optimum. One of these solutions is to condition the envelopes in piles, generally consisting of about ten envelopes arranged one on the others so as to form a vertical axis cylinder whose outer surface is substantially constituted by the treads of each of the envelopes.

This solution has the advantage of constituting homogeneous handling batches easily manipulated using suitable means. It thus brings a compromise interesting to optimize the logistics chain on all operations of the chain logistics such as shopping, loading and unloading operations, but also transport, especially for large envelopes difficult to manipulate manually, and proves particularly well adapted when the transport is carried out in several stages.

Once the stack is made up, the envelopes of the stack can be made integral by a link or strap as proposed in GB 166 747 or US Patent 1 507 376, by a shrink film as described in US Pat. No. 4,858,415 or remain under the sole action of their own weight.

Industrial machines, of the type proposed by US Pat. No. 3,955,491, have been developed to build batteries automatically in a first step, then to have one or more retaining straps in a second time.

Depending on the size of the envelopes, it is possible to have one or more batteries side by side on a flat pallet, which is generally not recoverable, so as to optimize the size of the handling batches or to treat the pile independently.

However, the optimization of these solutions is partly linked to the number of envelopes it It is possible to gather within the same pile and consequently to the height maximum of the battery.

In particular, it may be particularly interesting to make batteries whose height corresponds to the height of the volume used for the transport, and the increase in the height of the trailers used in road transport leads to wanting to use tall stacks. "High height" means heights that can be commonly go up to 3m, or even more in some special cases.

We note that these batteries are particularly delicate to handle in the absence of means of securing the envelopes constituting them, because of the risk possible fall of one or more envelopes during handling. On the other hand, we also find that under the action of their own weight or under the action of tension straps, these piles have an unfortunate tendency to deform and present a vertical projection of their center of gravity very eccentric to the center of their basis of levitation, constituted in this case by the contact of the first tire of the pile with the ground, and thus leading to pile instability and high risk and unacceptable reversal.

The object of the invention is to reduce these disadvantages.

Thus it has been shown that a precise alignment of the axes of the envelopes constituting the stack, prior to any compression operation, makes it possible to obtain cylindrical cells having a very substantially vertical axis, allowing the realization of piles of high height whose center of gravity projects substantially in the center of the base of levitation.

This precise alignment of the axes of rotation of the tires takes place before putting the stack in compression and after having deposited said tires on rollers alignment, by rotating all the tires intended for make up the pile. By doing so, the areas of contact between flanks of two adjacent tires so that their axes of rotation are precisely aligned, and we release all radial stresses located at these interfaces and likely to later deform the stack.

• Disposer les pneumatiques de même dimension et destinés à constituer une pile sur un dispositif de conditionnement comprenant un ensemble de rouleaux d'alignement, montés en rotation autour d'axes parallèles entre eux, chacun des rouleaux étant destiné à venir en contact avec les bandes de roulement de chacun desdits pneumatiques de manière à maintenir ces derniers de manière stable, l'axe de rotation des pneumatiques étant sensiblement parallèle à l'axe des rouleaux d'alignement.
• Puis, mettre en rotation au moins un des rouleaux, de manière à entraíner en rotation l'ensemble des pneumatiques destinés à constituer la pile autour de chacun de leurs axes de rotation respectifs, jusqu'à ce que les axes de rotation de chacun des pneumatiques soient précisément alignés avec l'axe de rotation CC' du cylindre formé par la pile ainsi constituée et dont les génératrices sont tangentes à la bande de roulement de chacun des pneumatiques, et parallèles à l'axe des rouleaux d'alignement,
• Arrêter la rotation des rouleaux d'alignement.
• Comprimer la pile dans la direction axiale à l'aide d'un moyen de compression tout en conservant l'alignement réalisé dans l'étape précédente.
• Disposer des moyens de contention selon des génératrices dudit cylindre permettant de maintenir la pile en compression.
• Relâcher l'action du moyen de compression afin de dégager la pile.
• évacuer la pile.

The method of packaging tires in a stack then comprises the following steps:

• Arranging tires of the same size and intended to form a stack on a packaging device comprising a set of alignment rollers rotatably mounted about axes parallel to each other, each of the rollers being intended to come into contact with the strips of rolling each of said tires so as to maintain them in a stable manner, the axis of rotation of the tires being substantially parallel to the axis of the alignment rollers.
• Then, rotate at least one of the rollers, so as to cause rotation of all the tires intended to form the pile around each of their respective axes of rotation, until the axes of rotation of each of the tires are precisely aligned with the axis of rotation CC 'of the cylinder formed by the stack thus formed and whose generatrices are tangent to the tread of each of the tires, and parallel to the axis of the alignment rollers,
• Stop the rotation of the alignment rollers.
• Compress the stack in the axial direction using a compression means while retaining the alignment made in the previous step.
• To dispose of the means of contention according to generatrices of said cylinder making it possible to maintain the stack in compression.
• Release the action of the compression means to clear the stack.
• evacuate the battery.

The device allowing the implementation of this method comprises means alignment means, means for compressing the tire stack, and means of setting restraints, and is characterized in that the means of alignment are constituted by at least two alignment rollers mounted in rotation around axes parallel to each other, each of the rollers being intended to come into contact with the treads of each of said tires so as to maintain these stably, at least one of the rollers being capable of causing rotation all the tires around their respective axes of rotation.

The alignment rollers may be arranged horizontally or alternatively, according to a variant embodiment, vertically.

• la figure 1 représente une vue schématique d'une implantation industrielle comprenant un dispositif de conditionnement conforme à l'invention,
• la figure 2 représente une vue schématique d'un dispositif de conditionnement conforme à l'invention,
• la figure 3a représente une vue schématique d'une pile de pneumatique réalisée avec un procédé traditionnel,
• la figure 3b représente une vue schématique d'une pile de pneumatique réalisée avec un procédé de conditionnement en pile des pneumatiques conforme à l'invention

The following description proposes to give a non-limiting example of embodiment of an apparatus the implementation of which is in accordance with the invention based on the figures in which

• FIG. 1 represents a schematic view of an industrial plant including a packaging device according to the invention,
• FIG. 2 represents a schematic view of a packaging device according to the invention,
• FIG. 3a is a schematic view of a tire stack made with a conventional method,
• FIG. 3b represents a schematic view of a tire stack made with a tire stacking method according to the invention;

In what follows, the same references will refer to the elements of the apparatus having identical functions, as shown in Figures 1 to 3.

Figure 1 presents a general schematic view of the production process in which the packaging machine is integrated. A forklift 1 brings the pneumatic packaged in vertical P - piles on a supply belt 2.

A loading and turning device 3 grasps the pile P and deposits it in the conditioning device 4.

It will be noted, as will be described in detail later, that this device for conditioning is arranged horizontally and that it is therefore necessary to rotate the axis of rotation of the envelopes so as to bring them in a horizontal position.

Moreover, when the stack to be packaged represents a number of envelopes too important for their stability to be manageable during transfer operations upstream, it is quite possible to introduce the envelopes in several operations of loading in the conditioning device 4.

Once the conditioning operation has been performed on the conditioning device 4, the same device 3 serves to extract the battery P and, after rotation, to arrange it on the carpet evacuation 5.

FIG. 2 represents a schematic view of a conditioning device 4 according to the invention, and configured in the following manner.

A frame 100, 101, supports a horizontal axis XX 'on which are arranged the two compression trays 300 and 301. These trays are movable in translation along the axis XX 'under the action of the cylinders 302 and 303, and in rotation about the axis XX' by via a drive motor (not shown).

The compression plates support two alignment rollers 200 and 201 whose axes are parallel to each other, and form a substantially horizontal plane. They are arranged symmetrically with respect to a vertical plane passing through the axis XX '.

The rollers 200 and 201 are mounted in rotation, and one of these rollers is provided with a drive motor (not shown). The other roll may also be provided with a motorization allowing to drive it in rotation or simply to be free in rotation around its axis.

The rollers 200 and 201 are also movable in the horizontal plane and their ends move in lights 304 and 305 (not visible) so that it it is possible to vary their spacing "e" according to the dimension of pneumatic to condition.

The means of laying the means of restraint uses a technology largely commercially available, and consists of a fixed station 400 in which are arranged a heat-sealable strap dispenser, a circulating strapping head and a tensioner and a cutting and thermal welding tool (not shown). Tracks 401, 402 404 and 405 are arranged on a substantially horizontal plane passing substantially by the axis XX 'and the equator of the stack and form a parallelepiped rectangle surrounding the battery P. The rails 404 and 405 are arranged in the trays of compression 300 and 301. It is thus possible, using the strapping head, to make move the strap along the rails 401, 404, 402, and 405 then, using the tensioner tension the strap by applying a calibrated force which will have the effect of release the strap from the rails and press against two generators diametrically opposite of the pile and on the flanks of the two tires located at both ends of the battery. The strap is then cut and both ends are welded.

A restraint of this type is marketed by the Company as an example. Delonca under the trade name Jumbo.

The implementation of the device includes a series of steps that will shed light on functions of each of the organs described above.

In a first step, the tires are deposited on the alignment rollers 200, 201 by arranging the axes of rotation of the tires in a direction substantially parallel to the alignment rollers.

The number of tires intended to form the pile is carefully determined from in such a way that the height of the stack once constituted is substantially equal to the height of the most commonly used means of transport. This height varies commonly from 2.5m to 3.m depending on the type of standard used by the logistics and can go in some cases up to 3.5m. Care will be taken to subtract a reserve of custody necessary to perform the loading and unloading operations using mechanical means. The length of the alignment rolls 200, 201, and the spacing between the compression plates 300, 301 will be determined accordingly.

It is then necessary to take into account the compression ratio required to ensure cohesion of the pile once strapped.

• la compression nécessaire pour assurer la cohésion de la pile P pendant toutes les opérations de manutention ultérieures ; en faisant en sorte qu'à aucun instant, des glissements entre les flancs des pneumatiques ne puissent se produire, et détruisent alors la coaxialité de la pile avec pour conséquence l'introduction d'un facteur de déséquilibre lorsque cette dernière est stockée verticalement,
• les déformations sous contrainte (provisoire) des enveloppes et principalement la déformation des pneumatiques situés aux deux extrémités de la pile,

Experimentally determined, this compression ratio varies from 10 to 15% depending on the dimensions. The criteria for determining the optimum rate take into account:

• the compression necessary to ensure the cohesion of the stack P during all subsequent handling operations; by ensuring that at no time slippage between the sidewalls of the tires can occur, and then destroy the coaxiality of the stack with the consequence of introducing an imbalance factor when the latter is stored vertically,
• stress deformation (temporary) envelopes and mainly the deformation of the tires located at both ends of the stack,

It is particularly useful as we will see later to match the axis of the stack with the axis of rotation XX 'of the compression plates 300, 301, so as to ensure that the means of restraint are as regular as possible. By presetting judiciously the spacing "e" between the rollers 200 and 201 depending on the dimension to condition, we make sure that the axes of the tires and the axis of the pile will be substantially aligned with the axis XX '.

Reposed by two generators of their tread on each of the rollers 200, 201, it will be noted that in this arrangement the tires are maintained in a stable manner because their centers of gravity are located substantially on a vertical plane passing through the axis XX 'and between the alignment rollers 200 and 201.

Before the alignment operation itself, it may be useful to reform the battery and to position the tires as evenly as possible. For this purpose bring the compression platens 300, 301 closer together for the first time cause a slight compression of the battery then, we will release the pressure by positioning trays as close as possible to the point of last contact between their faces respective interior and sidewall of the tires at both ends of the battery.

Rotating one of the alignment rollers will cause rotation of each of the tires around its axis of rotation. This overall movement has the effect of precisely aligning each of the tires relative to one another and to ensure that the axis of rotation of each of the tires is confused with the axis CC ' of a cylinder formed by the stack thus formed and whose generatrices are tangent to the tread of each of the tires, and parallel to the axis of the rollers 200, 201, to obtain the required maximum concentricity. It's the precision this alignment, combined with compression to preserve its effects, which the pile the desired stability.

This operation is completed after having made a low number of laps on the stack of pneumatic; ten rounds seems to experimentally give satisfaction.

Once the alignment has been achieved, it is advisable to compress the battery and bring the two compression trays 300, 301.

It should be noted, however, that it may be particularly interesting to avoid this alignment operation performed the tires lose their alignments by lack of axial cohesion. This is the reason why it has been suggested above position the compression plates 300, 301, as close as possible to the faces external tires located at both ends of the stack.

However, in order to avoid any friction that may occur during the of alignment between the inner face of the compression plates and the outer flanks two tires located at both ends of the pile and likely to harm their good alignment, it is particularly interesting to provide the inside of said trays of devices promoting sliding. This device can be constituted by a film of low friction material such as Poly Tetra Fluoro film Ethylene or by a set of bearings.

The compression of the battery is carried out by operating axially the cylinders 302, 303 and moving the trays 300, 301. It may be advisable to compress the stack at a value slightly higher than the desired end value to take into account the elasticity of the straps.

We will take care during this operation not to compromise the alignment achieved during the previous step.

Once the stack is in compression and maintained between the two plates 300, 301, it is then possible to have the means of contention so as to restrain the movements of the stack in the axial direction. In order to ensure the best regularity of the clamping of the battery, It is recommended to have at least two straps so that the traces of straps on the sidewalls of the tires located at both ends of the pile delimit substantially equal sectors. Thus we will have two straps with an angle of 90 °, three straps with an angle of 60 ° and possibly four straps with an angle of 45 °.

Care should be taken to ensure that the tension of the straps is constant.

It is also particularly interesting to be able to turn the battery around its axis CC 'so as to dispose the means of contention as regularly as possible. For this purpose, the simultaneous rotation of the plates rotating around the axis XX ', substantially coincident with the axis CC' of the battery, makes it possible to arrange the battery according to as many angular positions as contention means to deposit, while maintaining the stack in compression to prevent any radial movement of the tires, some by compared to others. For this purpose the trays 300, 301 each include as many games of rails as necessary to ensure the continuity of guiding the strapping head is, in the configuration used to support this description, two rails arranged at 90 °, 403, 404, 405, 406 (not visible). In case one wishes to have three straps, he It is advisable to make three rails arranged at 60 ° on each of the plates 300, 301.

The choice of straps 407 (FIG. 3B) is adapted as a function of the dimension to condition. Namely that the width and thickness will be determined according to the constraints on the strap, but also depending on the pressure it is possible to exert on the flanks tires located at both ends of the pile without inducing permanent deformations. So we will choose a 25mm strap for a tourism-type dimension and a 35 mm strap for a dimension of type heavy weights.

The strap may be made of a flexible material such as polyester, polyamide or else polyethylene. Metal links may be used in dimension heavy weight preferably.

Once the means of contention are linked, the compression plates 300, 301 are returned to their initial angular position, and away from said trays compression is released the battery P, it is possible to evacuate with a means of unloading 3 and put back in vertical position.

The cell thus formed has sufficient internal cohesion to be able to undergo without harmful evolutions all subsequent handling.

Figures 3A and 3B show a stack as obtained with traditional means (3A) and a stack obtained with the method as described above (3B).

The configuration of the device used to support the description of the invention corresponds to a preferred embodiment. It will nevertheless be noted that it is possible to propose equivalent forms of implementation within the framework of the teachings proposed by the present invention.

Those skilled in the art can thus adapt the device without difficulty so as to have the two alignment rollers 200, 201 horizontally and parallel to each other but forming a plane at an angle to the horizontal.

Similarly, while keeping the alignment rolls horizontal and parallel between them, it is possible to arrange a device comprising three or more rollers.

Another configuration is to arrange the rolls vertically, which can constitute an advantage in terms of handling and organization of the workshop of conditioning.

In this context it is necessary to implement at least three rollers alignment so as to stably grip the stack to be conditioned. These rollers will be arranged so that the trace of the intersection of the axes of the rollers alignment with a horizontal plane forms a substantially regular polygon. he It will be necessary to provide a mechanism for approaching and removing rollers in the radial direction so as to free a space for introducing and extracting the pneumatic alignment device. Finally, the contention device will be positioned accordingly.

In this configuration it will also be necessary to adapt the radial pressure of the rolls on the treads of the tires so as to constrain these last to align correctly in a radial direction by fighting the forces of friction between the flanks of each of the tires of the stack.

The choice of a strap through the diametrically opposed generators remains the form of implementation best suited. However it is possible to realize a webbing by passing the webbing along a path through a generator outside the stack, by the radial paths adjacent to this generator and located on the flanks of the two tires located at both axial ends of the pile, and by the inside the stack. This requires having a rail passing through the inside of the stack and remove it at each end of the cycle, which is not without consequence on the clutter general and on the cycle time of the conditioning device.

Claims (15)

A method of packaging tires in a stack, characterized in that it comprises the following steps: arranging tires of the same size for constituting a stack (P) on a conditioning device (4) comprising a set of alignment rollers (200, 201) rotatably mounted about axes parallel to each other, each of the rollers being intended to come into contact with the treads of each of said tires so as to maintain them in a stable manner, the axis of rotation of the tires being substantially parallel to the axis of the alignment rollers, to rotate at least one of the rollers, so as to cause rotation of all the tires intended to constitute the stack around each of their respective axes of rotation, until the axes of rotation of each of the tires are aligned with the axis of rotation CC 'of the cylinder formed by the stack thus formed, stop the rotation of the alignment rollers, compressing the stack in the axial direction using a compression means (300, 301) while maintaining the alignment made in the previous step, having the contention means (407) for holding the stack in compression, releasing the action of the compression means in order to disengage the battery, evacuate the battery. The method of claim 1 wherein the alignment means comprises at least two alignment rollers (200, 201) arranged substantially horizontally so as to stably maintain said tires. The method of claim 1 wherein the alignment means comprises at least three alignment rolls (200, 201) arranged substantially vertically to stably maintain said tires. The method of claim 1 wherein the compression ratio of pneumatic tires is between 10% and 15%. The method of claim 1 wherein the restraining means (407) is consist of continuous straps tensioned. A stack tire conditioning device comprising alignment means, means for compressing the tire stack, and contention means, characterized in that the alignment means is at least one two alignment rollers (200, 201), rotatably mounted about axes parallel to each other, each of the rollers being intended to come into contact with the treads of each of said tires so as to maintain the tires in a stable manner, at least one of the rollers being capable of causing the rotation of the set of tires around their respective axes of rotation. Device according to claim 6 characterized in that the alignment rollers (200, 201) are arranged substantially horizontally. Device according to claim 6 comprising at least three alignment rollers (200, 201) arranged substantially vertically. Device according to one of claims 7 or 8 wherein the means of compression are formed by two trays (300, 301) whose inner faces are parallel to each other and perpendicular to the axis of the alignment rollers, and at least one of the flanges is movable in translation along an axis parallel to the axis of the alignment rollers. Device according to claim 9 wherein the inner face of the plates (300, 301) is covered with a film made of a material with low resistance to friction and intended to promote the sliding of the flanks of the tires on the inner faces of the trays. Device according to claim 9 wherein the inner face of the plates (300, 301) comprises bearings intended to promote the sliding of the flanks of the pneumatic tires on the inner faces of the trays. Device according to one of claims 7 or 8 wherein the means for laying the contention means (400, 401, 402, 403, 404, 405, 406) are arranged to dispose of said tension-retaining means, along a path passing through two external generators and diametrically opposed cylinder formed by the stack, and by the flanks of the tires located at both axial ends of the pile Device according to one of claims 7 or 8 wherein the means for laying the contention means are arranged for disposing said restraining means in voltage, along a path passing through an external generator of the battery, by the radial paths adjacent to this generator and located on the flanks of the two pneumatic tires located at both axial ends of the pile, and by the inner part of the pile Device according to one of claims 12 or 13 wherein the trays (300, 301) are rotatable about an axis XX ', parallel to the axis of the rollers alignment, so as to circumferentially orient the stack according to as many angular positions as contention means to deposit. Device according to claim 14 wherein the distance (e) between the rollers alignment (200, 201), is adjustable according to the dimension to be conditioned, in such a way that the axis CC 'of the stack once constituted is substantially merged with the axis XX 'of the compression plates.

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