GB1344376A - Method and apparatus for handling flat work pieces - Google Patents

Abstract

1344376 Delivering or feeding sheets RODER & SPENGLER oHG 6 Aug 1971 [10 Aug 1970 1 March 1971 29 March 1971] 36973/71 Heading B8R Delivering sheets.-Sheets carried on a belt 14, Fig. 2, are conveyed over a stacking table 3 by engagement between transfer means comprising a group of rods 9 carried on continuously driven chains 7 and a plurality of staggered pairs of belts 24-28 driven round pairs of rollers 29-35. When a sheet 23 is fully over the table, the belts 24-28 are stopped by disengaging magnetic clutches, so that, owing to higher friction between the sheet and the belts than the sheet and the rods, the sheet stops, while the rods move away from underneath it, Fig. 4, to allow the sheet to drop on to the table. The front end of a next group of rods 9 is then in position to receive the next sheet. In another form, Figs. 8 and 9, the transfer means comprises a belt 121 passing over a roller 123 adjacent a delivery conveyer 134, over a roller 124 adjacent a co-operating belt 135, and over a plurality of carrier rollers 113- 117 connected together by a flexible cable 119, the roller 113 being mounted on a carriage 119 which reciprocates in a guide slot 110 as the carriage alternately engages the upper and lower runs of a chain drive 107. Spring-urged rollers 128, 130 compensate for the movement of the roller 113. Sheets delivered from the conveyer 134 are carried over a stacking table 104 by the belt 121 when it passes over the rollers 113-117, and when the rollers are retracted to the position of Fig. 1, the sheet is deposited on a stack 101. The table is lowered by chains 102 as the stack forms. In another form, Fig. 11, the transfer belt 221 passes over guide rollers 213, 230 jounalled on guide chains 207, 234, the roller 213 reciprocating over the stacking table 204 and the roller 230 moving to compensate, whereby the sheets 203 are drawn over the table 206 and deposited thereon. Feeding sheets.-Any of the forms described may be modified for separating sheets from the top of a pile on the table, by reversing the drive of all the conveyers and of the table, and providing above the left end of the table a plurality of vertically slidable suction separators which grip the left end of a sheet and raise it, whereupon the rods 9 (or rollers 13-17 or roller 213) move under the sheet to separate it from the pile, and it is then forwarded by means such as the belts 24-28 to the belt 14 or other forwarding means.