GB2084951A - Apparatus for loading packaging containers with articles of varying sizes - Google Patents

Abstract

An article conveyor 6 of a bag loader comprises two side-by-side conveyor belts 9 and 10 having a plurality of pockets 7a ... 7e defining between separator strips 15a ... 15d (carried by conveyor belt 9 and defining the trailing side of the respective pocket) and a plurality of associated separator strips 12b ... 12e (carried by the other conveyor belt 10 and defining the leading side of each pocket). Adjustment of the width of the pocket is achieved by shifting the angular orientation of one of the conveyor belts 10 on its circulating path relative to the other conveyor belt such that, even though the two conveyor belts 9 and 10 are normally driven synchronously from the same drive source, mere shifting of the orientation of the drive pulley for one (9) of the conveyor belts on a drive shah carrying the pulley of the other conveyor belt 10 will effect the necessary change in pocket width. The articles are ejected from the pockets by means of a single reciprocating article pusher (5) moving transversely of the direction of belt circulation. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Apparatus for loading packaging containers with articles of varying sizes The present invention relates to apparatus for loading articles into packaging containers, to be packaged therein, and in particular the present invention provides a means for defining articleholding pockets from which the articles may be propelled into a packaging container, for example a bag of heat-shrinkable and heat weldable plastics film.

It is known to load product articles into packaging containers such as flexible bags of heat-shrinkable film material by supplying bags to the bag loader, for example in the form of a continuous chain of discrete bags carried releasably on adhesively-coated support tapes, and to locate an article to be packaged at the loading station by feeding it forwardly on a conveyor belt into a guide from which the article is propelled into the leading bag of the chain, after opening of the bag by for example an inflation air jet.

With such bag loading equipment, the conveyor belt is designed to accommodate the maximum size of article to be packaged and the width of the article guide is large enough to receive the largest article so that when smaller articles are provided they are expected to arrive centrally of the product guide and to be inserted centrally into the opened bag. However, because the width of the article is less than the width of the sides of the guide for the article to be loaded, there is no certainty that the article will be positioned centrally of the bag; in the case of cylindrical or spherical articles the fact that the article may roll before or during its propulsion from the article guide into the bag can cause problems as regards centralisation of the article in the bag.

According to the present invention we provide apparatus for loading packaging containers with articles to be packaged, comprising an articletransporting conveyor having a plurality of pockets open at a delivery end and arranged such that the pockets move laterally to transport articles to a container loading path; means for driving said pockets for said lateral movement in use of the apparatus; side walls to each side pocket which comprise a first separating strip to one side of said pocket and a second separating strip to the other side of said pocket; means for simultaneously shifting the position of each of said first separating strips with respect to the associated one of said second separating strips to vary the width of all the said pockets simultaneously; and means for propelling an article from each of said pockets in turn as said pockets pass said article delivery path, for insertion of said articles into a packaging container along said path.

With such an article-transporting conveyor, the simultaneous adjustability of the separating strips defining the opposite side walls of all of the pockets makes it possible to adjust very quickly the width of each of the pockets of the conveyor. It is therefore no longer necessary to rely on a wide conveyor feeding any one of a number of sizes of article, and thus the only possible mismatch between the article-receiving pockets and the articles themselves will result from the normal tolerance on the dimensions of individual articles of a batch. The apparatus is particularly suitable for feeding cylindrical or spherical articles in that the width of the pocket is substantially the same as the diameter of the article, and rolling is essentially prevented.

Furthermore, by propelling the articles laterally from the pockets rather than longitudinally along a guidethe apparatus is effective to transport articles in a much more rapid succession since the propulsion of an article from one pocket can be followed virtually immediately by propulsion of the corresponding articles from the next pocket after merely an indexing of the pockets through an incremental travel equal to only slightly more than the width of a pocket.On the contrary, with a longitudinally-discharging conveyor it is necessary to stop the conveyor for some considerable time while the product article is advanced off the end of the conveyor by means which should not interfere with the positioning of the next successive article, and consequently a considerable travel of the conveyor is needed between the propulsion of a first article and the subsequent propulsion of the next successive article in the row on the conveyor.

The apparatus in accordance with the present invention has the advantage that the bags may be supplied to the loader in the form of a chain of laterally-extending bags at least partially together by side seals of the bag walls which side seals extend transversely of the chain, the mouth ends of the various bags being arranged at one margin of the chain with the mouths facing laterally at that margin, and the closed ends of the bags being arranged along the opposite margin of the chain.

Such a bag supply chain is able to be advanced under tension to the bag loading station and consequently there is no risk of folding of the bags.

In order that the present invention may more readily be understood the following description is given, merely by way of example, with reference to the accompanying drawings in which: FIGURE 1 is a side elevational view in schematic form of an apparatus in accordance with the present invention; FIGURE 2 is a top plan view of the apparatus illustrated in Figure 1; FIGURE 3 is a top plan view, on a larger scale, of the article-advancing conveyor shown in the plan view of Figure 2; FIGURE 4 is a horizontal section taken through the axis of rotation common to the drive pulleys of the two conveyor belts at one end of the articletransport conveyor, again on a larger scale; and FIGURE 5 is a front elevational, partly sectional view of the apparatus shown in Figure 4.

The apparatus schematically illustrated in Figures 1 and 2 comprises a supply roll 1 of preperforated side-sealed bag material in the form of a continuous chain of bags having the "mouth ends" of the various bags arranged along one margin of the chain (at the end 1 a of the supply roll in Figure 2) and the "ciosed ends" of the bags at the other margin (corresponding to the end 1 b of the supply roll in Figure 2).

From the supply roll 1, the bag material passes over a guide bar 2 and onwardly to a bag separating station 3.

At the bag-separating station 3 a pull on the bag chain is exerted along the line of predetermined weakness defined by a perforation line between the trailing side of the first bag of the chain and the leading side of the second bag of the chain. In doing so, the bag-separating mechanism exerts more tension at the end of the line of predetermined weakness near the "closed ends" of the two bags than it does on the end of the line of predetermined weakness corresponding to the mouth ends of the two bags. Indeed, one possibility is for there to be substantially no tension at the "mouth end" of the line of weakness and for the bag-separating tension to be concentrated at the "closed end" of the line of predetermined weakness.

From the bag separating station 3 the separated first bag is moved laterally to the bag loading station 4 in line with an article pushing member driven by an article-propelling ram 5. The individual articles to be loaded into the bags by operation of the ram 5 are fed to the loading station 4 by means of an article-advancing conveyor 6 which has a plurality of individual pockets 7a, 7b, 7c, 7d and 7e the width of which can be adjusted by means to be described later.

The articles are picked up in the pockets at a schematically illustrated article insertion unit 8 and are thus carried laterally to the loading station 4. The width of the individual pockets of the bags will be pre-adjusted for a given batch of articles so that the pockets will be capable of accepting the iargest articles within the tolerance range of that particular batch, but there will at no time be any considerable discrepancy between the pocket width and the article width.

The articles may, for example, be of cylindrical form such as "continental sausage" or cheeses of similar shape.

Attempting to feed such articles in a longitudinal direction along a conveyor gives problems due to the tendency of the articles to roil, but by having the various pockets 7a, 7b, 7c, 7d and 7e of the conveyor dimensioned to match the diameter of the cross-section of the article and open at at least the side of the conveyor nearer to the bag-separating station 3, the article conveyor 6 is capable of handling such difficult articles with relative ease.

The mechanism for adjusting the widths of the pockets 7a . . . 7e of the conveyor is illustrated in more detail in Figure 3 where the conveyor generally designated 6 is shown as comprising two separate conveyor belts 9 and 10 and which are entrained for rotation about common axes 1 a and 1 1b.

The conveyor belt has a set of pocket-defining separating strips 12a... 1 2e mounted thereon by means of brackets such as the bracket 13a which is secured to the belt 10 by two fasteners 14.

Each of the strips 12a . . . 12e extends across the full width of the article-transporting conveyor 6 so that the half of the plate 12a which is not in register with the bracket 13a overlies the other conveyor belt 9.

Likewise, the conveyor belt 9 has a plurality of plates 1 S.... 1 sue fastened thereto by a bracket such as 1 6a by means of further fasteners 14 of any suitable form, and these strips 1 5.... 1 sue themselves overhang the other conveyor belt 10.

The brackets 13a and 1 6a are in the space between two successive pockets 7a and 7b and this space can be varied from a minimum value at which the two brackets 13a and 1 6a are directly in line, to a maximum value in which the strip 1 5a is at its closest to the strip 1 2b defining the other side of the same pocket 7b. It may even be possible for the width of the pocket 7b to be adjusted to be so wide that the bracket 1 3a underlies the corresponding end of the strip 1 5a while the bracket 1 6a underlies the corresponding end of the strip 12a.

This adjustability of the width of the pockets 7a . .. 7e is achieved by adjustment of the timing of the conveyor belt 10 (i.e. the position of its various separating strips 12a... 12e) relative to that of the conveyor belt 9 (i.e. the position of its separating strips 15a ... 1 5e) for any given angular position of the drive sprocket (not shown in Figure 3) which drives the conveyor belt 9.

In operation of the article-transporting conveyor 6, the various separating strip 12a ... 1 2e and 15a ... 1 sue advance at the same speed and the pre-set timing of the conveyor belts 9 and 10 remains constant to hold the width of the respective pockets 7a ... 7e constant.In this way, as each pocket of the conveyor arrives at the position occupied by pocket 7e in Figure 3 the righthand strip (such as strip 1 5d which is supported by the conveyor belt 9) is directly in line with the upstream side of the side of the bag held at the bag loading station 4 whereas the strip 1 2e on the lefthand side of that pocket will be in any one of a number of positions depending on the relative timing of the two conveyor belts 9 and 1 0 (i.e. on the width of the pockets 7a ... 7e).

The bag separating station 3 of Figure 2 includes a first bag holding assembly 20 and a second bag holding assembly 23 which together cooperate to separate a first bag from a second bag of the bag chain delivered from supply roll 1.

The detailed operation of this bag-separating action is described and claimed in our co-pending British Patent Application No.

(publication No. ) a copy of the specification and drawings of which is attached.

This bag-separating action involves clamping of a first bag of the chain by relatively movable upper and lower clamping jaws of the first holding assembly 20 and clamping of a second bag of the chain by relatively movable upper and lower clamping jaws of the second bag holding assembly 23 so that the two assemblies 20 and 23 hold the respective bags to either side of the line of perforations between the side seals of the bags.The first bag-holding assembly 20 advances (i.e. moves leftwardly as considered in Figure 2) away from the stationary second bag-holding assembly 23 and in so doing is pivotable about a pivot axis 33 so that the end of the perforation line adjacent the axis 33 is subjected to most if not all of the bag-separating tension and this provokes rupture of the perforation line progressively along the perforation line from the end near the pivot axis 33.This separation continues, by continued movement of the first bag holding assembly 20 away from the second bag holding assembly 23, until total separation between the two bags has been achieved and then the first bag holding assembly 20 opens, with actuation of a suction pad carried on the upper jaw thereof to open the bag as the clamping action is released, and the bag is then brought into register with the path of movement of the article pusher driven by the ram 5, where the bag-advancing conveyor 25 stops until bag loading has been carried out, and from then on the loaded bag is transported by further movement of the conveyor 25 eventuaily arriving at the vacuum chamber 31 where one or more bags may be evacuated simultaneously and where "in-chamber" closing means such as heat sealing bars may be provided in order to seal the bags.

Figures 4 and 5 illustrate, on a much larger scale, the mechanism for adjusting the timing between the two conveyor belts 9 and 10. These two belts are themselves shown in Figure 4 and this drawing also shows the toothed drive pullies 60 and 61 of the respective conveyor belts 9 and 10.

A shaft 62 rotatably supporting the two toothed drive pulleys 60 and 61 has the pulley 61 non-rotatably pinned thereto at 63 and the other pulley 60 rotatably mounted with respect to a carrier 64 which is itself pinned at 65 to the shaft, rotation of the pulley 60 with respect to the shaft 62 being achieved by way of the adjustment mechanism having a control screw 74 reversed in a casing 66 externally of the conveyor frame 67.

A drive chain sprocket 68 is connected to a drive chain (not shown) which imparts the necessary drive torque to the sprocket 68 for circulating the two conveyor belts 9 and 10 synchronously.

The adjustment mechanism, generally designated 69, comprises a drive plate 70 which is secured to one end of the shaft 62 and has a pin 71 projecting axially therefrom at an eccentric location.

The pulley 60 is carried by a sleeve assembly 72 having a similar pin 73 axially extending therefrom at an eccentric location.

The control screw 74 intersects the axis of rotation of the shaft 62 diametrically and is illustrated in Figure 5 as having a hexagonal socket 75 into which a suitable key can be engaged to rotate the screw 74 to effect the appropriate timing change.

A long threaded shank 74a of the adjustment screw 74 is threadedly engageable with a chordally extending link 76 which has at its ends elongate recesses 77a, 77b which also extend chordally of the axis 11 b of the shaft 62 and receive the axially extending pins 71 and 73 of the plate 70 on the one hand and the sleeve 72 on the other hand. Clearly, by acting on the adjustment screw 74 and thereby displacing the portion of the chordally extending link 76 with respect to the axis of rotation 11 b of the shaft 62, it is possible to shift the angular orientations of the plate 70 on the one hand and the sleeve 72 on the other hand with respect to the cover 66 of the adjustment mechanism, and thereby to shift the angular orientation of the shaft 62 with respect to the sleeve 72. For example, lifting the chordally extending link 76 (as viewed in Figure 9) will rotate the plate 70 anticlockwise through a given angle with respect to the housing 66 of the adjustment mechanism and will rotate the sleeve 72 through exactly the same angle in the opposite direction. The result will be that the timing of the conveyor belt 9 (driven by the toothed pulley 60 non-rotatably connected to the sleeve 72) with respect to the conveyor belt 10 (driven by the toothed pulley 61 keyed at 63 to the shaft 62) will have been shifted by twice the angular shift of the plate 70 and the sleeve 72 with respect to the casing 66. Access to the hexagonal socket 65 of the adjustment screw 75 is readily obtainable from outside the casing 66 when the belt conveyors 9 and 10 are stationary.

Claims (8)

1. Apparatus for loading packaging containers with articles to be packaged, comprising an article-transportingconveyor having a plurality of pockets open at a delivery ena ana arranged sucn that the pockets move laterally to transport articles to a container loading path; means for driving said pockets for said lateral movement in use of the apparatus; side walls to each said pocket which comprise a first separating strip to one side of said pocket and a second separating strip to the other side of said pocket; means for simultaneously shifting the position of each of said first separating strips with respect to the associated one of said second separating strips to very the width of all the said pockets simultaneously; and means for propelling an article from each of said pockets in turn as said pockets pass said article delivery path, for insertion of said articles into a packaging container along said path.

2. Apparatus according to claim 1, wherein said first and second strips are parallel, and the width of each said pocket is constant along its length.

3. Apparatus according to claim 1 or claim 2, wherein said pockets are all open at both ends, and said article propelling means enters each said pocket through its end opposite said delivery end and expels the article from within said pocket through said delivery end.

4. Apparatus according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein the floor of each said pocket is defined by a belt conveyor comprising two side-by-side conveyor belts, said first separating strips being drivably supported on a first of said two conveyor belts and said second separating strips all being drivably supported by said second of said two conveyor belts, and said means for simultaneously adjusting the positioning of each of said first strips with respect to the associated second strip comprises means for adjusting the angular orientation of said first conveyor belt on its circulation path with respect to said second conveyor.

5. Apparatus according to claim 4, wherein said first and second belt conveyors are mounted on drive pulleys such that one drive pulley of said first conveyor belt and one drive pulley of said second conveyor belt are mounted on a common shaft, said one drive pulley of said first belt being fixed to said shaft and said one drive wheel of said second belt being rotatable with respect to said shaft but connected thereto by a linkage capable of adjustment of the angular position of said one drive wheel of said second conveyor with respect to said shaft; wherein said linkage comprises said means for simultaneously adjusting the positioning of said first separating strips with respect to said second separating strips.

6. Apparatus according to claim 5, wherein said linkage includes: a first pin mounted eccentrically with respect to said shaft and extending parallel to said shaft and carried by said shaft; a second pin mounted eccentrically of said shaft and extending parallel to said shaft, but carried by said one drive wheel of said second conveyor belt; a link having slots which extend chordally of said shaft and receive respective ones of said first and second pins: and means for shifting said link towards and away from the axis of rotation of said shaft to shift said pins angularly with respect to the axis of said shaft.

7. Apparatus according to claim 6, wherein said means for shifting said link towards and away from the axis of rotation of said shaft comprises an adjustment screw.

8. Apparatus for loading articles into a packaging container, constructed and adapted to operate substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to, and as illustrated in, the accompanying drawings.