GB2163696A - Food shaping apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

The food shaping apparatus includes: a housing; a pair of shaping rotors (18, 19) disposed within the housing, each rotor having a shaft (20, 21) rotatably and horizontally supported on the housing and having shaping recesses (22) formed in the circumferential face thereof so that two corresponding recesses of the rotors form a shaping cavity as the rotors are rotated; a first rotating mechanism, disposed to the housing, for synchronously rotating the shaping rotors; a guiding mechanism for guiding at least one shaping rotor to be horizontally movable toward and away from the other rotor; and a moving mechanism for moving the one shaping rotor to the other whereby the food material supplied above the shaping rotors is shaped in the shaping cavity of the rotors and dropped from the corresponding recesses as the rotors are rotated. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Food shaping apparatus Background of the Invention The present invention relates to a food shaping apparatus for shaping, for example, a ball of rice for sushi, a Japanese food.

Such a food shaping machine for automatically forming cereal food such a rice ball of sushi, which is conventionally hand shaped, is well known. Japanese Patent Publication No.

58-3660 discloses a typical automatic food shaping machine for shaping a rice ball for sushi, in which boiled grains of rice is supplied to a chute, from which the rice is introduced into a food passage communicated to the chute and having a reduceddiameter tip portion. Then, the rice is extruded from the tip portion on a conveyer to a shaping mechanism where it is shaped in sushi shape or as rice ball.

However, such a conventional food shaping machine is large in size and complicated in structure, resulting in high equipment cost.

/Summary of the Invention Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a food shaping apparatus which is less complicated in structure and small in size and is hence less expensive.

It is another object of the present invention to provide a food shaping apparatus which may be used for domestic use as well as commercial use.

With these and other objects in view the present invention provides food shaping apparatus for shaping a food material, comprising: (a) a housing; (b) a pair of shaping rotors disposed within the housing, each rotor having a shaft rotatably and horizontally supported on the housing and having shaping recesses formed in the circumferential face thereof so that two corresponding recesses of the rotors form a shaping cavity as the rotors are rotated; (c) first rotating means, disposed to the housing, for synchronously rotating the shaping rotors; (d) guiding means for guiding at least one shaping rotor to be horizontally movable toward and away from the other rotor; and (e) moving means for moving the one shaping rotor to the other whereby the food material supplied above the shaping rotors is shaped in the shaping cavity of the rotors and dropped from the corresponding recesses as the rotors are rotated.

Brief Description of the Drawings In the drawings: FIG. 1 is a front view of the food shaping apparatus according to the present invention, with a front cover removed; FIG. 2 is a rear view of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 1; FIG. 3 is a side view, partly cut away, of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 1, with a side wall taken away,; FIG. 4 is a front view of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 1 in which boiled grains of rice is supplied to facing recesses of the rotors; FIG. 5 is a front view of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 1 in which the rice is subject to compression in a cavity formed by the facing recesses; FIG. 6 is a front view of a modified form of the food shaping apparatus, with a front cover removed; FIG. 7 is a rear view of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 6, with a rear wall removed;; FIG. 8 is a side view, partly cut away, of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 6, with a side wall removed; FIG. 9 is a front view of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 6 in which boiled grains of rice is supplied to facing recesses of the rotors; and FIG. 10 is a front view of the food shaping apparatus in FIG. 6 in which the rice is subject to compression in a cavity formed by the facing recesses.

Detailed Description of the Preferred Embodiments Referring to FIGS. 1-5, there is illustrated a boiled rice shaping apparatus constructed according to the present invention, in which reference numeral 1 designates a base of the apparatus. The base 1 includes a bottom plate 4, a middle plate 5, having a circular opening 7 and disposed on the bottom plate 4, and an upper plate 6 disposed on the middle plate 5.

An axle 2 vertically passes through the bottom plate 4, the opening 7 of the middle plate 5 and the upper plate 6 and rotatable supported on the bottom plate 4 and the upper plate 6. A large pulley 3 is mounted on the axle 2 within the opening 7 of the middle plate 5 so that it is rotatable about a vertical axis. A turntable 46 is mounted on the upper end of the axle 2 to be horizontally disposed above the upper plate 6.

A housing 8 is vertically built on the base 1. The housing 8 includes a front wall 8a, rear wall 9, opposite side walls 8b and 8b and a front cover 8c. The front wall 8a is erected in parallel with the rear wall 9. The front cover 8c has a channel shape and is detachably attached at its flange portions (not shown) to respective opposite side walls 8b and 8b by conventional means so that the web of the front cover 8c faces the front wall 8a in a parallel manner. Such a conventional means includes, for example, pins projecting from each side wall 8b and slots formed through the edge of each flange of the front cover 8c and designed to detachably engage with corresponding pins. A rice shaping chamber 60 is defined by the front wall 8a, the web of the front cover 8c, side walls 8b and 8b, upper plate 6 and the bottom of a rice container 50 placed on the housing 8.

Within the rice shaping chamber 60, there are rotatably provided a pair of rollers 10 and 11 respectively mounted on horizontal shafts 20 and 21 which pass through and are rotatably supported on both the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9 at the same level and in parallel with each other. Another roller 14 is disposed above the roller 10 within the rice shaping chamber 60 through a shaft 15 which is also rotatably supported on the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9. The roller 14 is disposed slightly nearer to one side, or the left side in FIG. 1, of the rice shaping chamber 60 than the roller 10. An endless belt 16 extends around the rollers 10 and 14. A guide plate 17 is disposed above the roller 11.The guide plate 17 is fixed in an inclined manner at its upper end to a rest plate 49 so that the guide plate 17 thereof is oriented downwardly inwards, and so that a small clearance is formed between the lower end of the guide plate 17 and the circumferential face of the roller 11. The rest plate 49 is secured on the upper edges of the front and rear walls 8a and 9.

Within the rice shaping chamber 60, rotors 18 and 19 are mounted on horizontal shafts 20 and 21 respectively, which pass through and are rotatably supported on the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9 so that the rotors 18 and 19 are located below the rollers 10 and 11 and at the same lever. The rotors 18 and 19 are basically pentagonal tubes each having closed opposite ends and having the same dimensions. Each rotor 18, 19 has five recesses 22 of the same shape formed in the circumferential face thereof in a symmetrical manner about the center thereof, thus forming five partition projections 1 8a and 1 9a between adjacent recesses 22 and 22. Each recess 22 has substantially a trapezoidal crosssection and the top face 23 of each partition projections 18a, 1 9a has a slightly convex face.The walls of corresponding recesses 22 of these rotors 18 and 19, front cover 8c and front wall 8a are adapted to define, as shown in FIG. 5, a cavity 62 for a rice ball for sushi by facing facing corresponding recesses 22 and 22 as the rotors 18 and 19 are rotated.

For facilitating washing of the rotors 18 and 19 and the rollers 10, 14 and 11 after the apparatus is used, these members are detachably attached to respective rotation shafts 20, 21, 12, 15 and 13 by means of conventional key-and-keyway connection and pins passing through respective rotation shafts for releasably locking the members in position on the rotation shafts. The front end face and rear end face of each of the rollers 14, 10 and 11, and rotors 18 and 19 and the opposite edges of the belt 16 slidably contact with the inner face of each of the rear wall 8a and the web of the front cover 8c.

The shaft 20 of the rotor 18 is slidably fitted through a pair of horizontal slots 8d and 9b respectively formed through the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9 so that it is movable toward the other shaft 21 within the length of the slots 8d and 9b. The shaft 20 is connected to the shaft 21 by a coil spring 24 so that the shaft 20 is spring-biased toward the shaft 21. The coil spring 24 has a ring 24a at each end thereof although only one of the rings 24a and 24a is illustrated in FIG. 3 and the rings 24a and 24a are slidably fitted around shafts 20 and 21.

As clearly illustrated in FIG. 3, the shaft 21 has a shoulder pulley 25 mounted on it between the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9.

The shaft 21 furthermore has substantially pentagonal, rotation transmission member 26 mounted on it behind the rear wall 9. The rotation transmission member 26 includes a pair of substantially pentagonal rotation transmission plates 26a and 26b have substantially the same dimensions and are fixedly put together with their apex portions superposed. Each plate 26a, 26b has semicircular projections 28 and recesses 29 radially formed at the apex portions thereof. The projections 28 and recesses 29 of the rotation transmission plate 26a are positioned just in front of the recesses 29 and the projections 28 of the other rotation transmission plate 26b, respectively.

On the other hand, the horizontal shaft 20 has also a rotation transmission member 30 mounted on it. The rotation transmission member 30 includes two substantially pentagonal rotation transmission plates 30a and 30b which are equal in shape and dimensions to the rotation transmission plates 30a and 30b, respectively. These rotation transmission plates 30a and 30b are also fixedly put together with their apex portions superposed.

As in the rotation transmission member 26, in this rotation transmission member 30 the projections 28 and the recesses 29 of the rotation transmission plate 30a are positioned just in front of the recesses 29 and the projections 28 of the rotation transmission plate 30b. The rotation transmission members 26 and 30 are designed so that when the rotors 18 and 19 are rotated, projections 28 and recesses 29 of the rotation transmission member 26 fit to corresponding recesses 29 and projections 28 of the rotation transmission member 30, respectively.

At the rear end of the horizontal shaft 21 there is mounted a worm wheel 32. On the rear face 9a of the rear wall 9 there are mounted a pair of bearing plates 33 and 33, on which a rotation shaft 34 is rotatably supported to extend perpendicularly to the shaft 21. A worm 35 is formed in the rotation shaft 34 so as to engage with the worm wheel 32. The rotation shaft 34 has a handle 36 mounted on its one end outwardly projected from one bearing plate 33. By rotating the handle 36, rotors 18 and 19 are rotated through the rotation shaft 21, worm 35, worm wheel 32 and rotation transmission members 26 and 30. During this rotation, the rotors 18 and 19 are moved toward and away to each other.

A large pulley 25a of the shoulder pulley 25 is connected through an endless belt 42 to a pulley 41 mounted on a horizontal shaft 39 which is rotatably supported on the front plate 8a and the rear plate 9. The shaft 39 and the shaft 12 of the roller 10 are connected through a toothed wheel 47 mounted on the former and the a toothed wheel 37 mounted on the latter. Both the toothed wheels 37 and 47 are disposed between the front plate 8a and the rear plate 9. Thus the rotation of the shaft 21 is transmitted to the shaft 12 through the large pulley 25a, endless belt 42, pulley 41 and toothed wheels 47 and 37. On the other hand, the toothed wheel 38, mounted on the shaft 13 of the roller 11, engages with the toothed wheel 47 through an idle gear 48 which is rotatably supported on the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9 through a shaft 40.These toothed wheels 38 and 48 are also disposed between the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9. Another endless belt 43 extends around the smaller pulley 25b of the shoulder pulley 25 and the large pulley 3. The belt 43 passes through a pair of guide holes 44, formed through the upper plate 6 of the base 1, and into the opening 7 of the middle plate 5.

The rest plate 49 is supported on the upper edges of the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9 so that the upper face thereof is at the same level as the upper edges of the side walls 8b and 8b. A container 50 for containing rice is placed on the rest plate 49. The container 50 has an outlet 51 formed through its bottom so that when it is placed in position on the rest plate 49, the outlet 51 may communicate to the inside of the rice shaping chamber 60 between the belt 16 and the guide plate 17.

When the handle 36 is rotated, this rotation is transmitted through the rotation shaft 34, worm 35, worm gear 32 and shaft 21 to the plates 26a and 26b of the rotation transmission member 26, causing the plates 30a and 30b of the other rotation transmission member 30 to rotate since the rotation transmission member 26 is spring biased against the rotation transmission member 30. Thus, the rotor 18 is synchronously rotated with the rotor 19. The rotation of the shaft 21 also causes the shoulder pulley 25 to rotate, thus rotating the roller 10, the roller 11 and the large pulley 3. The rotation of the roller 10 moves the endless belt 16 in the direction shown by the arrows in FIG. 1 and the rotation of the large pulley 3 causes the turntable 46 to be rotated.During actuation of the apparatus in such a manner, boiled rice, placed within the container, is fed through its outlet 51 into the rice shaping chamber 60 so that boiled rice continuously falls between the belt 16 and the guide plate 17 at a rate. The rotation of the roller 11 and the movement of the belt 16 forcedly feed the rice into a space 62 shown in FIG. 4, defined by the corresponding recesses 22 and 22 of the rotors 18 and 19 and the front cover 8c and front wall 8a of the housing 8. The boiled rice thus placed within the space 62 is subjected to compression as the corresponding recesses 22 face to each other by the rotation of the rotors 18 and 19.When the corresponding recesses opposingly face to each other and form a cavity 64 as illustrated in FIG. 5, boiled grains of rice placed there is subject to the largest pressure, so that the rice is formed into a ball 65 of rice for sushi. A further rotation of the handle 36 causes the facing recesses 22 and 22 to moves apart, thus dropping the ball of rice on the rotating turntable 46. By repeating these operations, a number of balls of rice are subsequently placed on the turntable 46 around its center.

In the rice feeding mechanism above described, the roller 11 and the guide plate 17 may be replaced by another conveyer consisting of rollers 10 and 14 and endless belt 16.

Alternatively, the guide plate 17 may be omitted. Further, the rice feeding mechanism may include only the rollers 10 and 11. In this case, roller 14, belt 16 and guide plate 17 are omitted.

The rotors 18 and 19 may be in the shape of other equilateral polygons or circle in crosssection if they have the same shape and corresponding recesses for shaping food as in the preceding embodiment. Also the rotation transmission plates 26a, 26b, 30a and 30b may be other equilateral polygons or circle if they have the same shape. The other members for rotating the rotors 26 and 30 may be replaced by suitable conventional parts.

In this embodiment, the apparatus is used for forming balls of boiled rice for hand-rolled sushi, but may be used for making balls of boiled rice for onigiri (rice ball) by replacing the rotors 26 and 30 with rotors having recesses of onigiri shape as shown in FIG. 10.

By changing the rotors 26 and 30, the apparatus may be used for shaping various foods, for example, various boiled cereals and dough for bread.

Although in this embodiment, the rotor 18 is moved toward the rotor 19 which is horizontally stationary, the rotor 18 may be stationary while the rotor 19 is movable toward the rotor 18. Further, both the rotors 18 and 19 may be adapted to be movable toward each other. In this case, the shaft 21 slidably passes through slots 8d respectively formed through the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9 so that the rotor 19 may be movable toward the rotor 18.

A modified form of the apparatus above described is illustrated in FIGS. 6-10, in which parts corresponding to parts of the preceding embodiment are designated by like reference characters and explanation thereof is omitted.

This modified apparatus is used for shaping a ball of boiled rice for onigiri or rice ball and is distinct from the preceding embodiment with respect to points mentioned below. The front wall 8a is provided at its lower edge portion with recess 70. The front wall 8a has a cover sheet 72 detachably attached to it.

This attachment is carried out by fitting pins (not shown), projected from the front wall 8a, into holes (not shown) formed through the cover sheet 72. In place of the belt conveyer and the guide plate 17, there are provided with a pair of guide members 74 and 74 for guiding boiled rice for processing. The guide members 74 and 74 are each provided with a guide plane 74a inclined nearly vertically toward the center of the housing 8. Further, in place of the roller 11 a pair of rollers 76 and 76 each having a large number of projections 78 formed in the circumferential face thereof in the shape of a circular saw is adopted. One 80 of rotors 80 and 82, which is horizontally movable, is a tube having an asteroidal profile and its center hub 84 is connected to its five projected portions 86 through plate ribs 88.

Thus, the rotor 80 has five recesses 90 having arcuate cross section. The other rotor 82 has five recesses 92 having a trapezoidal cross section. Also, this rotor 82 has a tubular shape and has a center hub 84 connected through plate ribs 88 to five projected portions 94. These rotors 80 and 82, the front cover 8c and the cover plate 72, as shown in FIG. 10, form a cavity 96 of a ball rice shape as the rotors 80 and 82 are rotated. The shoulder pulley 25, small pulley 41, a pair of rotation transmission members 26 and 30 are disposed between the middle wall 100 and the rear wall 9. In this modified form, the transmission member 30 has a regular pentagonal back plate 68 secured on its back face facing to the rear wall 9.Another pair of rotation transmission members 102 and 104 are respectively mounted on the shafts 20 and 21 between the front wall 8a and the rear wall 9 as shown in FIGS. 6 and 8. These transmission members 102 and 104 each consist of the rotation transmission plates 26a and 26b and engage with each other as in the transmission members 26 and 30. These two pairs of transmission members 26, 30 and 102, 104 keep the horizontal shafts 20 and 21 more accurately parallel with each other. A rotation shaft 106 of the handle 36 is rotatably supported on a pair of bearings 108 and 108 mounted on one face of the middle wall 100 near the shaft 22, the one face facing to the front wall 8a.(FIGS. 8-10) A worm 110 formed in this shaft 106 engages with worm wheel 32 mounted on the shaft 21 between the rotation transmission member 104 and the middle wall 100.

The rollers 76 and 76 may be interchanged or they may be mounted on the shafts 12 and 13 with the front faces thereof directed backwards. By doing so, a force, exerted by the rollers 76 and 76 to the boiled rice toward the rotors 80 and 82, is weakened, so that a less compact ball of rice is produced.

For changing such a rice feeding force, rollers may be eccentrically mounted on the shafts 112 and 114, or the shafts 112 and 114 may be horizontally movably supported so that the spacing between the rollers 76 and 76 are adjusted.

Claims (10)

1. A food shaping apparatus for shaping a food material, comprising: (a) a housing; (b) a pair of shaping rotors disposed within the housing, each rotor having a shaft rotatably and horizontally supported on the housing and having shaping recesses formed in the circumferential face thereof so that two corresponding recesses of the rotors form a shaping cavity as the rotors are rotated; (c) first rotating means, disposed to the housing, for synchronously rotating the shaping rotors; (d) guiding means for guiding at least one shaping rotor to be horizontally movable toward and away from the other rotor; and (e) moving means for moving the one shaping rotor to the other whereby the food material supplied above the shaping rotors is shaped in the shaping cavity of the rotors and dropped from the corresponding recesses as the rotors are rotated.

2. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 1, further comprising feeding means, mounted on the housing to be located above the rotors, for feeding the food material to the corresponding recesses of the rotors.

3. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 2, wherein the feeding means comprises: at least one pair of parallel rollers, spacedly and rotatably disposed within the housing above the rotors, for feeding the food material to the rotors; and second rotating means, operatively connected to the the first rotating means, for rotating the rollers.

4. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 2, wherein the feeding means comprises at least one belt conveyor, disposed in an inclined manner to be directed toward the rotors for feeding the food material.

5. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 4, wherein the feeding means comprises a planar guide member, disposed in an inclined manner to be directed toward the rotors for feeding the food material.

6. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 3, wherein each of the rollers has a plurality of projections formed in the circumferential face thereof.

7. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 6, wherein each roller has a profile in the shape of a circular saw.

8. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 2, wherein each rotor has substantially a regular polygonal Profile having each recess positioned between adjacent apexes.

9. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 8, wherein: the first rotating means comprises at least one pair of rotation transmission members, mounted on respective shafts of the rotors, for transmitting rotation of one shaft to the other shaft, each rotation transmission member having substantially the same profile as the rotors; each rotation transmission member has an engaging portion at each of its apex portions for engaging a corresponding engaging portion of the other rotation transmission member whereby the shafts are kept in parallel with each other.

10. A food shaping apparatus as recited in Claim 9, further comprising a turntable rotatably mounted on the housing to be located below the rotors so that the shaped food material dropped from the rotors are placed on the turntable.