GB337358A - Improvements in and relating to chocolate or the like enrobing or coating apparatus or machines - Google Patents

Abstract

337,358. Savy, R., Guggenheim, M. M., Lebert, L., and Anciens Etablissements A. Savy, Jeanjean, et Cie, Soc. Anon., and Baker Perkins, Ltd. May 22, 1929. Coating bakers' and confectioners' goods. - In a machine for coating sweetmeat centres and the like, the supply tank and elevating means for the coating material together with the curtain coating means and/or the immersion coating means are made as a self-contained unit which may be positioned in or withdrawn from the machine as such. As shown in Fig. 1, both curtain and immersion coating means are provided, the wire conveyer for the goods running between the curtainproducing trough 36 and the immersion tube 17. The supply tank is mounted on wheels 11, 12 the latter running in a trackway 13. The elevating means comprise a tube 25 containing a helical conveyer, the tube having an outlet 14 which leads to the immersion tube 17 and an upper outlet 15 which leads to the trough 36. The tube 17 is journaled at 20 in the stationary casing of the machine, so that before the removable unit is moved, the end of the tube is slid out of the opening 14. If, however, the unit is mounted for removal in a direction at right angles to the conveyer, the tube 17 may be permanently secured in the opening 14. The tube 17 has a longitudinal outlet 23 which normally lies immediately beneath the wire conveyer. The issuing material is received by a fine gauze or like endless apron which is trained into contact with the wire conveyer to which the coating material is thus applied, the goods consequently being immersed. The flow through the orifice 23 is controlled by a ported sleeve revolubly mounted within the tube, which also has a drainage orifice. The sleeve is adjusted to regulate the outflow or to drain the tube 17 by a handle 33 the tube 17 is revolved accurately to position the orifice 23 by a handwheel 26. The upper opening 15 discharges into a trough which is separated from the trough 36 by a baffle which ensures that the trough 36 shall be uniformly supplied with coating material. Both openings 14, 15 may be valve-controlled. The trough 36 is capable of a limited angular adjustment about the axis of the tube 25, rollers 35b and guides 35<a> being provided for this purpose. The height of the trough is adjusted by a screw 35<d>. At the immersion position, an openwork frame is arranged between the wire conveyer and the gauze apron, the frame being raised, either by hand-operated mechanism or by automatic means, to lift the goods out of the coating material. The mechanism may be interconnected with the starting or stopping means, e.g. a belt striker, automatically to raise the goods from the material when the machine is stopped. An adjustable stop on the mechanism may be provided to regulate the depth of immersion. The raising and lowering of the goods may be effected periodically by ratchet, cam or like mechanism, and the periodicity may be varied. The supporting rollers for the conveyer are arranged to give the wire conveyer a slight longitudinal curvature to counteract the tendency of the edges of the conveyer to curl or distort. The lifting frame may be correspondingly curved.