GB962487A - Improvements relating to load-handling equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

962,487. Furnace - charging machines. ROBEY & CO. Ltd., and C. MEADOWS & CO. Ltd. March 14, 1963 [March 18, 1962], No. 9938/62. Heading F4B. [Also in Division B8] A pivotally suspended horizontal beam 1 has power-operated load holding means such as grippers 6 at one end, its pivotal support 3 between its ends, a counterweight 34 movable along the beam and a control unit 24 at the other end. The beam is particularly for handling loads within a limited headroom, e.g. for removing billets from a furnace. The control unit 24 consists of valves operable either manually from the beam itself or by remote control, e.g. an associated crane or overhead trolley from which the apparatus is suspended. These valves control the flow of pressure fluid from a pump-and-motor unit 21, 22, which may constitute, wholly or in part, the counterweight 34. The latter is movable along the beam by an hydraulic ram 23, Fig. 3 (not shown), and the whole beam may be raised and lowered by a like ram 5 from which it is suspended. A third ram 16 controls the grippers 6 and the arrangement is such that the grippers are openable only with the counterweight in the position (Fig. 1) in which it balances the unloaded beam, this being ensured, e.g. by a mechanical device operable on movement of the counterweight out of this position to actuate the valve controlling the ram 16. Operation of grippers.-The ram 16 carries a cross-head 15 on which a pair of rollers 13 are mounted to engage external cam surfaces 11 on the gripper arms and so open the gripper arms, which are pivoted together at 8, whenever the ram is retracted. A roller 14 on the cross-head likewise engages internal cam surfaces 12 on the gripper arms to open them when the ram is extended. In the extended position, the roller 14 tends to wedge between the arms so that the grippers only reclose on positive retraction of the ram.