JP3430314B2 - Bottle label peeler - Google Patents

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a bottle label peeling apparatus for automatically peeling a label attached to a bottle such as a polyethylene bottle (hereinafter referred to as "plastic bottle").

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art The amount of PET bottles used is enormous, and it is obligatory to recycle them. Labels are a major obstacle in that case. Since the label is made of a resin material different from that of the bottle body and contains various paints, the reproduction quality is greatly affected unless the label is properly removed from the bottle body.

Conventionally, most of the label removing work in the recycling of PET bottles relies on manual cutting work, and it takes the most labor to recycle a huge amount of PET bottles, and some of them are labeled. Although automatic peeling is also performed, it is not satisfactory in practice, and its improvement is strongly desired.

For example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 9-220540 discloses the following container label removing apparatus using a rotary cutter. This device conveys on a conveyor while holding the mouth of the container in a vertical position with the holding claws.
With the rotary cutter pressed against the container, move vertically by the cutter elevating mechanism to make vertical cuts in the label, then turn the container so that the cuts face forward and open the container with a pair of peeling rollers that open and close. The label is torn between the slits by the rotation of these peeling rollers, and the label is blown off by air jetting from a jetting nozzle.

[0005]

However, in this conventional device, a holding mechanism for holding the mouth of a container conveyed in an upright posture, a cutter elevating mechanism for raising and lowering a rotary cutter while pressing the container, and a container A direction change mechanism that changes direction,
Not only does it require many complicated mechanisms such as an opening and closing mechanism that opens and closes a pair of peeling rollers, but the overall operation is also very complicated.If the container is a PET bottle, the rotary cutter is thin and easily deformed. If you move it while pressing it against, the rotating cutter may cut into the PET bottle and bite into it, and there is a possibility that it will not come off, the processing amount is enormous, and the label is peeled off from the PET bottle that is thin and easily deformed. Not suitable.

In particular, in the case of PET bottles, many of them have irregularities formed on the body or shoulder of the bottle, and the method of directly pressing a blade such as a rotating cutter directly onto the PET bottle to mechanically cut the bottle The label cannot be cut in the recess of
At the convex part, there is a problem that the blade body cuts into the bottle and bites into it.

In view of the above problems when the object is a plastic bottle, the object of the present invention is to attach a label to the shoulder, the body, or the corners of the body and the bottom of the plastic bottle. Even if the PET bottle is uneven, the label can be fused in a straight line without contact, and the label can be continuously peeled from the PET bottle at a high speed with a simple mechanism. It is an object of the present invention to provide a label peeling device that can perform label peeling extremely efficiently, accurately and economically.

[0008]

A label peeling apparatus according to the present invention comprises a bottle aligning and transporting means for aligning and transporting bottles in a horizontal position, and a follower arm that abuts on the bottles that are aligned and transported and swings up and down. By attaching a hot air cutter nozzle to the bottle and blowing the hot air supplied from the hot air supply source to the bottle from the hot air cutter nozzle, the label fusing means that blows the label of the bottle in a straight line as the bottle is transported, and the label is cut in two parts. And a label peeling means for peeling.

Preferably, the bottle aligning / conveying means has a bottle carry-in conveyor for separating the bottles from the hopper, taking them out, and carrying them onto the aligning / conveying conveyor. The follower arm has a cutout near the jet port of the hot air cutter nozzle so that the jet port of the hot air cutter nozzle follows the bottle surface as close as possible to the label on the bottle.

The label peeling means has a pusher for forcibly advancing the bottle and a peeling roller for rotating the bottle while pressing it against the bottle to peel the label from the bottle.

The label peeling means further has a peeling air nozzle for blowing air from both directions to the fusing site of the label before peeling by the peeling roller.

[0012]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Next, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

First, the outline will be described. As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, in the label peeling apparatus 1 according to the present invention, a large number of PET bottles 3 loaded in a hopper 2 are laterally moved by an inclined bottle carry-in conveyor 4 ( While being captured in a sideways posture), they are arranged in a line and conveyed obliquely upward, and placed one by one on the alignment conveyer 5. The alignment transfer conveyor 5 transfers the PET bottles 3 in a line with their postures aligned in the axial direction. In the illustrated example, the bottle carry-in conveyor 4 and the aligning and carrying conveyor 5 are 2
The PET bottles 3 are installed as a set and are capable of processing two rows of PET bottles 3 at the same time.

In each of the aligning and conveying conveyors 5, hot air is blown onto the PET bottles 3 conveyed as described above in a non-contact manner from directly above at the label fusing section by the hot air cutter nozzle 6 as shown in FIGS. 12 to 14. As a result, the labels on the PET bottles 3 are blown out in a straight line, and the PET bottles 3 are continuously conveyed in a line with their postures aligned in the axial direction.
On the other hand, at the label peeling portion, as shown in FIG. 15, while pushing the plastic bottle 3 forward with the pusher 7, as shown in FIG. After injecting air from both directions to make the label easy to peel off from the PET bottle 3,
As shown in, the label is mechanically peeled by the peeling roller 9 which rotates in a direction against the forward movement by the pusher 7.

As shown in FIG. 2, the label peeled from the PET bottle 3 is forcibly dropped onto the net-like label collecting conveyor 11 by the suction action of the blower through the drop guide 10 and separated from the conveyor 11. Collect.

On the other hand, the PET bottle 3 from which the label has been peeled off by the present label peeling apparatus 1 is carried out from the present label peeling apparatus 1 by the bottle carry-out conveyor 12, and the temporary storage hopper 1
After being stored in No. 3, it is carried into the crushing chamber 15 by the crushing carry-in conveyor 14 and crushed.

FIGS. 3 and 4 show an enlarged view of a portion relating to the present label peeling apparatus 1 in FIGS. 1 and 2. The hopper 2 is tapered toward the discharge port 2a on the lower side, and a vibrator 16 is attached to the outside (lower side) of a curved side wall 2b extending to the discharge port 2a. By guiding the plastic bottle 3 to the discharge port 2a while applying vibration, the entire PET bottle 3 can be discharged sideways (sideways) from the discharge port 2a.

The bottle carry-in conveyor 4 comprises a circulating endless belt 4a having a large number of fins 4b projecting at equal intervals. The bottle carry-in conveyor 4 is slanted from below the discharge port 2a of the hopper 2 to above the carrying start end of the aligning conveyor 5. The plastic bottle 3 in the hopper 2 extends upwards and is discharged from the discharge port 2a to the fins 4b.
And the fins 4b are taken out one by one and conveyed, and are sequentially dropped on the alignment conveyer 5. At this time, the PET bottle 3 is placed on the alignment transfer conveyor 5 while being guided by the insertion guides 17 arranged in the inverted C-shape on both sides of the alignment transfer conveyor 5.

The alignment conveyer 5 is mounted on a mount 18. FIG. 5 shows a side view of the alignment conveyer 5, and FIG. 6 shows an enlarged sectional view of a part thereof. The alignment conveyor 5 is
As shown in FIG. 6, the body section of the plastic bottle 3 is circular.
Regardless of the size of the prism, regardless of the size of the prism, a large number of V-shaped receiving plates 19 are provided so that the PET bottle 3 can be conveyed sideways and in a straight line with its posture aligned in the axial direction. Are arranged in a line on a pair of endless chains 21 that circulate along the rails 20. The PET bottles 3 dropped from the bottle carry-in conveyer 4 onto the aligning conveyer 5 ride on the plurality of receiving plates 19 in a sideways state,
Since the receiving plate 19 is V-shaped, the receiving plate 19 is linearly conveyed while being fitted thereto.

Next, the structure of the fusing part for linearly fusing the label on the PET bottle 3 thus conveyed by the hot air cutter nozzle 6 will be described. As shown in FIG.
The hot air cutter nozzle 6 is attached to the tip (free end) of the follower arm 22 that swings up and down, and the hot air from the hot air supply source 23 is supplied to the hot air cutter nozzle 6 through the hot air hose 24.

7 to 11 show the relationship among the hot air cutter nozzle 6, the follower arm 22 and the hot air hose 24. The follower arm 22 has a U-shaped cross section, and a hot air pipe 25 connected to a hot air hose 24 is fixed by two sets of clamps 26. Then, the hot air cutter nozzle 6 is connected to the tip of the hot air pipe 25 downward by an elbow (pipe fitting) 27 so that the small injection port of the hot air cutter nozzle 6 can follow the arm 2.
The notch 22a provided at the tip (free end) of No. 2 is exposed.

12 to 14, the PET bottles 3 are linearly aligned and transported by the alignment and transport conveyor 5 as described above.
12 shows the follow-up operation of the follower arm 22 and the hot air cutter nozzle 6 with respect to FIG. 12, FIG. 12 shows a case where the body portion of the PET bottle 3 is a small circle, FIG. 13 shows a case of a large circle, and FIG. 14 shows a case of a square shape.

As shown in FIG. 12A, when the small circular PET bottle 3 is conveyed with the mouth portion first, after the mouth portion of the PET bottle 3 collides with the tip portion of the follower arm 22. When the tip portion of the follower arm 22 slides from the shoulder portion to the body portion as it is, and conversely, as shown in (B), the small circular plastic bottle 3 is conveyed with the bottom portion first, the body portion and the bottom portion are conveyed. The corners of the trailing arm collide with the tip of the follower arm 22, and the tip of the follower arm 22 slides as it is from the body to the shoulder.

As shown in FIG. 13 (A), when the large circular PET bottle 3 is conveyed with the mouth portion first, the shoulder portion of the PET bottle 3 collides with the tip end portion of the follower arm 22. When the tip of the follower arm 22 comes into sliding contact with the body, and conversely, as shown in (B), when the large circular plastic bottle 3 is conveyed with the bottom first, the corners of the body and the bottom are After abutting against the tip of the follower arm 22, the tip of the follower arm 22 slides as it is from the body to the shoulder.

As shown in FIG. 14 (A), when the rectangular plastic bottle 3 is conveyed with the mouth portion first, the shoulder portion of the plastic bottle 3 collides with the intermediate portion of the follower arm 22 and follows the follower arm. After lifting 22 up, as shown in (B), the tip end of the follow-up arm 22 makes sliding contact with the body. On the contrary, when the rectangular PET bottle 3 is conveyed with the bottom first as in (C), the corners of the body and the bottom collide with the tip of the follower arm 22, and then (D). As described above, the tip end portion of the follow-up arm 22 slides from the body portion to the shoulder portion.

In any of FIG. 12, FIG. 13 and FIG. 14, the jet port of the hot air cutter nozzle 6 is in a state of being close to the shoulder portion of the PET bottle 3, the body, and the corners of the body and the bottom. In order to pass the bottle 3, whether the label is attached to the shoulder portion, the body portion, or the corner portions of the body portion and the bottom portion of the PET bottle 3, and the PET bottle 3 has irregularities,
The label can be blown out linearly without contact.

Next, the structure of the label peeling portion for peeling the label after fusing from the PET bottle 3 will be described. As shown in FIG. 5, the PET bottle 3 after the label is blown is pushed by the pusher 7 and transferred from the aligning / conveying conveyor 5 onto the roller conveyor 28. At that time, as shown in FIGS. The air nozzle 8 receives the air jet.

The roller conveyor 28 is composed of two rows of roller groups 2
By arranging 8a in an inverted C shape, the PET bottles 3 linearly conveyed by the alignment conveyer 5 are guided linearly as they are.

The pair of peeling air nozzles 8 are arranged so as to incline in opposite V-shapes so that air is jetted obliquely downward from both sides of the label fusing site on the PET bottle 3. By injecting air in this way from the pair of peeling air nozzles 8 toward the PET bottle 3, air is blown from the label fusing part between the label and the surface of the PET bottle 3, and moisture is also dried, so that the label Is easily peeled off from the plastic bottle 3. As the peeling air nozzle 8, as shown in FIG. 18, it is preferable that a plurality of small jetting ports 8a and fins 8b are provided in a line at equal intervals because the air can be jetted in a knife shape.

As shown in FIGS. 16 and 17, the pusher 7 moves an air cylinder 30 for vertical movement, which is slidable back and forth along a rail 29, by moving the piston rod 31a of the air cylinder 31 for longitudinal movement back and forth. Further, a push head 30b is provided at the tip (lower end) of the piston rod 30a of the vertical movement air cylinder 30, and when the PET bottle 3 is detected by a sensor (not shown), it operates as follows.

First, after the piston rod 30a of the vertical movement air cylinder 30 extends and the push head 30b descends, the piston rod 31a of the forward and backward movement air cylinder 31 extends and advances the vertical movement air cylinder 30 to push it. The plastic bottle 3 is pushed backward by the head 30b and moved forward. Front-rear movement air cylinder 3
After the expansion of the piston rod 31a of No. 1 is stopped, the piston rod 30a of the vertical movement air cylinder 30 contracts, so that the push head 30b rises and is disengaged from the PET bottle 3, and then the forward / backward movement air cylinder 31.
The piston rod 31a of the above contracts and the air cylinder 30 for vertical movement is returned to the original position. By repeating such an operation, the plastic bottles 3 are sequentially advanced by the pusher 7 one by one.

When the PET bottle 3 which has been sprayed with air by the pair of peeling air nozzles 8 is advanced in this way, the peeling roller 9 is pressed from one side to the PET bottle 3 as shown in FIG. The peeling roller 9 is obliquely supported by an arm (not shown). When the peeling roller 9 is pressed against one side of the PET bottle 3 and rotates in a direction against the forward movement of the PET bottle 3, the label is divided into two parts from the fusing point. The plastic bottle 3 is mechanically separated from the plastic bottle 3 and falls. The dropped label is collected as described above.

Although the label peeling from the PET bottle 3 is taken as an example, the present invention can be applied to the label peeling from a bottle other than the PET bottle.

[0034]

As described above, according to the present invention, bottles are aligned and transported in a horizontal position, and hot air is blown from a hot air cutter nozzle attached to a follower arm that abuts on the transported bottle and swings up and down. After fusing the label on the bottle in a straight line, the label is split into two pieces from the fusing point and peeled off, so that the label is attached to the bottle shoulder, body, or corners of the body and bottom. Even if
Even if the bottle has irregularities, the label can be fused in a straight line without contact, and the label can be continuously peeled off from the bottle at a high speed with a simple mechanism. In a recycling factory, label peeling can be performed very efficiently, accurately, and economically, and the quality of reproduction can be improved.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an overall schematic plan view showing an example of use of a label peeling device according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a side view of the above.

FIG. 3 is an enlarged plan view showing a portion related to the label peeling device in the above.

FIG. 4 is a side view of the same.

FIG. 5 is a side view of a label fusing unit and a label peeling unit in the label peeling apparatus.

FIG. 6 is an enlarged cross-sectional view of a part of the alignment transfer conveyor.

FIG. 7 is a side view showing the relationship between the hot air cutter nozzle, the following arm, and the hot air hose.

FIG. 8 is a plan view of the same.

FIG. 9 is a bottom view of the same.

FIG. 10 is a sectional view of an intermediate portion of the same.

FIG. 11 is a sectional view of the tip portion of the same.

FIG. 12 shows the follow-up operation of the follower arm and the hot air cutter nozzle when the PET bottle has a small circular shape, and (A) shows the case where the PET bottle is conveyed with the mouth portion first.
(B) is the case where it is conveyed with the bottom first.

FIG. 13 shows the follow-up operation of the follower arm and the hot air cutter nozzle when the PET bottle is a large circle, and (A) shows the case where the PET bottle is conveyed with the mouth portion first.
(B) is the case where it is conveyed with the bottom first.

FIG. 14 shows the follow-up operation of the follower arm and the hot-air cutter nozzle when the PET bottle has a square shape. (A) shows that the shoulder portion of the PET bottle conveyed with the mouth first hits the middle portion of the follower arm. In the contacted state, (B) is the state in which the tip of the follower arm is in sliding contact with the body after that, and (C) is the corner of the PET bottle conveyed with the bottom first, the tip of the follower arm. In the state in which the trailing arm is in contact with the body, (D) is the state in which the tip portion of the follow-up arm is in sliding contact with the body after that.

FIG. 15 is a front view showing an outline of a label peeling unit.

FIG. 16 is an enlarged front view of a part of the above.

FIG. 17 is a plan view of the pusher of the above.

FIG. 18 is a perspective view of a preferred example of a peeling air nozzle.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 Label peeling device 2 hoppers 2a outlet 2b Side wall 3 PET bottles 4 Bottle carry-in conveyor 4a Endless belt 4b fin 5 Alignment conveyor 6 hot air cutter nozzle 7 pushers 8 Peeling air nozzle 8a Small injection port 8b fin 9 Peeling roller 10 Fall guide 11 Label recovery conveyor 12 Bottle unloading conveyor 13 Temporary storage hopper 14 Crushing carry-in conveyor 15 Crushing room 16 vibrator 17 Loading Guide 18 mounts 19 Support plate 20 rails 21 endless chain 22 Following arm 22a Notch 23 Hot Air Supply Source 24 hot air hose 25 hot air pipe 26 Clamp 27 Elbow (pipe fitting) 28 Roller conveyor 28a roller group 29 rails 30 Air cylinder for vertical movement 30a piston rod 30b push head 31 Front-rear air cylinder 31a Piston rod

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (72) Inventor Yasushi Hayasaka 2-9-2 Jiyugaoka, Meguro-ku, Tokyo Inside Nippon Denka Koki Co., Ltd. (56) Reference JP-A-58-41092 (JP, A) JP Flat 9-57225 (JP, A) (58) Fields surveyed (Int.Cl. ⁷ , DB name) B08B 9/08 B08B 9/30 B65B 69/00

Claims (5)

(57) [Claims] 1. A hot air cutter nozzle is attached to a bottle aligning and conveying means for aligning and transporting bottles in a horizontal position and a follower arm that abuts on the bottles to be aligned and transported and swings up and down, and is supplied from a hot air supply source. By blowing hot air from the hot air cutter nozzle onto the bottle, the label fusing means for fusing the label of the bottle in a straight line along with the transport of the bottle, and the label peeling means for peeling the label into two parts from the fusing point are provided. Label peeling device for bottles. 2. The bottle aligning / conveying means has a bottle carry-in conveyor for separating and taking out bottles from the hopper and carrying them onto an aligning / conveying conveyor.
The label peeling apparatus for bottles according to. 3. The bottle label peeling apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the follow-up arm has a notch in the vicinity of the jet port of the hot air cutter nozzle. 4. The label peeling means has a pusher for forcibly advancing the bottle and a peeling roller for rotating the bottle while pressing it against the bottle to peel the label from the bottle. 3. The bottle label peeling apparatus according to item 3. 5. The label peeling means has a peeling air nozzle for injecting air from both directions to the fusing portion of the label before peeling by the peeling roller.
The label peeling apparatus for bottles according to.