Plastic article or earthenware shaping or treating: apparatus – Press forming apparatus having opposed press members – Periphery of female mold limiting the movement of a dynamic...
Reexamination Certificate
1999-10-29
2003-01-21
Silbaugh, Jan H. (Department: 1722)
Plastic article or earthenware shaping or treating: apparatus
Press forming apparatus having opposed press members
Periphery of female mold limiting the movement of a dynamic...
C425S414000, C425S416000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06508642
ABSTRACT:
The present invention concerns a system for the production of fat-containing, chocolate-like masses, in particular for chocolate articles, by which an amount of liquid mass is deposited into more than one mould cavity, whereafter more than one core member is immersed into the mass forming the shells.
Systems for moulding of shells of fat-containing, chocolate-like masses through immersion of a core member into the liquid mass of an associated cavity and thereby bringing the mass into the desired shape are today well-known within the prior art, and are being used extensively by the chocolate making industry.
EP 0 589 820 A1 (AASTED-MIKROVERK APS) describes the first commercially available method and associated apparatus of the displacing type for industrial use. It relates to a method, where the chocolate-like mass under crystallisation solidifies to form the shell, the temperature of the mould cavity being lower than the temperature of the tempered mass, that a cooling member having a temperature lower than 0° C. is immersed into the mass and kept in the mass in a fully immersed position for a predetermined period of time. The cooling member is furthermore immersed immediately into the mass after this has been filled into the mould cavity and shaken out. The associated apparatus furthermore comprises means of controlling the up- and down movement of the cooling members, as well as controlling residence times in the fully immersed position. However, by this early teaching within the technical field of the present invention the chocolate-mass is filled into the mould cavity in an amount, which is typically about 10% larger than the volume of the finished chocolate-shell.
Generally within the present field, chocolate-like masses are suspensions of non-fat particles, such as sugar, milk powders and cocoa solids in a liquid fat phase. The fat phase in most cases comprises an extent of the genuine cocoa butter of until around 30%, but may comprise substitutes as well. Such substitutes may be in the form of other types of fat-containing oils. Chocolate-like masses where the cocoa butter has been replaced wholly or partly by other fats, are often named commercially as compound chocolate, in which the cocoa butter has been replaced by palm-kernel oil, or corresponding oils. Shells made of 100% fat being cocobutter or compound is also possible.
In the subsequent treatment of the ready-finished shell, the shell is frequently provided with a centre mass of a creamy or liquid food material, which differs from that of the shell. Thereafter the shell is closed either with other shell parts along the periphery of the shell or by means of a coating or flat bottom. For this purpose, it is very important that the periphery of the shell is complete or it will not be possible to make a tight joint.
Furthermore it is possible to join a produced shell with other types of shells immediately after being moulded, so that the finished food article being present as a hollow body e.g. in the form of eggs or figures, such as pixies and the like. In joining shells to produce hollow articles, it is of great importance that especially the rim of the shells is complete.
Furthermore, it should be mentioned that manufactured shells do not have to consist of just one layer of material but may e.g. consist of several layers of chocolate-like material. For example, one shell or part of made of dark chocolate may be provided with a further interior coating of white chocolate (or vice versa or any colour) by the same method and system even before the shell moulded first leaves the mould cavity.
The chocolate-like masses are deposited and shaken into the mould cavity in a tempered liquid state. For several decades, the technique of providing tempered chocolate-like masses has been well known to the persons skilled within the art of chocolate making. Chocolate-like mass being heated to 40-50° C. enters the process of tempering in which the mass in cooled down to around 27-32° C., whereby crystallisation is initiated. Thereafter, the chocolate-like mass is re-heated, normally not more than 2° C. providing the ready-tempered chocolate-like mass with a content of stable &bgr; crystals in an amount lesser than 5%. Thereby lower melting crystals are re-melted, so that only stable crystals remain in the ready-tempered mass. Such a process is for example performed by the AMK-tempering machines provided by Aasted-Mikroverk ApS, Denmark.
The quality of the ready-moulded chocolate shells has always been determined firstly by the state of the tempered chocolate mass. The skilled person knew that good flavour and mouth feeling chocolate, high gloss, high resistance to fat bloom as well as enhanced resistance to warm or heat was the consequence of the optimum tempering state, in which the liquid chocolate comprises only stable &bgr; crystals, especially small crystals before being deposited into the mould. However, before the invention of EP 0 589 820 B1 (AASTED-MIKROVERK APS), the skilled person thought that the setting of the deposited chocolate in the mould should be gentle and time consuming to an extent of often ½-1 hour before the moulded shell could be released from the mould cavity. By the invention of EP 0 589 820 B1 this prejudice was turned upside down, thereby discovering a method by which the deposited tempered chocolate was set rapidly e.g. typically within 10 seconds providing tremendous fast production rates for chocolate making industry.
DE 197 20 844 C1 (KMB PRODUCTIONS AG) discloses a system for moulding of shells primarily for moulding of chocolate shells. This system comprises multiple core members firmly fixed to a holding device. However, since the core members are firmly fixed it is not possible to lower the individual core members to different depths to compensate for inaccuracies in the dosage of chocolate or for differences in the depth of the individual mould cavities. The core members will simply all be lowered to the same pre-determined depth.
EP 0 715 813 (GEBR. BINDLER) discloses a similar system for moulding of chocolate articles, especially for chocolate shells, through displacement of the chocolate mass in a mould by immersion of a core member. The disclosed embodiments all have a multiplicity of core members firmly fixed to the same holding device. As in the above DE disclosure, the system has no way of compensating for inaccuracies in the dosage of chocolate or for differences in the depth of the individual mould cavities. Thus, if for some reason, one of the mould cavities of a mould element is clogged and the associated core cannot be immersed further than the depth of the obstruction, all the fixed cores will be halted and consequently all the shells of that mould element will be incomplete.
In practise, it has proven impossible to manufacture mould elements where all the mould cavities have exactly the same size, volume and especially depth. Furthermore, it is not possible due to mass viscosity changes to achieve exact dosage of the chocolate when it is deposited into the mould cavities. Consequently, when multiple core members are firmly fixed to the same holding device are lowered into the mould cavities the resulting displacement of chocolate will give rise to shells of different size. In order to ensure that all articles moulded were complete, it was necessary to compensate for these variations by over-dosing the deposited amount of chocolate, thus leaving a variable rim of surplus chocolate above the surface of the mould element.
WO 95/32633 (AASTED-MIKROVERK APS) describes a method and a system of the displacing type, by which an engagement ring is mounted peripherally around the cooling member by a press-fit or by threaded engagement. The engagement ring comprises at least one peripherally extending recess defining the moulded shell rim to compensate for inaccuracies in the deposited amount of chocolate. However, this teaching does not disclose anything about how more than one core member may be arranged to compensate for the above-mentioned inaccuracies.
For large and complex
Aasted-Mikroverk APS
Fish & Richardson P.C.
Heckenberg Donald
Silbaugh Jan H.
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