Article dispensing – Plural sources – stacks or compartments – With discharge means for each source
Patent
1991-03-20
1993-08-31
Olszewski, Robert P.
Article dispensing
Plural sources, stacks or compartments
With discharge means for each source
221130, 221289, 221 13, 221 90, 221194, 221197, 211 592, G07F 1164
Patent
active
052401421
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The present invention relates to article dispensing apparatus. The invention provides article dispensing apparatus particularly suitable for use in cold environments, for example in dispensing items of frozen food in an automatic vending machine, but is not restricted to such applications.
There have been many proposals to combine a freezer compartment with a microwave oven in order to permit automatic vending of hot food, such as hamburgers. A serious problem to be overcome in the construction of such a machine is that the mechanism employed to select an item from the freezer compartment and transfer it to the oven tends itself to freeze and eventually to fail through the accumulation of frost.
There have been proposals in the prior art to utilise heat as a means of releasing an article from a storage location in a dispensing machine. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,163,276, the articles to be dispensed are supported on hooks by means of retaining elements which are weakened or broken when the hooks are heated. In GB-851,100, each article to be dispensed is suspended from a lever which is prevented from rotating by a detent formed of a bimetallic strip. When the strip is electrically heated, it bends out of the way of the lever and allows the latter to pivot under the weight of the suspended article, which is then released from its storage location.
It is important to be able to ascertain that sufficient heat has been applied to, release an article from a storage location. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,163,276, a mechanical switch is provided at each location to sense when an article has been released. This requires several sensing switches and the reliability of such sensing switches cannot be guaranteed in a frozen environment.
With a view to mitigating the foregoing disadvantages found in the prior art, the present invention provides a dispensing machine having a plurality of storage locations for supporting articles to be dispensed, each location including a respective electrical heating element, and means for supplying current to the individual heating elements to enable a selected article to be dispensed, the heat generated by an energised heating element causing an article to be released from the storage location and to pass along a dispensing chute, characterised in that means are provided for monitoring the passage of articles along the dispensing chute and for controlling the power supply to the heating elements of the storage locations to ensure that a selected article is dispensed.
It is possible to continue to apply current to the heating element of a storage location for as long as is necessary for the article to be released and to be sensed as it passes through the dispensing chute. Alternatively, one may apply current for a length of time which is predetermined to be sufficient to release an article under most operating conditions. If no article should be detected on the chute by the end of the heating time, one may in this case either make a further attempt at retrieving an article from the same storage location or attempt to retrieve a similar article from another storage location.
Though the invention is designed with the aim of providing reliable operation in a cold environment, the use of heat as the means for releasing an article to be dispensed, makes for a simple, inexpensive and inherently reliable construction which can be used in a wide variety of vending machines, even where temperature presents no problem.
In a preferred embodiment of the invention, each storage location comprises a hook from which an article to be dispensed can be suspended, the application of heat to the hook being capable of releasing the suspended article.
The articles to be dispensed may conveniently be packaged in containers each having a portion from which the container can be suspended, at least the portion of the container from which it can be suspended being made of a material capable of being softened or melted by the application of heat to the hook and wherein the heat applied to the hooks serves to weaken the container s
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patent: 4225056 (1980-09-01), Flubacker
patent: 4629090 (1986-12-01), Harris et al.
patent: 4634021 (1987-01-01), Davis
Olszewski Robert P.
Reichard Dean A.
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