Material or article handling – Plural – static structures for supporting discrete loads and... – Load-underlying members
Patent
1996-05-07
1998-03-17
Merritt, Karen B.
Material or article handling
Plural, static structures for supporting discrete loads and...
Load-underlying members
414269, 414786, 4147929, 414928, 414929, B65G 100
Patent
active
057279195
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The invention relates to a beverage terminal for the automatic supply of beverage crates.
1. Field of the Invention
The well-known selling places for beverage crates substantially are formed by so-called self-service markets where a customer must transport beverage crates to a pay desk within the market and after having paid must take them to his vehicle. The return of the empties takes place in a similar manner, usually they are to be delivered to a pay desk separately. It is disadvantageous that the entire purchase step is expensive in time and arduous for the customer and that such a beverage market requires a large surface as also sufficient passageways for the customers must be available. There is also required a large number of employees for refilling the beverage crates, for performing the payment step and for attending to the customers.
2. Description of the Related Art
It is a further disadvantage of well-known self-service markets that they are subject to the law relating to the closing time of shops, so that the customer can only do his shopping during a few hours of the day.
German Patent DE-PS 33 01 905 relates to an automatic machine for selling goods charging the money by itself, in which individual bottles placed on inclined storages of filled goods can selectively be transported to a supply area by means of a transverse conveyor. In addition to the supply area there is provided an area for receiving empties where empties can be placed on inclined belts for storing empties, by using the transverse conveyor. This goods automate is able to deliver or receive individual bottles of beverages.
There is neither provided a fully automated course of operation nor is it possible with this construction to handle or even discharge from and/or stack on pallets larger units of e.g. beverage crates.
The article in the Journal "Transport-, Forder- und Lagertechnik, 1984, vol. 4, pages 9 to 12" describes a distribution center for books, wherein arriving pallets are placed in a high-shelf storage. From said high-shelf storage the pallets are either distributed in the shop or packed in partial quantities and transferred to an intermediate storage. This is followed by a consignment stock where individual books are stored temporarily for subsequent packing and commissioning. The entire storage system is controlled by a computer.
The closest prior art is known from EP-A2-590 646 and DE-0S 42 32 833. In these previously known automatic beverage terminals the intermediate stocking of the beverage crates takes place in a depot which is formed either by inclined raceways or by turning-around storages. With inclined race-ways there can arise the problem that individual beverage crates are blocked by pieces of glass, decontaminations or the like or by tilting or getting out of place of the crates themselves. Depending on the respective conditions of use and the storing capacity of the depot a turning-around storage can require a too long access period.
The invention is based on the problem to provide a beverage terminal for the automatic supply of beverage crates, offering to the customer a large number of different beverages in a fully automatical mode of operation and without personnel being required, in a safe and quick mode of working, and distinguishing by very short access periods to the depot.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
According to the invention the problem is solved by the features of the main claim, the subclaims comprising advantageous embodiments of the invention.
The beverage terminal according to the invention thus allows to sell to a customer sets of beverage containers in an automated manner, said sets of containers consisting either of beverage crates or of one-way containers. The beverage crates usually contain reusable bottles that are supplied together with the beverage crates against payment of a respective deposit and are taken back with the deposit being returned. One-way container sets are not taken back, these are rather disposed of separately. The beverage termi
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CH-Z transport, forder- und lagertechnik 1983, issue 6, pp. 19-20.
Heumann Cordula
Heumann Friedrich
Hess Douglas
Merritt Karen B.
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