Food or edible material: processes – compositions – and products – Packaged or wrapped product
Patent
1996-01-04
1998-02-03
Czaja, Donald E.
Food or edible material: processes, compositions, and products
Packaged or wrapped product
426112, 426115, 426132, 426398, 426477, 53420, 53432, 53474, 220528, 220906, B65D 4700, B65D 8300
Patent
active
057141860
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
FIELD OF INVENTION
This invention concerns devices for assisting in the production of a so-called head on an alcoholic beverage such as beer, ale, stout or lager.
BACKGROUND TO THE INVENTION
EP 0520646A1 describes a hollow capsule device which can be inserted into and fixed at the bottom of a can which is to contain a beverage, the latter being pressurised by an inert gas when the can is sealed, typically Nitrogen. The gas occupies a headspace above the beverage in the can and by inverting the can shortly after the contents are pressurised, the headspace can be transferred to the opposite end of the can containing the said device. By providing a small aperture in the wall of the capsule, through which the gas can pass when the can is inverted, the interior of the capsule can be raised to the headspace pressure and by selecting the position of the aperture, the gas which has entered the capsule can be trapped therein when the can is returned to its normal upright position.
As described in EP 0520646A1 before the can is inverted the aperture in the wall of the capsule will enable beverage to be forced into the capsule therethrough as the can contents rise in pressure.
Beverage will continue to be forced into the capsule until the pressure inside the capsule balances the pressure within the can--unless the can is inverted before this process is complete, after which, instead of beverage entering the capsule, gas from the headspace will be forced into the capsule until the pressure balance is obtained.
In general it is desirable that the capsule should contain as much gas as possible, rather than beverage, and it is for this reason that the can should be inverted as soon as possible after sealing and pressurisation of the can contents begins to occur.
It has been known for many years to invert pressurised beverage cans between filling and pasturisation for a completely different purpose--namely to allow for lid seal verification by simply checking the level of the beverage in the can after pasturisation. Since the latter involves raising the temperature of the can and its contents by an appreciable amount, and therefore the internal pressure in the can as a consequence. Any weakness in the lid seal will tend to be revealed by this process and if the seal is not perfect, some of the contents of the can will be forced out through the imperfection in the seal. If the can is inverted it will be beverage which will be forced out by this process and this will result in a smaller volume of beverage in the can than would have been the case. If as is usual, the volume of beverage in the can is accurately controlled during the filling operation, the level of beverage in each filled can should be the same, and by checking the level after pasturisation, cans having a lower than permitted level of beverage can be identified readily and rejected.
However the need to invert the cans very quickly after sealing requires a canning line to be modified, since existing canning lines do not normally provide for can inversion until shortly before entering into the pasturizer and this could be an appreciable distance away from the can filling and sealing apparatus.
Furthermore, although canning lines are intended to operate continuously, stoppages do occur due for example to faulty cans, cans falling over and cans becoming jammed. If the time within which a can is to be inverted is limited to a few seconds, all the cans which have been sealed but not completely inverted just before a shutdown of the line should be rejected since too much beverage will have entered the capsule before the can is finally inverted when the line begins operating again.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a new design of capsule which can still be pressurized by gas from the headspace but which does not require the can to be inverted before it will be so pressurized.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
According to the present invention, in its broadest aspect a head generating device comprises a substantially hollow capsule having a first aper
REFERENCES:
patent: 4524078 (1985-06-01), Bardsley et al.
patent: 4995533 (1991-02-01), Vandoninick
patent: 5584165 (1996-12-01), Wright
Cox Peter Erich
Houzego Peter John
Nash Stuart Justin
Wood Timothy Michael
Czaja Donald E.
Scottish & Newcastle
Sherrer Curtis E.
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