Material or article handling – Plural – static structures for supporting discrete loads and... – Load-underlying members
Reexamination Certificate
1999-11-19
2002-06-25
Werner, Frank E. (Department: 3652)
Material or article handling
Plural, static structures for supporting discrete loads and...
Load-underlying members
C414S798900, C414S280000, C414S283000, C414S808000, C221S012000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06409449
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention pertains to a commissioning unit with at least one high-speed automatic turning unit, which has at least one article bay with essentially vertical, preferably gently sloping article shafts, which are arranged next to one another, are accessible from the front, and in which articles to be commissioned can be stored, wherein a traveling bay-storage and retrieval unit associated with the article bay can be positioned at each article shaft and it loads articles into the article shaft. The present invention also pertains to a process for providing and storing articles in a commissioning unit, preferably one of the above-mentioned type.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The filling shafts of automatic commissioning units have hitherto been loaded with new articles mainly manually. The operation is comparatively expensive and time-consuming. To save costs and time, a prior-art commissioning unit provides for automatic loading by means of a bay-storage and retrieval unit according to DE 297 03 230, by means of which articles can be pushed from the lower end of the filling shaft into a filling shaft inclined in relation to the horizontal. This type of loading of the filling shaft is unsuitable for vertical or quasi-vertical filling shafts, because the filling shaft is loaded with the total weight of the stack in this case and the stack already present would have to be pushed upward.
Furthermore, the filling shaft is loaded from the top in the case of vertical or nearly vertical filling shafts accessible from the front. To make it possible to perform this expediently by means of an automatic unit, provisions are made according to EP 0 794 135 to load not only a single article, but even an entire stack of articles at the same time by means of an automatic unit. The stack of articles is handled now in a special box-like magazine with an elongated hole in a longitudinal side wall. The magazine serves the purpose of consistently keeping together the stack of articles, doing so from the loading site at the acceptance department to the loading operation proper. The magazine is adapted to the shape of the articles and the plurality of stacked articles. After a loading operation in the high-speed automatic turning unit, the empty magazine is returned to the acceptance department for being filled again with articles.
SUMMARY AND OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
The object of the present invention is to provide a commissioning unit of the type described in the introduction, which makes it possible with simple means to efficiently load articles into the high-speed automatic turning unit and optionally to keep ready articles to be loaded in an expedient manner.
According to the invention, a commissioning system is provided with with at least one high-speed automatic turning unit, which has at least one article bay with essentially vertical, preferably gently sloping, article shafts, which are arranged next to one another, are accessible from the front and in which articles to be commissioned can be stored. The traveling bay-storage and retrieval unit associated with the article bay can be positioned at each article bay and it loads articles into the article shaft. The bay-storage and retrieval unit is movable in space and has an article-handling unit, which loads articles of the same brand and dimension stack by stack without a magazine, wherein a stack of articles to be loaded is handled by the bay-storage and retrieval unit simultaneously without a separate stack-of-articles magazine or container. The article-handling unit has a bottom-side stack-of-articles pick-up, an adjustable longitudinal stack-of-articles pusher, an adjustable transverse stack-of-articles pusher and an adjustable longitudinal stack-of-articles clamping plate provided especially with a row of the spring-tensioned fingers. The clamping plate is located in parallel and opposite the stack-of-articles pick-up and pushes in the clamped state a stack of articles picked up directly by the longitudinal stack-of-articles clamping plate, especially by the spring-tensioned fingers of the clamping plate, in the transverse direction (Q) of the stack against the stack-of-articles pick-up.
According to another aspect of the invention, a process for providing and loading articles in a commissioning unit with at least one high-speed automatic turning unit. The turning unit has at least one article bay with, essentially vertical, preferably gently sloping article shafts, which are arranged next to one another, are accessible from the front and in which articles to be commissioned can be stored. At least one traveling bay-storage and retrieval unit associated with the article bay can be positioned at each article shaft and can load articles into the article shaft, especially during the operation of a commissioning unit. Articles of the same brand and size can be removed by the bay-storage movable in space and retrieval unit from a supply bay or from a stack-of-articles stacker plate at the acceptance department in a stack prepacked there essentially by the horizontal displacement of the stack of articles in the longitudinal direction of the stack, preferably gently sloping downward in the longitudinal direction toward the bay-storage and retrieval unit and gently sloping laterally in the transverse direction against a stop (and be optionally loaded again at another supply bay). The stack of articles removed is transferred by the bay-storage and retrieval unit essentially in horizontal arrangement on the bay-storage and retrieval unit to the high-speed automatic turning unit, and the stack of articles is clamped there in the transverse direction of the stack directly in a stack of articles handling unit before the (vertical) positioning of a stack of articles at a selected article shaft. After positioning in the deposition position, the clamped stack of articles is released from or pushed out of the clamping in a selected shaft of the high-speed automatic turning unit.
The essence of the present invention is that the bay-storage and retrieval unit, which is movable in space, has an article-handling unit, which stores articles of the same brand or dimension in stacks without magazine, wherein a stack of articles to be stored is handled by the bay-storage and retrieval unit simultaneously without a separate stack-of-articles magazine or container and the article-handling unit has a bottom-side stack-of-articles pick-up, an adjustable longitudinal stack-of-articles pusher, an adjustable transverse stack-of-articles pusher and an adjustable longitudinal stack-of-articles clamping plate, which said clamping plate has, in particular, a row of spring-tensioned fingers and which is located in parallel to and opposite the stack-of-articles pick-up and which presses in the clamped state a stack of articles picked up directly by the longitudinal stack-of-articles clamping plate, especially its spring-tensioned fingers, against the stack-of-articles pick-up in the transverse direction of the stack.
Instead of the spring-tensioned fingers, it is also possible to provide other clamping means, which ensure the local clamping of every single article in the stack of articles, e.g., a flexible, resilient clamping strip.
The bay-storage and retrieval unit is preferably able to travel from and to at least one supply bay by means of a guide or rail system with or without switches, and it can be positioned at a selected lateral end of a shaft of the storage bay, especially of an angle sheet iron, wherein a single stack of articles to be handled is or can be arranged in each selected shaft and the stack of articles reaches an aligned article pick-up of the article-handling unit by being pushed in the direction of the stack or conversely, it reaches the selected shaft from the article support.
In the case of small products, two stacks of articles may also be optionally stored in a single shaft, in which case these stacks of articles will be parallel (“multiple load support”).
The supply bay may be a higher-level supply bay, which is ass
Freudelsperger Karl
Preiss Manfred
Knapp Logistik Automation GmbH
McGlew and Tuttle , P.C.
Werner Frank E.
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