Material or article handling – Apparatus for moving intersupporting articles into – within,... – Stack forming apparatus
Patent
1999-02-15
2000-11-28
Fischetti, Joseph A.
Material or article handling
Apparatus for moving intersupporting articles into, within,...
Stack forming apparatus
4147946, 414927, 414799, 271 91, B65G 5711
Patent
active
061526819
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Technical Field
The invention relates generally to material handling systems, and particularly to palletizers for arranging articles on a pallet.
2. Related Prior Art
A palletizer is operable to arrange objects, such as beverage containers, into an organized pattern and place the objects onto a pallet. It is known to provide such palletizers with a container conveyor assembly for conducting a stream of containers. It is also known to provide a palletizer with "pattern-forming" apparatus to organize the conveyed objects into a pattern. U.S. Pat. No. 4,834,605, which issued to Jerred and which is titled "Apparatus for Palletizing Layers of Circular Containers Arranged in a Honeycomb Pattern", discloses one known apparatus for arranging a stream of generally circular containers on a conveyor into a "voidless" arrangement of nested, parallel rows of containers.
It is also generally known to provide a palletizer with apparatus to accumulate a portion of the stream of conveyed containers and to move the portion of the stream containers from the stream of conveyors onto a pallet. An example of such an accumulation and sweep assembly is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,271,709 which issued to VanderMeer et al. on Dec. 21, 1993 and which is titled "Device and Method for Repeatedly Forming a Preselected Arrangement of Conveyed Articles". It is also known to provide a palletizer with a pallet dispenser, a separator sheet dispenser and a main hoist for holding a pallet in a position to receive multiple tiers of containers and separator sheets.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention provides a palletizer including a container sweep assembly operable to repeatedly organize a stream of objects, such as containers on a conveyor, into a preselected pattern, and operable to transfer the containers in the preselected pattern onto a pallet. The container sweep assembly includes a container shift apparatus that removes selected containers from the stream of containers, and reinserts the containers into the stream at preselected positions to assure that the containers repeatedly move into the desired, preselected pattern.
More particularly, the invention provides a palletizer assembly including a container sweep assembly, an associated container shift apparatus, and a main hoist. The container placement apparatus and the sweep apparatus cooperate to receive a stream of containers that have been organized into a voidless pattern, and to segregated the stream of containers into a series of groupings or "patterns". The sweep assembly then transfers the pattern onto a pallet in the main hoist.
The sweep apparatus operates to repeatedly transfer a predetermined pattern of containers from a "sweep area" onto a pallet. Because of the staggered arrangement of containers when in a voidless pattern, the stream of containers moving along the conveyor to the sweep apparatus is not, without intervention, properly configured to provide repeated patterns. The container shift apparatus intervenes to rearrange selected containers in the stream without interrupting the advance of the stream. The container shift apparatus properly organizes the containers by shifting a number of containers in the stream to the lead edge of patterns being formed to make those patterns complete. In particular, the container shift apparatus temporarily removes containers from the stream of containers, and re-inserts the temporarily removed containers into a position occupying the lead edge of alternating patterns.
In one embodiment, the palletizer removes all but one of the containers in a row of containers from the stream, thereby leaving a single container in a row.
In another aspect of the invention, the sweep apparatus operates to permit the lines of containers to slide by the container that is left behind, thereby permitting the lead edge of the pattern being formed to attain the proper configuration without having to handle all of the containers in a row that is to be rearranged. This is accomplished by utilizing back pressure on
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Busse Brian E.
Vincent Patris E.
Arrowhead Systems LLC
Fischetti Joseph A.
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