Conveyors: power-driven – Conveyor section – Spiral
Patent
1995-09-29
1997-10-28
Valenza, Joseph E.
Conveyors: power-driven
Conveyor section
Spiral
198812, 62380, B65G 2118
Patent
active
056809239
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a plant for temporary storage of items, preferably a freezer tunnel having an inlet station and a discharge station, drive members for the conveyor both at the inlet and discharge stations, and a conveyor for conveying the items from the inlet station through the plant to the discharge station, said conveyor looping around fixed turning rolls located opposite each other in the plant and around turning rolls that are displaceable in relation thereto as they are placed on at least one trolley which can be slid back and forth between said fixed turning rolls freely displaceable as a result of the lengths of conveyors in conveyor sections on either side of the trolley and the speeds of the drive members only, wherein the fixed turning rolls of the plant are arranged in at least one row with rotation around a mutual axis.
Plants in which items are stored temporarily, possibly while being subjected to simultaneous treatment, will often be part of a process line. Either the inlet station or the discharge station of such a process line will frequently have to be operated at a continuous and constant speed determined by the speed of operation of the other machines forming part of the process line.
A plant of the type mentioned in the introduction may be used as a buffer in such a process line. Thereby, machines on either side of the plant may continue at a constant speed while minor operational interruptions or stoppages are absorbed by the plant buffer, which is provided with the possibility of displacing the trolley back and forth between the fixed turning rolls.
Particularly in freezer tunnels it is essential that the conveyor belt at the inlet station may be driven at a continuous fixed speed because an ice-cream extruder supplying the inlet station with products must operate at a constant speed for the sake of the ice-cream composition.
Packing machines situated in connection with the discharge station of the freezer tunnel may frequently be subject to larger or shorter stoppages. However, these machines are also able to operate at an increased operational speed compared to normal operation speed.
Upon stoppages in such packing machines, the frozen products were hitherto removed from the discharge station and returned for processing if this was possible, or it has been necessary to dispose of the frozen products. This disposal of the products has frequently been chosen because it is very time-consuming to stop an ice-cream extruder and subsequently restart it. This is because stopping and subsequently restarting an extruder takes a good deal of time and much ice-cream material before a balance occurs in the process line that permits the production of products with a satisfactory quality.
Plants of the type mentioned in the introduction for temporary storage of items are known, e.g. from German publication No. 2,248,193.
However, a plant according to said German publication would not be suitable for use in situations when the temporary storage of the items must take place for a predetermined storage time in the plant. This may, for example, be the case in a freezer tunnel where items are to be frozen. It may also, however, be the case in other plants where the items are to be subjected to heat treatment, hardening or some other treatment that requires a minimum storage time in a treatment plant. Thus, the known plant assumes that the items should primarily be discharged as soon as possible in order to keep as much storing room vacant as possible.
The plant is further disadvantageous in that the drive members used are only designed to be driven at a predetermined speed. One or the other of the drive members may be stopped when it is desirable to fill or empty the store room, but a variation of speed is not possible.
Furthermore, stopping either of the drive members will at the same time necessitate activation of additional drive members which permit changing the size of the stock via a clutch. The stock size is varied by pulling the trolleys one way o
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Valenza Joseph E.
Vigil Thomas R.
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