Butchering – Conveyer – Transfer from one conveyor to another
Patent
1993-11-05
1996-05-07
Little, Willis
Butchering
Conveyer
Transfer from one conveyor to another
452178, 452183, A22C 2100
Patent
active
055140335
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The present invention relates to a poultry-handling assembly.
There are about 500 million broiler birds slaughtered each year in the United Kingdom alone. The birds are removed from the transport containers and shackled at about 1000 birds/man-hour. A typical processing line operates at about 5,000 birds/hour, has 1,200 or so shackles, and moves at around 0.2 meters/second. Other Western European countries have similar per capita production rates while in the USA, the per capita production rate is about twice that of the UK.
There is currently a great deal of welfare concern about the handling and transport of poultry. Using operatives to remove the live birds from their containers and then hang them on shackles at the processing plant is a frequent source of stress and injury to the birds, mainly due to the poor quality of manual handling.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a poultry-handling assembly such that manual handling at the shackling site can either be avoided altogether or at least reduced to a minimum.
According to the present invention, a poultry-handling assembly for use with a shackle line comprises conveying means operative to move the birds to a shackling site at which the conveying means supports the birds with at least their lower leg regions free of the conveying means for engagement by a shackle and subsequent take-up by the shackle line, the conveying means comprising two conveyors which together either grip the birds laterally at said shackling site or provide a support surface underneath the birds at said shackling site.
In one such case, for example, the two conveyors co-operate so as together to present said support surface in the form of an open-bottomed V-shaped trough configuration at said shackling site. Conveniently, in this instance, the conveyors increasingly assume said trough configuration as they move forward from an input site at which they abut one another in a shallow-vee or horizontal disposition.
Where the conveying means comprises two conveyors which grip the birds laterally at said shackling site, then the bird-engaging surfaces of the conveyors conveniently carry resilient gripping elements profiled to allow relative movement between adjacent elements.
In one such case, the elements are profiled to allow relative movement in at least two different directions.
Conveniently, the poultry-handling assembly includes a re-orientation/metering device operative to encourage the birds to travel backwards towards the shackling site.
Conveniently, the shackles are open-fronted shackles.
Conveniently, the shackles are made of wire but in an alternative design they are made of a plastics material with a metal insert to make them electrically conducting (for stunning).
Conveniently, the plastics shackles include key-hole shaped slots for accepting the lower leg portions of the birds.
Conveniently, a leg divider is provided at or upstream of the shackling site to facilitate take-up by the shackles.
Alternatively, the shackles themselves include a leg-divider portion.
Conveniently, the poultry-handling assembly includes a detection device operative to detect the arrival of a bird at the shackling site, a shackle accumulator, and transfer means operative at the command of the detection device to transfer a shackle from the shackle accumulator to the shackling site.
The invention also includes a poultry-handling apparatus incorporating both the poultry-handling assembly of the present invention and a shackle line adapted to be supplied with poultry from the assembly.
The invention further includes a processing plant incorporating such apparatus and means for stunning, slaughtering and, optionally, plucking the birds.
Embodiments of the invention will now be described, by way of example only, with reference to the accompanying somewhat diagrammatic drawings, in which:
FIGS. 1A and 1B, FIGS. 2A and 2B, and FIGS. 3A and 3B are end-on and side views of part of a poultry-handling assembly according to a first embodiment of the present invention (viewed at three succes
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British Technology Group Ltd.
Little Willis
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