Classifying – separating – and assorting solids – Sorting special items – and certain methods and apparatus for... – Condition responsive means controls separating means
Patent
1996-04-01
1998-09-01
Terrell, William E.
Classifying, separating, and assorting solids
Sorting special items, and certain methods and apparatus for...
Condition responsive means controls separating means
209564, 209583, 1983497, 198350, 414273, 414285, B07C 500
Patent
active
057998000
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method of sorting piece goods of any type such as articles of clothing, small parts, pallets, mail, medicament packages, etc. and to a sorting installation for sorting these piece goods.
2. The Prior Art
Sorting installations for items are known from the state of the art in which different individual articles are to be supplied as an ordered combination of the individual articles to a specific receiving group at the end of the sorting process. For example, articles of clothing washed for various customers are to be returned to the individual firms in an ordered state after the common washing process; or various pharmacies are to be sorted with medicaments from the wholesale warehouse in the desired combination according to patients and are to be supplied in the sequence in which the pharmacies are supplied. Known sorting methods have the decisive drawback that the throughput achieved by the sorting installation varies greatly and is much lower overall than the capacity of the conveyors linked to the sorting installation because the "items" to be sorted and the "loads" assembled from them can be of different sizes and considerable waiting times therefore arise in the item collecting systems of the sorting installation because sorting is carried out substantially by successive distributing processes.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
As the invention is to be illustrated, in particular with reference to an example of a laundry for hired occupational clothing, the known procedure is also to be adopted in this sphere. The procedure is carried out in such a sorting installation in that a plurality of soiled articles of clothing belonging to several customers and collected in protective sacks is supplied to the laundry daily and, after being washed, is returned or allocated to the individual customers some time later in the sequence requested by the customer, for example according to wearer, matching of the articles of clothing (jacket/trousers), cupboard number, pigeon-hole, etc. For this purpose, the following stages are necessary in a typical specialist laundry with a throughput of about 18,000 articles of clothing per layer:
1) The articles of clothing are removed from the protective sacks in the laundry. The individual identification number fastened securely in each item of clothing is read and stored in the inventory management computer. All articles of clothing belonging to a customer are read in each case before articles of clothing belonging to the next customer are recorded.
2) The articles of clothing are sorted after recording according to type of fabric, colour, types and intensities of soiling and are collected separately in conveying containers. The loading volume of a conveying container corresponds to a "washing load" of the plurality of similar washing machines operating in parallel.
3) Washing loads with the same sorting criterion are washed in succession at the adjusted machine rate. A change to a different sorting criterion entails a changeover of the washing machine to a different washing process. Losses of throughput occur during each changeover as idle rates have to be included.
4) To keep the number of changeovers per layer to a minimum, the partial stream passing from the identification positions to the sorting station is divided into equal-size "sortable loads" comprising about 2,000 articles of clothing.
5) With the average capacity of about 18,000 articles of clothing per layer, the articles of clothing appearing in loads after the washing machines are picked up individually by several operators working in parallel and are placed on clothes hangers for transportation. The transportation hanger is located in a catch from which it is automatically received by a hanger conveyor after being released by the operator.
6) The identification number fastened in the article of clothing, for example coded as a bar code, is read by a scanner and recorded in the control computer of the hanger sorting installation together
REFERENCES:
patent: 4244672 (1981-01-01), Lund
patent: 4907699 (1990-03-01), Butcher et al.
patent: 5058750 (1991-10-01), Graese
patent: 5411151 (1995-05-01), Sasada
Nguyen Tuan N.
Terrell William E.
LandOfFree
Process and installation for sorting individual goods does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.
If you have personal experience with Process and installation for sorting individual goods, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Process and installation for sorting individual goods will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-260712