Adhesive bonding and miscellaneous chemical manufacture – Methods – Surface bonding and/or assembly therefor
Reexamination Certificate
2001-05-11
2003-03-04
Crispino, Richard (Department: 1734)
Adhesive bonding and miscellaneous chemical manufacture
Methods
Surface bonding and/or assembly therefor
C156S361000, C156S363000, C156S566000, C156S567000, C156SDIG002
Reexamination Certificate
active
06527888
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to an apparatus and method for transferring tags to articles such as box blanks, blister cards, boxes or other containers, and in particular to a very high speed surveillance tag applicator apparatus having an indexed rotating drum with a plurality of slots around the circumference of the drum for receiving surveillance tags and then transferring the tags onto the articles either perpendicular to or parallel to the direction of travel of the moving articles.
DESCRIPTION OF RELATED ART
Transferring “tags” with an adhesive backing from a storage material (such as mylar or other similar materials) to a target article within required specifications is extremely difficult, particularly when the target material is moving at high rates of speed. The current average speed to apply “tags” is about 200 to 300 per minute. Speeds required by the industry are now 1000 tags per minute or greater.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,621,434, issued Dec. 16, 1952 to E. W. Jackson et al. discloses a stamp transferring mechanism for applying stamps to successive packages as they travel past a fixed point A. The mechanism comprises a rotatable mounted wheel having on its peripheral surface a plurality of protruding stamp carrying pads spaced circumferentially to correspond to the center-to-center spacing of the successive packages, a conveyor spaced from the wheel for carrying the objects past the fixed point and a motor for moving the wheel via a belt. The stamps are picked up by the stamp-carrying pads of the wheel by the contact between web and these pads, which contact occurs at a point B. However, problems occur when the product is not evenly spaced on the conveyor. “Tag” speeds and accuracy may be compromised. The vacuum applied to the “tag” may not separate the “tag” from the web as in the case of a label. Also, this mechanism cannot handle box blanks coming at random spacing between blanks, and it cannot be rotated to put labels on at right angles to the direction of labels coming off a carrier web.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,061,334, issued Oct. 29, 1991 to Eugene H. Paules discloses a high speed labeling (400 articles per minute) machine for transferring labels to articles such as cans. A label reel supplies pressure sensitive labels of the carrier tape. The carrier tape is fed to a feed-on roller and then onto a label transfer wheel. The transfer wheel holds the labels by vacuum suction on label pads while the spent carrier tape is removed by uptake reel. A glue supply wheel and glue applicator wheel are used when applying non-pressure sensitive labels. However, the speed of this machine is not fast enough for the requirements of the industry. The vacuum may not hold the pitch on the drum at higher stop-and-start speeds, and this labeling machine cannot handle randomly spaced items coming to the labeler.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,256,239, issued Oct. 26, 1993 to Helmet Voltmer and Urs Reuteler and assigned to New Jersey Machine, Inc. of Lebanon, N.H. discloses a continuously moving web pressure-sensitive labeler. The labels are carried initially by a web from a label unwind disc to a label applying drum after passing over a tension control liner. The Drum applies a vacuum to the labels, stripping them from the web at a peel plate and carrying stripped labels to a label applying station adjacent to conveyor. A feed roll driven by a servomotor advances the web to the drum. After the labels are stripped from the web, the web is wound on a backing rewind disc after passing over a tension control liner. However, this machine relies on a continuous motion of the web and the product at preset spacing. The current “tag” industry has products coming at various spacings along the path of the running machine. Also, labels can only be placed in the cross direction of the labels on a carrier web, but there is a need today for labels to be applied at right angles to the direction coming off the carrier web.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,429,576, issued Jul. 4, 1995 to Alfred Doderer-Winkler and assigned to Winkler & Dunnebier of Neuwied, Germany discloses an apparatus for making reusable adhesive envelopes. The envelope comprises a pouch having an opening along one edge, and a top flap adapted to be folded over to close the opening. The apparatus forms the reusable seal and has two spools which mount rolls of material used to form the protective strip having an adhesive layer and adhesive portion. Each strip and adhesive portion is fed by an idle and/or tension roller and then by a metering roller which are located in proximity to an associated anvil roller rotated at a constant common speed. Each anvil roller has an associated cutter roller. The blades of the cutter rollers will sever the tapes to create strips of the tapes corresponding to the final size of the protective strip and adhesive portion. The tape strips are transferred to a placing roller which is located in proximity to the transfer roller and the conveyor means. The tape strips are pressed upon the envelopes at the desired location. However, the constant speed of this machine does not conform to the current standard of the industry. Also, the tape strips cannot be pressure applied at high speeds without skewing the tape strips or moving individual envelopes.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,676,629, issued Oct. 14, 1997 to Ingvar Andersson and assigned to Tetra Laval Holdings & Finance S.A. discloses a method and apparatus for transferring tabs to a continuous material web. The apparatus comprises a rotating wheel with vacuum ducts for holding tabs located between a supply station and a deposit station with vacuum ducts for holding tabs. A groove extends about the periphery of the wheel and accommodates a number of retainer jaws displaced along the periphery of the wheel. When the wheel is rotated the tab is moved into contact with the work surface of one of a plurality of retainer jaws dispersed about the periphery of the wheel, and then that tab is transferred to the web at the deposit station with vacuum ducts for holding tabs on the retainer jaws. However, this is also a continuous motion machine with speeds far too slow for the current industry requirements. Surveillance tags must be applied to continuous or randomly fed articles.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Accordingly, it is therefore an object of this invention to provide a surveillance tag applicator that applies tags such as electronic article surveillance tags to articles, such as box blanks, blister cards, boxes, or other containers, at a very high rate of speed.
It is another object of the invention to receive a roll of tags attached to a web, thread a leader of the web around a portion of a drum and then to a rewind reel, and transfer each tag on the web to the rotating drum and then to one of a plurality of articles passing by the drum at a very high rate of speed.
It is a further object of this invention to provide a drum to receive tags from a web and apply the tags to articles, the drum having a plurality of slots around the circumference of the drum, each slot being narrower than the width of the tags to provide a pressure fit of the tags in each slot.
It is another object of this invention to provide a first servo motor to drive a rotating drum and a second servo motor to drive a tag ejector arm to enable the tags to be applied to articles at a very high rate of speed under the control of a programmable controller.
It is a further object of this invention to turn the tag applicator assembly comprising the tag transfer drum ninety degrees to enable tags to be applied across the width or along the length of different size articles passing by the indexed rotating drum.
It is yet another object of this invention to provide control to apply tags to every article or to random articles at fixed or variable intervals of advancing articles in accordance with preset controls.
It is another object of this invention to provide three-axis adjustment of a tag transfer drum for proper alignment with articles passing by the drum to receive the tags.
These and other objects are accomplished
James Frank A.
Lindberg Jeffrey C.
Williams Edward F.
Crispino Richard
Pearson & Pearson LLP
Purvis Sue A.
Shrink Packaging Systems Corporation
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