Article dispensing – Plural sources – stacks or compartments – With discharge means for each source
Patent
1999-06-21
2000-11-07
Noland, Kenneth W.
Article dispensing
Plural sources, stacks or compartments
With discharge means for each source
221268, B65G 5900
Patent
active
06142336&
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The invention relates to a storage shelf for items, said storage shelf comprising adjacently arranged and superposed storage compartments and a controllable dispensing device for shifting the items out of the storage compartments, the dispensing device including cross members associated to the rows of adjacently arranged storage compartments and movable in parallel to the compartment bottoms thereof, the cross members cooperating with separately activatable drivers associated to the individual storage compartments of the respective row so as to shift the items out of the respective storage compartments in the activated state of the drivers, when the cross members are moved forwards. The items may be contained in the storage compartments in vertical stacks, yet also in horizontal stacks.
Furthermore, the invention relates to an arrangement comprising several such storage shelves.
From U.S. Pat. No. 4,267,942 A, a pharmaceutical dispensing cabinet is known, wherein storage cubicles for prepackaged pharmaceuticals are provided in horizontal and vertical rows, wherein for each storage cubicle a probe is provided for pushing out the pharmaceutical packages, which probe is mounted behind the respective storage cubicle in a bushing and is capable of pushing out each lowermost pharmaceutical package of the vertical package stacks present in the storage cubicle. To perceive probe activations, spring-actuated pivot vanes are provided in the path of the probe behind the storage cubicles. The probe activation is provided so as to otherwise prevent access to the pharmaceutical packages in the cabinet. This known construction thus is comparatively complicated and hardly suitable for commissioning systems.
On the other hand, commissioning systems have become known in many instances, in which items are dispensed under computer control from storage compartments (often also termed channels, magazines or storage containers) of storage shelves, for which purpose the most varying ejectors, one for each storage compartment, had been provided, constituting a considerable expenditure, cf., e.g., EP 26,754 A, EP 165,918 A, EP 515,350 B, yet also EP 560,206 A or EP 592,729; in such systems, the items as a rule are automatically put onto a conveying belt, depending on the commissioning order, optionally with a previous intermediate storage (cf., e.g., AT 391,671 B), and from this conveying belt they are transported to a transfer station, to a further conveying belt (cf. e.g., EP 183,074), or to a packaging region.
A storage shelf of the initially defined type is known from U.S. Pat. No. 5,439,345 A. In detail, two steep, slantedly abutting storage shelves are provided in an A-arrangement in whose storage compartments the items are superposed in stacks. To eject the lowermost items, cross members provided with a common drive are provided to which a driver in the form of a cuboid-shaped ejector for each item stack can become attached via a solenoid if the solenoid is activated. The common drive of the cross members is effected by a drivable disk arranged between the storage shelves, the drivable disk comprising excentrically arranged grooves on either side, each groove guiding one end of a two-armed rocking lever whose other end is connected with the cross member. It is also provided that always two superposed rows of adjacent storage compartments are mounted in the storage shelves, a further disk being required for the drive. The known construction is relatively complex, complicated and thus susceptible to failure, in particular if the number of superposed compartment rows were increased.
The invention aims at providing a storage shelf of the initially defined type, in which the expenditures for the dispensing device including its drive are as low as possible and an efficient dispensing procedure is enabled by parallel shift-out actions, also under the control of a computer, and which optionally can be used for the most diverse commissioning systems according to the prior art (e.g. as indicated above).
According to the invention, thi
REFERENCES:
patent: 3624792 (1971-11-01), Lipfert
patent: 5065897 (1991-11-01), Smith
patent: 5439345 (1995-08-01), Ivo
Knapp Logistik Automation Gesellschaft mbH
Noland Kenneth W.
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