Apparatus for separating agricultural products

Abstract

Apparatus for the separation of agricultural or vegetable product, with a fixed structure having two parallel horizontal side members, a plurality of cutting modules equipped with a common rotating shaft (32A, 32B, 32C,...) having a plurality of rotating blades (11,12,13,...) in fixed position along its length, said shafts (32A, 32B, 32C,...) being parallel to each other and mounted above conveying means suitable to carry the products placed thereon toward said rotating blades (11,12,13,...), a plurality of positioning ramps (11-1,12-1,13-1,...) mounted in a position corresponding to a respective rotating blade (11,12,13,...) and having a shape elongated in the direction of movement of said conveying means and almost flattened and oriented vertically, the elongate upper edge of which is oriented downward toward said conveying means with an inclination such that the height of said edges increases in the feeding direction of the conveying means, so that the clusters of products placed on said conveying means are carried toward said ramps (11-1, 12-1,13-1,...), the respective upper edge of which determines the point of intersection of the respective blade (11,12,13,...) with the stems of each cluster carried under the blade, wherein: said conveying means include a table formed by a plurality of parallel grooves substantially orthogonal to said rotating shafts (32A, 32B, 32C,...) and reciprocally separated by respective raised portions; said table moves in a direction parallel to said grooves; said ramps are arranged in positions corresponding to said respective grooves.

Description

technical field [0001] The present invention relates to an improved device for separating agricultural or vegetable products, wherein the agricultural or vegetable products are connected to each other by associated connecting appendages such as stalks, stems, stalks, etc., such as cherries, small clusters of cherry tomatoes, etc. , have been picked previously and are usually obtained in small clusters connected or still connected to each other by related stems, especially in the case of cherries. Background technique [0002] It is well known that such plant products are grown on an industrial scale for sale through a large network of retail trades. In order to be ready for such use, the products generally have to undergo appropriate handling and processing, such as washing, separation from each other where they occur in strings, clusters, etc., weighing, sizing, based on predetermined characteristics such as color , maturity, etc. for sorting. [0003] In general, these s...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

[0012] Solutions using conveyor belts, despite their simplicity, do not however ensure that the cutting of the stems will be carried out in a regular manner, and especially at points far from the nodes connecting the stems; since the products are loaded on the conveyor in an arbitrary and unguided manner fact on the belt, if the stems in the cluster overlap on the conveyor belt then this will also happen

[0013] This creates serious problems in the field: in fact, it is generally observed that in order to ensure a more pleasing and attractive presentation to the average consumer, the stems of such products—such as cherries—must be placed in close contact with the connecting stems. The point or point closest to the node is cut to avoid the very undesired effect of some stems being too short while others remain unnecessarily connected by V-shaped junctions

[0018] However, this solution suffers from some serious drawbacks; in fact the movement of the tufts towards the rotating blade is obtained by means of continuous rocking on an inclined support plane on which the tufts to be cut are placed and due to the friction with the plane itself, this shaking is detrimental to the product, especially in the case of fragile products

[0019] The continuous rocking of the inclined support plane also requires a suitable mechanism with a motor to which a cam element is connected, and as is well known, the generation of alternating movements of a rigid structure relative to another leads to a more complex construction of all drive and control means

[0020] Finally, as per the above mentioned US 7,033,631 B1 patent Figure 9 It can be appreciated that the inclinations of the inclined portion 46 are substantially constant except for the end section 48, which is slightly different from the initial section; and these inclinations of said inclined portion 46 are constant, i.e., cannot be modified to suit the length of the stem; this results in no adjustments to the cutting operation, as described Figure 9 As shown, because the cherries with short stems can reach the position on the inclined portion 46 and become away from the vibration plane 38, and thus the movement of the cherries towards the rotary blade will be significantly hindered or even prevented.

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