Self-adaptive freshwater fish scaling and sectioning all-in-one machine

Abstract

The invention discloses a self-adaptive freshwater fish scaling and sectioning all-in-one machine, and belongs to the technical field of aquatic product processing mechanical equipment. The all-in-one machine is sequentially provided with a scaling module, a conveyor belt self-adaptive centering conveying module, a gill removing module, a laparotomy module and a viscera removing module along a processing assembly line. The device is characterized in that the conveyor belt module adopts a symmetrical rocker arm connecting rod mechanism to realize self-adaptive adjustment of the clamping width; the belly cutting module is provided with a follow-up lifting mechanism and is matched with real-time fish belly contour detection to realize accurate cutting; the viscera removing module adopts a profiling brush wheel to clean the abdominal cavity; and the gill removing module realizes automatic gill removing. The equipment is high in integration level and strong in adaptability, and integrated automatic processing from scaling to viscera removing of various freshwater fishes is realized.

Description

Technical Field

[0001] This invention belongs to the technical field of aquatic product processing machinery and equipment, and specifically relates to an adaptive integrated processing equipment for descaling, degilling, cutting, and eviscerating of various species and sizes of freshwater fish. Background Technology

[0002] This invention belongs to the technical field of aquatic product processing machinery and equipment, and specifically relates to an integrated adaptive descaling, gill removal, gutting, and evisceration processing device suitable for various species and sizes of freshwater fish. With the continuous expansion of the freshwater fish consumer market, the production efficiency, processing quality, and food safety level of the primary processing stage directly determine the added value of products and the core competitiveness of the industry. Currently, the primary processing of freshwater fish still heavily relies on manual labor. The entire process, from descaling, gill removal, gutting to evisceration, is largely completed manually, resulting in significant problems such as high labor intensity, low production efficiency, unstable processing quality, and difficulty in controlling hygiene standards. This has become a core bottleneck restricting the industry's scaling up and standardization.

[0003] While some automated fish processing equipment has emerged in the prior art, such as the fish evisceration and cleaning device disclosed in patent application CN111184055B, which achieves mechanized operations of fish gutting, evisceration, and cleaning through the coordination of a transmission mechanism, evisceration mechanism, water spraying device, and control system, the evisceration device provided by this invention features a fixed gutting knife inside the fish belly. After the belly is opened, a movable belly-supporting clamp fixed on one side holds the belly open until evisceration is completed. One forward-rotating evisceration knife and two evisceration brushes rotating in opposite directions are designed to be height-adjustable. A control program effectively enables coordination between multiple blades, and a high-pressure water spraying device is installed between each blade to achieve efficient evisceration and automatic cleaning. This solves the problem of time-consuming and labor-intensive manual evisceration to some extent. However, this equipment and similar existing equipment on the market still have significant technical limitations and cannot meet the actual production needs of the industry.

[0004] Firstly, the integration of functions is insufficient, and there are core gaps in the full-process automation. Most of these devices can only complete 1-2 preliminary processing steps such as gutting, cleaning, and washing, but do not cover the core processes of scale removal and gill removal. Among them, fish gills are extremely difficult to remove automatically due to their complex structure and deep location. Existing equipment has not been able to achieve stable integration of this process and still relies entirely on manual labor. It is impossible to achieve true full-process continuous production and it is also difficult to ensure the hygiene consistency of the products.

[0005] Secondly, the equipment has weak flexibility and adaptability, making it unable to meet the processing needs of multiple varieties and specifications. The existing equipment's conveying mechanism is mostly a fixed-width double conveyor belt with a passive clamping structure, lacking adaptive centering adjustment capability. The fish body is prone to slipping and tilting. The blotting knife is designed with a fixed position, and the lifting of the knife and brush can only be preset manually. There is no real-time detection and follow-up adjustment capability for the fish belly contour, making it impossible to dynamically adjust the cutting depth. This can easily lead to problems such as cutting the gallbladder, incomplete cutting, or damage to the fish meat. It can only adapt to single or similar-sized fish, making it difficult to meet the flexible processing needs of multiple varieties and small batches.

[0006] Thirdly, the core structural design has inherent flaws, making it difficult to balance processing efficiency and finished product quality. Existing equipment often uses a rigid main cutting blade with hooks and ordinary equal-length brushes for cleaning. These brushes lack contour-following design, failing to conform to the curved inner wall of the fish's abdominal cavity, easily resulting in visceral residue. Furthermore, the rigid hooking method easily damages the fish meat tissue. Meanwhile, existing descaling equipment in the industry mostly uses rigid rollers and hard brushes, generally resulting in a contradiction between incomplete descaling and damage to the fish skin. Overall, the yield rate and commercial value of the processed product are limited. In conclusion, the freshwater fish primary processing field urgently needs a highly integrated, highly adaptable, end-to-end processing equipment to overcome the core bottlenecks of existing technologies and promote the automation and standardization of the industry.

[0007] In summary, the primary processing of freshwater fish urgently needs a highly integrated and adaptable end-to-end processing equipment to overcome the core bottlenecks of existing technologies and promote the automation and standardization of the industry. Summary of the Invention

[0008] This invention aims to solve the problems of the prior art mentioned above. It proposes an adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine.

[0009] The technical solution of the present invention is as follows:

[0010] An adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine, comprising, along the processing production line direction, the following components:

[0011] The descaling module is used to remove scales from the surface of fish using a descaling mechanism that employs gear meshing to drive spring brush bristles.

[0012] The conveyor belt adaptive centering conveyor module is used to clamp and convey the fish, and its clamping width is adaptively adjusted according to the size of the fish.

[0013] The gill removal module is used to grab and remove the fish's gills;

[0014] The ventriloquism module includes a high-speed rotating ventriloquism knife and a lifting mechanism that can be adjusted to follow the contour of the fish belly for ventriloquism.

[0015] The visceration module, including a contoured brush wheel and a lifting mechanism, is used to clean the abdominal cavity of the fish.

[0016] Furthermore, the descaling mechanism includes a pair of meshing gears powered by a drive motor to ensure that the brush rollers on both sides rotate synchronously and stably in opposite directions. Each brush roller is densely arranged with spring brushes with specific flexible deflection. When in operation, the high-speed rotating spring brushes, when in contact with the surface of the fish, can adapt to the curvature of the fish body and the hardness of the scales by their flexible characteristics, applying uniform and gentle contact pressure.

[0017] Furthermore, the conveyor belt adaptive centering conveying module includes a symmetrically arranged rocker arm linkage mechanism and a drive cylinder. The linkage length of the rocker arm linkage mechanism is a specific size, which realizes adaptive centering adjustment of the clamping width within the range of 40~150mm.

[0018] Furthermore, the ventriloquism module includes a high-speed rotating ventriloquism blade unit and a follow-up lifting mechanism. The follow-up lifting mechanism uses a crank-slider mechanism as the drive source. The ventriloquism blade unit is installed at the output end of the crank-slider mechanism and its blade is driven to rotate at high speed by an independent motor. The control system dynamically controls the lifting stroke of the crank-slider mechanism based on the real-time acquired fish belly contour height information, so that the ventriloquism blade can accurately follow the fish belly curve to complete the ventriloquism operation, and the ventriloquism depth can be dynamically adjusted.

[0019] Furthermore, the viscera removal module includes a contour cleaning unit and a lifting drive mechanism. The lifting drive mechanism is a servo electric cylinder, driven by a motor to achieve the vertical lifting movement of the contour cleaning unit. The core of the contour cleaning unit is a specially designed brush wheel with bristles that are longer in the middle and shorter on both sides, in order to conform to the arc-shaped inner wall of the fish's abdominal cavity. When the brush wheel is inserted into the dissected abdominal cavity and rotates at high speed under the drive of the lifting drive mechanism, the viscera can be completely peeled off and thrown out through the scraping and wrapping action of the bristles.

[0020] Furthermore, the gill removal module includes a fish head fixing unit and a gill removal execution unit. The fish head fixing unit is equipped with positioning claws, which are driven by a cylinder to clamp the fish head. The gill removal execution unit includes a gill removal blade and a pair of openable and closable contour clamps. The gill removal blade is driven by a belt drive to move left and right, and is used to enter the gill cavity to cut the gill root connection. The contour clamps are driven by a gear and rack mechanism to perform the clamping action and are mounted as a whole on a linear guide rail. During operation, the gill removal blade first enters the gill cavity to complete the cut, and then the contour clamps move in the opposite direction at high speed along the guide rail under the push of the drive element, thereby completely tearing and separating the clamped fish gills from the root.

[0021] The advantages and beneficial effects of this invention are as follows:

[0022] (1) Corresponding to claims 1 and 6: For the first time, the entire process of primary processing of freshwater fish is integrated into a single, integrated system, especially the innovative integration of an automated gill removal module. Existing technologies in this field have long been limited by the structural characteristics of fish gills, and have not achieved effective integration of the gill removal process, which has always relied on manual labor. This invention overcomes the industry challenge of automated gill removal through a combination design of a fish head fixing unit, a gill removal blade, and a contour-following clamp tearing gill removal execution unit. It is not a simple functional superposition, but rather solves a series of technical problems such as multi-process connection and matching, precise fish body positioning, and full-process collaborative control.

[0023] (2) Innovative design of flexible adaptive descaling mechanism corresponding to claim 2. Conventional descaling mechanisms mostly adopt rigid roller and hard brush structures, which generally have the contradiction of "incomplete descaling" and "damage to fish skin". The present invention adopts a spring brush roller with gear meshing and synchronous reverse rotation. Through the spring brush bristles with specific flexible deflection, it adapts to the curvature of the fish body and the hardness of the scales, so as to minimize the fish skin damage rate while ensuring the descaling rate. This targeted structural design solves the technical pain point that has existed in the field for a long time, and is not a conventional material replacement or structural adjustment.

[0024] (3) Corresponding to claims 3, 4, and 5: Collaborative design of multi-process adaptive actuators. Compared with the patented cutting and cleaning mechanisms, which can only achieve simple lifting and lowering of a preset stroke, the conveying mechanism is passively clamped and has no adaptive centering capability. This invention achieves synchronous centering and adaptive adjustment of conveying and clamping through a symmetrical rocker arm linkage mechanism, achieves follow-up lifting and precise cutting of the abdominal knife through a crank slider mechanism + control system, and achieves close cleaning of the abdominal cavity through a non-circularly shaped brush wheel. The three core mechanisms cooperate with each other, providing a structural foundation for adaptive processing throughout the entire process, solving the problem of insufficient flexibility of conventional equipment, and is not a conventional combination of technologies in this field. Attached Figure Description

[0025] Figure 1 This is a schematic diagram of the overall structure of the adaptive freshwater fish scaling and cutting integrated machine according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

[0026] Figure 2 This is an exploded view of the descaling module structure of the present invention.

[0027] Figure 3 This is a simplified diagram of the conveyor belt adaptive centering transport module of the present invention.

[0028] Figure 4 This is a schematic diagram of the gill removal module structure of the present invention.

[0029] Figure 5 This is a schematic diagram of the laparotomy module and the viscera removal module of the present invention.

[0030] The components include: 1. Scale removal module; 2. Conveyor belt adaptive centering conveyor module; 3. Fish head fixing device; 4. Gill removal module; 5. Rocker arm linkage mechanism; 6. Belly cutting and visceration removal module; 7. Spring brush bristles; 8. Meshing gear; 9. Up and down adjusting screw; 10. Belt drive; 11. Gill removal blade; 12. Fish head contouring clamp; 13. Crank slider mechanism; 14. Belly cutting knife; 15. Contouring visceration removal wheel; 16. Servo electric cylinder; 17. Belly cutting knife drive motor; and 18. Visceralization brush wheel drive motor. Detailed Implementation

[0031] The technical solutions of the embodiments of the present invention will be clearly and thoroughly described below with reference to the accompanying drawings. The described embodiments are merely some embodiments of the present invention.

[0032] The technical solution of the present invention to solve the above-mentioned technical problems is:

[0033] Please see Figure 1 This invention provides an adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine, employing a longitudinal linear assembly line layout. The frame serves as the supporting foundation, and along the processing direction, a scaling module, a conveyor belt adaptive centering transport module, a gill removal module, a evisceration module, and a visceration module are sequentially fixedly installed. The fish carcass is placed at the beginning of the assembly line by a manual or automatic feeding device, and after being processed by each of the aforementioned modules, the entire processing cycle is completed.

[0034] Descaling module

[0035] Please see Figure 2 The descaling module includes a drive motor, a pair of meshing transmission gears 8, and two parallel brush rollers 7. Each brush roller is densely covered with highly elastic stainless steel spring bristles. The drive motor drives the two brush rollers to rotate synchronously in opposite directions via a gear set. When a fish passes by, the spring bristles open under centrifugal force and come into contact with the fish's surface. Their flexibility adapts to changes in the fish's contours, efficiently removing scales while avoiding damage to the fish skin from rigid scraping.

[0036] Conveyor belt adaptive centering conveyor module

[0037] Please see Figure 3 This module serves as the conveyor link connecting various workstations. Its core is a symmetrically designed rocker arm linkage mechanism 5, driven by a pneumatic cylinder or electric push rod. When the sensor or control system detects the width of the fish, the drive element activates, causing the conveyor belts on both sides to move synchronously in opposite directions via the rocker arm linkage mechanism. This adaptively adjusts the clamping width within a range of 40-150mm, ensuring that fish of different widths can be centered, stably clamped, and transported downstream.

[0038] Gill removal module

[0039] Please see Figure 4 This module addresses the challenge of automated gill removal. It comprises a fish head positioning unit and a gill removal execution unit. The fish head positioning unit features cylinder-driven, liftable contoured grippers 12 for clamping and securing the fish head. The gill removal execution unit, driven by a belt drive 10, moves the gill removal blade 11 left and right; the blade 11's tip is specifically designed to penetrate the gill cavity. Then, driven by a miniature cylinder, the grippers extend into both sides of the gills, clamp them, and then rapidly retract via a linear module, completely removing the gills.

[0040] Laparotomy module and viscera removal module

[0041] Please see Figure 5 The evisceration module is located after the gill removal module. It includes a crank-slider mechanism 13 and an assembly of a vertically lifting evisceration knife 14 driven by the mechanism. The evisceration knife is driven to rotate at high speed by an independent motor 17. The visceration module is located after the evisceration module and includes a servo electric cylinder 16 and an assembly of a vertically lifting contour-following visceration brush wheel 15 driven by the cylinder. The bristles of the brush wheel are irregularly distributed with longer bristles in the middle and shorter bristles at both ends to conform to the shape of the fish's abdominal cross-section.

[0042] The systems, devices, modules, or units described in the above embodiments can be implemented by computer chips or entities, or by products with certain functions.

[0043] It should also be noted that the terms "comprising," "including," or any other variations thereof are intended to cover non-exclusive inclusion, such that a process, method, article, or apparatus that comprises a list of elements includes not only those elements but also other elements not expressly listed, or elements inherent to such process, method, article, or apparatus. Without further limitation, an element defined by the phrase "comprising one..." does not exclude the presence of other identical elements in the process, method, article, or apparatus that includes said element.

[0044] The above embodiments should be understood as illustrative only and not as limiting the scope of protection of the present invention. After reading the description of the present invention, those skilled in the art can make various alterations or modifications to the present invention, and these equivalent changes and modifications also fall within the scope defined by the claims of the present invention.

Claims

1. An adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine, characterized in that, Along the processing assembly line direction, the following are included in sequence: The descaling module is used to remove scales from the surface of fish using a descaling mechanism that employs gear meshing to drive spring brush bristles. The conveyor belt adaptive centering conveyor module is used to clamp and convey the fish, and its clamping width is adaptively adjusted according to the size of the fish. The gill removal module is used to grab and remove the fish's gills; The ventriloquism module includes a high-speed rotating ventriloquism knife and a lifting mechanism that can be adjusted accordingly, for ventriloquizing along the outline of the fish belly; The visceration module, including a contoured brush wheel and a lifting mechanism, is used to clean the abdominal cavity of the fish.

2. The adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine according to claim 1, characterized in that, The descaling mechanism includes a pair of meshing gears, powered by a drive motor, to ensure that the brush rollers on both sides rotate synchronously and stably in opposite directions; Each brush roller is densely arranged with spring brush filaments with a specific degree of flexibility. When in operation, the high-speed rotating spring brush filaments contact the surface of the fish, and their flexibility allows the brush filaments to adapt to the curvature of the fish and the hardness of the scales, applying uniform and gentle contact pressure.

3. The adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine according to claim 1, characterized in that, The adaptive centering conveyor module includes a symmetrically arranged rocker arm linkage mechanism and a drive cylinder. The linkage length of the rocker arm linkage mechanism is a specific size, which enables adaptive centering adjustment of the clamping width within the range of 40~150mm.

4. The adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine according to claim 1, characterized in that, The ventriloquism module includes a high-speed rotating ventriloquism blade unit and a follow-up lifting mechanism. The follow-up lifting mechanism uses a crank-slider mechanism as the drive source. The ventriloquism blade unit is installed at the output end of the crank-slider mechanism and its blade is driven to rotate at high speed by an independent motor. The control system dynamically controls the lifting stroke of the crank-slider mechanism based on the real-time acquired height information of the fish belly contour, so that the ventriloquism blade can accurately follow the curve of the fish belly to complete the ventriloquism operation, and the ventriloquism depth can be dynamically adjusted.

5. The adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine according to claim 1, characterized in that, The visceration removal module includes a contour cleaning unit and a lifting drive mechanism. The lifting drive mechanism is a servo electric cylinder driven by a motor to achieve the vertical lifting movement of the contour cleaning unit. The core of the contour cleaning unit is a specially designed brush wheel with bristles that are longer in the middle and shorter on both sides, in an irregular shape to conform to the arc-shaped inner wall of the fish's abdominal cavity. When the brush wheel is inserted into the dissected abdominal cavity and rotates at high speed under the drive of the lifting drive mechanism, the viscera can be completely peeled off and thrown out through the scraping and wrapping action of the bristles.

6. The adaptive freshwater fish scaling and gutting integrated machine according to claim 1, characterized in that, The gill removal module includes a fish head fixing unit and a gill removal execution unit. The fish head fixing unit is equipped with positioning claws, which are driven by a cylinder to clamp the fish head. The gill removal execution unit includes a gill removal blade and a pair of openable contour clamps. The gill removal blade is driven by a belt drive to move left and right, and is used to enter the gill cavity to cut the gill root connection. The contour clamps are driven by a gear and rack mechanism to perform the clamping action and are mounted as a whole on a linear guide rail. During operation, the gill removal blade first enters the gill cavity to complete the cut, and then the contour clamps move in the opposite direction at high speed along the guide rail under the push of the drive element, thereby completely tearing the clamped fish gills apart from the root.

Images