A conveying system for transporting breast meat removed from the top half of a poultry carcass to a trimming area.

Abstract

To provide a conveyance system for conveying the breast stripped off the upper body of a slaughtered edible bird to a trimming site, which allows for improved efficiency of trimming work as compared to the conventional art.SOLUTION: The present invention provides a conveyance system for conveying the breast stripped off the upper body of a slaughtered edible bird to a trimming site, the system including: an X-ray irradiation device that irradiates the breast with X-rays to detect the presence of small bones; a small bone separating device that sorts the breast into small bone-containing breast and small bone-free breast; and a conveyance device that conveys the breast to a trimming site through the X-ray irradiation device and the small bone separating device.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 2

Description

[Technical field]

[0001] The present invention relates to a conveying system for conveying breast meat removed from the top half of a poultry carcass to a trimming station. [Background technology]

[0002] When breast meat is removed from the upper half of a chicken carcass, the triangular bone, which is a thin plate-like bone fragment extending from the tip of the coracoid bone, may be broken and remain as small bones in the removed breast meat. As shown in Fig. 1, the conventional transport system is composed of only a transport device C such as a belt conveyor connecting a breast meat removing device A and a breast meat trimming work area B, and the left and right breasts are transported to the trimming work area B in a mixed state, with breast meat with small bones 100c1 and breast meat without small bones 100c2, and the left and right breasts are transported to the trimming work area B and trimmed by an operator 200c. Summary of the Invention [Problem to be solved by the invention]

[0003] Conventionally, breast meat with and without small bones was transported to the trimming workplace together, and the trimming worker had to process both the breast meat with and without small bones, which reduced the efficiency of the trimming work. The present invention has been made in consideration of the above problems, and has an object to provide a conveying system for transporting breast meat stripped from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming work area, which can improve the efficiency of trimming work compared to conventional conveying systems. [Means for solving the problem]

[0004] In order to solve the above problems, the present invention provides a conveying system for transporting breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace, comprising an X-ray irradiator that irradiates the breast meat with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones, a small bone sorting device that separates the breast meat into breast meat with small bones and breast meat without small bones, and a conveying device that transports the breast meat to the trimming workplace via the X-ray irradiator and the small bone sorting device. By irradiating the breast meat with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones, and separating the breast meat into those with and without small bones before transporting them to the trimming area, trimming workers can be divided into those who specialize in breast meat with small bones and those who specialize in breast meat without small bones, which improves the efficiency of the trimming work. The present invention also provides a transport system for transporting breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace, comprising: a right X-ray irradiator that irradiates X-rays to the right breast meat from the breast meat separated into right and left breast meat to detect the presence or absence of small bones, a right small bone sorting device that separates the right breast meat into right breast meat with small bones and right breast meat without small bones, a right transporting device that transports the right breast meat to the right trimming workplace via the right X-ray irradiator and the right small bone sorting device, a left X-ray irradiator that irradiates X-rays to the left breast meat from the breast meat separated into right and left breast meat to detect the presence or absence of small bones, a left small bone sorting device that separates the left breast meat into left breast meat with small bones and left breast meat without small bones, and a left transporting device that transports the left breast meat to the left trimming workplace via the left X-ray irradiator and the left small bone sorting device. By separating the breast meat into right breast meat and left breast meat in advance, separating the right breast meat into right breast meat with small bones and right breast meat without small bones, and separating the left breast meat into left breast meat with small bones and left breast meat without small bones, and transporting them to the trimming workshop, trimming workers can be divided into workers specializing in right breast meat with small bones, workers specializing in right breast meat without small bones, workers specializing in left breast meat with small bones, and workers specializing in left breast meat without small bones, thereby further improving the efficiency of the trimming work.

[0005] The present invention provides a method for processing poultry breast meat, which comprises irradiating breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones, separating the breast meat into breast meat with small bones and breast meat without small bones, having a worker specializing in breast meat with small bones remove the bones from the breast meat with small bones and trim the breast meat, and having a worker specializing in breast meat without small bones trim the breast meat without small bones. The present invention also provides a method for processing poultry breast meat, which comprises the steps of: irradiating the right breast meat, which has been removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass and separated into right and left breast meat, with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones, separating the right breast meat into right breast meat with small bones and right breast meat without small bones, a worker specializing in right breast meat with small bones removes the small bones from the right breast meat with small bones and trims said breast meat, a worker specializing in right breast meat without small bones trims the right breast meat without small bones, irradiating the left breast meat from the separated breast meat with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones, separating the left breast meat into left breast meat with small bones and left breast meat without small bones, a worker specializing in left breast meat with small bones removes the small bones from the left breast meat with small bones and trims said breast meat, and a worker specializing in left breast meat without small bones trims the left breast meat without small bones. The method for processing chicken breast meat according to the present invention can improve the efficiency of trimming work compared to the conventional method. [Brief description of the drawings]

[0006] [Figure 1] FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration of a conventional conveying system for conveying breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace. [Diagram 2] FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a conveying system for conveying breast meat removed from an upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace according to an embodiment of the present invention. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

[0007] A conveying system for conveying breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described. 2, in the conveying system 1 according to this embodiment, the right breast meat 100a is placed on the right belt conveyor 2a at a predetermined interval, and the left breast meat 100b is placed on the left belt conveyor 2b at a predetermined interval via a breast meat peeling device A and a left / right separating device A' that is attached to the device A and separates the breast meat into right breast meat and left breast meat. The breast meat peeling device A equipped with the left / right separating device A' is a known technology, as described in, for example, Japanese Patent No. 6861459.

[0008] The right conveyor belt 2a passes through a right X-ray irradiator 3a which irradiates X-rays onto the right breast meat 100a to detect the presence or absence of small bones, and further passes through a right small bone sorter 4a which operates in response to an output signal from the right X-ray irradiator 3a and sorts the right breast meat 100a into right breast meat with small bones 100a1 and right breast meat without small bones 100a2. A right small bone belt conveyor 2a' for transporting the right breast meat with small bones 100a1 branches off from the right belt conveyor 2a. The right small bone belt conveyor 2a' transports the right breast meat with small bones 100a1 to a right breast meat with small bones trimming work area B1'. The right belt conveyor 2a passes through the right bone separator 4a and transports the boneless right breast meat 100a2 to the boneless right breast meat trimming work area B1. The trimming work areas B1' and B1 are formed by one side and the other side of a single wide belt conveyor. A worker 200a1 specializing in right breast meat with small bones facing the one side removes small bones from right breast meat with small bones 100a1 and trims the breast meat 100a1, and a worker 200a2 specializing in right breast meat without small bones facing the other side trims right breast meat without small bones 100a2.

[0009] The left conveyor belt 2b passes through a left X-ray irradiator 3b which irradiates X-rays on the left breast meat 100b to detect the presence or absence of small bones, and further passes through a left small bone sorter 4b which operates in response to an output signal from the left X-ray irradiator 3b and sorts the left breast meat 100b into left breast meat with small bones 100b1 and left breast meat without small bones 100b2. A left small bone belt conveyor 2b' for transporting the left breast meat with small bones 100b1 branches off from the left belt conveyor 2b. The left small bone belt conveyor 2b' transports the left breast meat with small bones 100b1 to a left breast meat with small bones trimming work area B2'. The left belt conveyor 2b passes through the left bone separator 4b and transports the boneless left breast meat 100b2 to the boneless left breast meat trimming work area B2. Work areas B2' and B2 are formed by one side and the other side of a single wide belt conveyor. A worker 200b1 specializing in left breast meat with small bones facing the one side removes small bones from left breast meat with small bones 100b1 and trims the breast meat 100b1, and a worker 200b2 specializing in left breast meat without small bones facing the other side trims left breast meat without small bones 100b2.

[0010] By irradiating the breast meat with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones, and separating the breast meat into those with and without small bones before transporting them to the trimming area, trimming workers can be divided into those who specialize in breast meat with small bones and those who specialize in breast meat without small bones, which improves the efficiency of the trimming work. By separating the breast meat into right breast meat and left breast meat in advance, separating the right breast meat into right breast meat with small bones and right breast meat without small bones, and separating the left breast meat into left breast meat with small bones and left breast meat without small bones, and transporting them to the trimming workshop, trimming workers can be divided into workers specializing in right breast meat with small bones, workers specializing in right breast meat without small bones, workers specializing in left breast meat with small bones, and workers specializing in left breast meat without small bones. Since the way of applying the knife when trimming right breast meat and left breast meat is different, by separating the trimming workers into workers specializing in right breast meat and workers specializing in left breast meat, the efficiency of the trimming work is further improved. The X-ray irradiation devices 3a, 3b and the small bone separation devices 4a, 4b may be commercially available products from specialized manufacturers (such as A&D Co., Ltd., Ishida Co., Ltd., Anritsu Infivis Co., Ltd., etc.). The small bone separation devices 4a, 4b may be manufactured in-house by a poultry butchering device manufacturer. The method for processing chicken breast meat realized by the conveying system according to the above embodiment can improve the efficiency of trimming work compared to the conventional method.

[0011] In the above embodiment, the breast meat that has been separated into left and right in advance is further separated into breast meat with small bones and breast meat without small bones, but the breast meat mixed with left and right may be separated into breast meat with small bones and breast meat without small bones. This improves the efficiency of breast meat processing work compared to the conventional conveying system in which breast meat with small bones and breast meat without small bones are mixed. Note that a breast meat peeling device that does not have a left and right separation device is a publicly known technology, as described in, for example, Japanese Patent No. 3431196. The breast meat peeling device including the left and right separating device and the breast meat peeling device not including the left and right separating device are not limited to the above-mentioned devices, and may be any device that has a similar function. [Industrial Applicability]

[0012] INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY The present invention is widely applicable to a conveying system for conveying breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace and a method for processing poultry breast meat. [Explanation of symbols]

[0013] 1. Transport system 2a Right conveyor belt 2a' Right bone conveyor belt 2b Left conveyor belt 2b' Left bone conveyor belt 3a Right X-ray irradiation device 3b Left X-ray irradiation device 4a Right ossicular separation device 4b Left ossicular separation device 100a Right breast meat 100a1 Right breast meat with small bones 100a2 Breast boneless right breast meat 100b left breast meat 100b1 Left breast meat with small bones 100b2 Left breast meat without small bones 100c1 Chicken breast with bones 100c2 boneless chicken breast 200a1 Right breast meat with small bones specialist 200a2 Boneless Right Breast Meat Specialist 200b1 Left breast meat with small bones specialist 200b2 Boneless left breast meat specialist 200c worker A Breast meat stripping device A' Left and right separation device B1 Boneless right breast meat trimming workshop B1' Right breast meat with small bones trimming workshop B2 Boneless left breast meat trimming workshop B2' Left breast meat with small bones trimming workshop

Claims

1. A conveying system for conveying breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace, comprising: an X-ray irradiator for irradiating the breast meat with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones; a small bone separator for separating the breast meat into breast meat with small bones and breast meat without small bones; and a conveying device for conveying the breast meat to the trimming workplace via the X-ray irradiator and the small bone separator.

2. 1. A conveying system for conveying breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass to a trimming workplace, the conveying system comprising: a right X-ray irradiator that irradiates X-rays to the right breast meat from among the breast meat separated into right and left breast meat to detect the presence or absence of small bones; a right small bone sorting device that separates the right breast meat into right breast meat with small bones and right breast meat without small bones; a right conveying device that conveys the right breast meat to the right trimming workplace via the right X-ray irradiator and the right small bone sorting device; a left X-ray irradiator that irradiates X-rays to the left breast meat from among the breast meat separated into right and left breast meat to detect the presence or absence of small bones; a left small bone sorting device that separates the left breast meat into left breast meat with small bones and left breast meat without small bones; and a left conveying device that conveys the left breast meat to the left trimming workplace via the left X-ray irradiator and the left small bone sorting device.

3. This method for processing chicken breast meat comprises irradiating the breast meat removed from the upper half of a chicken carcass with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones, separating the breast meat into breast meat with small bones and breast meat without small bones, a worker specializing in breast meat with small bones removes the small bones from the breast meat with small bones and trims the breast meat, and a worker specializing in breast meat without small bones trims the breast meat without small bones.

4. This method for processing poultry breast meat comprises the steps of: irradiating the right breast meat from among the breast meat removed from the upper half of a poultry carcass and separated into right and left breast meat with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones; separating the right breast meat into right breast meat with small bones and right breast meat without small bones; a worker specializing in right breast meat with small bones removes the small bones from the right breast meat with small bones and trims said breast meat; a worker specializing in right breast meat without small bones trims the right breast meat without small bones; irradiating the left breast meat from among the separated breast meats with X-rays to detect the presence or absence of small bones; separating the left breast meat into left breast meat with small bones and left breast meat without small bones; a worker specializing in left breast meat with small bones removes the small bones from the left breast meat with small bones and trims said breast meat; and a worker specializing in left breast meat without small bones trims the left breast meat without small bones.

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