Co-circular Filling Spout for Vial Packaging
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Solution Overview
Problem
Automated packaging machines for liquid or semi-liquid products face challenges in achieving high speeds and adaptability to various substances and bottle types, with issues such as air bubble entrapment, foam creation, and synchronization problems due to intermittent bottle rotation and centrifugal accelerations on circular conveyor plates.
Innovation Solution
A multi-station packaging machine with a horizontal circular plate and a filling device that includes a gantry and claw-holder carriage system, allowing for simultaneous continuous filling of bottles during both motion and stoppage, with motorized means for vertical and co-circular movement of filling spouts to accommodate intermittent bottle rotation, ensuring precise control and high-speed operation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Area of stationary object
If bottles are transported on a rotating circular plate, then machine compactness is improved, but intermittent rotation causes jerks and centrifugal accelerations that affect filling quality
Solution Approach 1:
The filling spout is made movable rather than fixed, allowing it to dynamically adjust its position to follow the bottle during intermittent rotation. The spout can move radially outward to maintain alignment with the bottle while the plate rotates, compensating for the dynamic motion and preventing filling defects caused by centrifugal accelerations and jerks.
Solution Approach 2:
A guide plate mechanism acts as an intermediary between the fixed machine frame and the moving bottle. The guide plate provides a controlled path for the filling spout to follow the bottle's motion, mediating the interaction between the stationary filling station and the dynamically rotating bottle carrier.
2Reliability
If filling is performed during intermittent rotation, then filling problems due to jerks and centrifugal accelerations occur, but continuous rotation prevents precise positioning at stations
Solution Approach 1:
The filling spout is made movable rather than fixed, allowing it to dynamically adjust its position to follow the bottle during intermittent rotation. The spout can move radially outward to maintain alignment with the bottle while the plate rotates, compensating for the dynamic motion and preventing filling defects caused by centrifugal accelerations and jerks.
Solution Approach 2:
The system uses synchronization means that detect the position of the bottle on the circular plate and provide feedback control to the filling spout movement. This ensures the spout is precisely positioned to follow the bottle's intermittent motion, maintaining both filling stability and proper synchronization with the rotating plate.
3Productivity
If the number of stations and bottles filled in parallel is increased to raise production rates, then productivity improves, but the diameter of the circular plate must increase
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of increasing the plate diameter horizontally to accommodate more bottles, the solution moves the filling device to a peripheral position outside the circular plate. This utilizes the vertical and radial dimensions, allowing multiple bottles to be filled in parallel without increasing the plate's rotational diameter, thus maintaining machine compactness while increasing productivity.
Solution Approach 2:
Multiple filling spouts are positioned to fill multiple bottles simultaneously in parallel. This copying approach allows the same filling operation to be performed on multiple bottles at once, increasing productivity without requiring a larger plate diameter, as the filling capacity is expanded through parallel operations rather than increased plate size.
4Device complexity
If filling spouts are fixed centrally on the machine, then machine structure is simplified, but precision control at high speeds with high accelerations and decelerations becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The filling spout is made movable rather than fixed, allowing it to dynamically adjust its position to follow the bottle during intermittent rotation. The spout can move radially outward to maintain alignment with the bottle while the plate rotates, compensating for the dynamic motion and preventing filling defects caused by centrifugal accelerations and jerks.
Solution Approach 2:
The synchronization means预先 (in advance) positions the filling spout to follow the bottle's intermittent motion before filling begins. This preliminary positioning ensures that the spout is already correctly aligned with the bottle when high-speed rotation and acceleration occur, eliminating positioning errors that would otherwise occur during rapid motion changes.
Data Source
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AI summary
The invention concerns a packaging machine (27) and a device (1) for filling vials for a multi-station machine having a circular tray (24) for transporting vials, the vials being transported intermittently by the peripheral edge of the tray in indexed positions (26) of the tray, said device allowing the continuous simultaneous filling of a predefined number of vials both when the vials are moving and when the vials are stationary, said device comprising a first motorised means (7) allowing filling nozzles (16) to be raised and lowered and a second motorised means (8) allowing the filling nozzles to be moved back and forth following the vials. It is intended to be installed at the edge of the tray and allows a movement of the nozzles that is co-circular to that of the vials. It comprises a gantry (2, 3) and a nozzle-holder carriage (4; 6, 21, 5), the gantry comprising at least two lateral vertical uprights (2) between which the horizontal nozzle-holder carriage (4) can move vertically, the nozzle-holder carriage comprising a guide plate (6) and a nozzle-holder (21), the nozzle-holder being mobile in translation in an arc of a circle, co-circularly to the vials, along the guide plate, said gantry supporting the first motorised means (7) acting on the guide plate (6) of the nozzle-holder carriage (4) in order to move said guide plate vertically up and down, the guide plate (6) supporting the second motorised means (8) acting on the nozzle-holder (21) in order to move said nozzle-holder (21) horizontally and co-circularly in an arc of a circle and back and forth along the guide plate (6).