Conveyor Chain Links Without Articulation Rods
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional conveyor belt links with articulation rods pose challenges in hygiene and mechanical strength due to complex layouts that hinder cleaning and reduce shear strength, particularly in applications involving food products.
Innovation Solution
The design features links without articulation rods, utilizing hooks with intermediate brackets and single flat sides on protruding pieces for coupling, allowing secure attachment and easy assembly, while the elliptical shape and guided flat sections facilitate cleaning and enhance mechanical strength.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If articulation rods are used to join conveyor belt links, then the chain can fold and change direction, but the complexity of the layout hinders cleaning and reduces mechanical strength
Solution Approach 1:
The invention removes articulation rods from the conveyor belt link assembly, extracting the problematic component that hindered cleaning and reduced strength. Instead, it uses integrated hooks with socketed pieces that eliminate the need for separate articulation rods, thereby simplifying the overall structure while maintaining the ability to fold and change direction.
2Ease of manufacture
If conventional protruding pieces with two shear planes are used for coupling, then assembly is possible, but cleaning becomes extremely difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The invention inverts the traditional coupling approach by using hooks with socketed pieces instead of protruding pieces requiring elastic deformation. This reversal allows for easier cleaning access while maintaining secure coupling, as the socketed design eliminates deep grooves and complex geometries that trapped dirt in conventional designs.
3Ease of manufacture
If elastic deformation is required to insert protruding pieces into hooks, then coupling is achieved, but the hooks lack retention capacity and tend to open up when pulled
Solution Approach 1:
The invention applies preliminary action by pre-forming the hooks with a specific geometry that provides both ease of insertion and secure retention. The hooks are designed with a mouth that opens at an angle and a body that tapers, allowing easy insertion without elastic deformation while maintaining strong retention capacity when pulled.
4Strength
If deep grooves are used to frame and support cylindrical connectors, then structural support is provided, but the grooves are transversely closed making cleaning extremely difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The invention removes the deep grooves that framed and supported cylindrical connectors, eliminating the cleaning problem they caused. Instead, it uses a simpler hook geometry where the hook body itself provides structural support without creating closed-off spaces that trap dirt and debris.
Data Source
Figure 1~2
Figure 3~5
Figure 6~7
AI summary
Of the type that are coupled together by socketing without resorting to the use of articulation rods or axes between links, where one of the longitudinal edges is equipped with a series of socketed pieces (3), in the form of a hook, where there are seating devices (5) whose interior noticeably exceeds the semi-cylinder and that are segmented by means of an intermediate partition (6) for strengthening purposes, which has a flat edge included on the imaginary plane of the mouth of those seating devices (5), whereas the protruding pieces (4) take the form of a pair of coaxial and opposite pivots (8), equipped with one single flat side (9) that facilitates access to the seating devices (5) for the assembly between links and that is coplanar with the edge (7) of the partitions (6) when the chain is working in a normal situation. It is thus possible to make the socketed pieces (3) rigid thanks to the partitions (6), in view of the fact that it is not necessary to deform the mouth of the seating devices (5) to insert the pivots (8) of the protruding pieces into them.