Cutting Blade Embossed Features Stiffness Weight Trade-off
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing rotationally drivable cutting knives for high-speed slicers lack sufficient rigidity and balance, leading to inefficiencies in cutting quality and material handling, despite attempts to reduce friction with dome-shaped elevations, which do not significantly stiffen the knife.
Innovation Solution
The introduction of embossed, alternately deepened and raised formations in the distance area of the cutting blade enhances structural rigidity and balance, reducing material thickness and weight while minimizing contact with the food product, and promoting air vortices to reduce deflection.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If dome-shaped or spherical segment-shaped ribs are added to reduce friction, then friction between blade surface and food slices is reduced, but the knife stiffness is not significantly increased
Solution Approach 1:
The blade surface is segmented into alternating raised and recessed features arranged in a pattern. This segmentation creates multiple small structural elements that collectively enhance stiffness while the raised features maintain the friction-reduction function by minimizing contact area with food slices.
Solution Approach 2:
Different regions of the blade are given different properties: raised features provide friction reduction through minimal contact, while recessed features and the overall patterned structure provide stiffness enhancement. The local alternation of raised and recessed areas creates zones with different functional characteristics.
2Strength
If the blade is made thicker to increase stiffness, then knife stiffness is improved, but the blade weight increases
Solution Approach 1:
The blade features curved, dome-shaped or spherical segment-shaped raised areas instead of flat surfaces. This curvature allows the material to be distributed more efficiently, providing structural stiffness through the geometric form rather than simply increasing thickness, thereby reducing weight while maintaining rigidity.
Solution Approach 2:
The blade incorporates a composite structure with raised and recessed features creating a patterned design. This composite geometric structure provides enhanced stiffness-to-weight ratio compared to a uniform thick blade, as the patterned configuration optimizes material distribution for structural efficiency.
3Strength
If alternating raised and recessed features are embossed in the distance area, then blade stiffness is significantly increased and weight is reduced, but the manufacturing complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The blade features a periodic pattern of alternating raised and recessed areas arranged in a regular sequence around the blade circumference. This periodic structure provides consistent stiffness enhancement throughout the blade while allowing for efficient manufacturing through repetitive forming processes, reducing the complexity compared to irregular patterns.
Solution Approach 2:
The embossed features utilize changes in geometric parameters (height, radius, spacing) of the raised and recessed areas to optimize stiffness. By carefully controlling these parameters, the blade achieves high stiffness with relatively simple embossed features that can be manufactured using standard forming techniques rather than complex multi-step processes.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This solution significantly increases the knife's stiffness and balance, reducing wobble and weight, while maintaining cutting quality and efficiency, and allows for dynamic balancing to minimize imbalance.
Implementation Method 1
the features can also be used to generate local air vortices on the rotating blade, thereby reducing the deflection of the cut food slices
Data Source
Figure 1~2
Figure 3~4
Figure 5~6
AI summary
The invention relates to a cutting blade (10) that can be driven in rotation and is provided for machines for cutting up food products, in particular high-speed slicers. With the aid of a mounting region (11) surrounding an axis of rotation the cutting blade (10) is fastened to a drive shaft of the machine. A width (18) is created outside the mounting region (11) but inside a cutting region (17). The stability of the cutting blade (10) should be improved while having the lowest possible weight. For this purpose there are distinct, alternately recessed and raised formations (19) in the width (18).