Food Processing Machine Lateral Constraint for Slice Precision
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing food processing machines struggle to maintain precise control over the weight and size of slices or portions cut from food products, often resulting in wastage due to lateral movement or deformation of the product between scanning and cutting.
Innovation Solution
A food processing machine equipped with a cutter, a forming module, a transport system, and a profile sensor that continuously constrains the food product laterally as it travels from the forming module to the cutter, ensuring precise control over slice size and minimizing wastage.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If the food product is transported from the forming module to the cutter without continuous lateral constraint, then the transport system is simpler, but the product may shift laterally or rotate between scanning and cutting, reducing cutting accuracy
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines the scanning function and cutting function into a single integrated machine, with the profile sensor positioned to scan the product while it is being transported on the same conveyor system that delivers it to the cutter. This integration ensures the product remains in the same reference frame for both scanning and cutting operations, eliminating the need for separate transport systems and maintaining cutting precision.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces side guides as intermediary elements that gently constrain the product laterally during transport without requiring complex active control systems. These guides act as passive mediators between the product and the transport system, maintaining product position and orientation throughout the transport path from the forming module through the scanning region to the cutter.
2Manufacturing precision
If the product is scanned in a separate machine before cutting, then the scanning and cutting operations can be optimized independently, but the product may deform or shift between scanning and cutting
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the scanning operation and cutting operation into a single continuous process within one machine. The profile sensor scans the product while it is being transported on the conveyor, and the cutter immediately follows in the same transport sequence. This eliminates the time gap and spatial separation between scanning and cutting, ensuring the product maintains its measured profile and position consistency throughout the process.
3Ease of operation
If the transport system allows product movement freedom, then the product handling is simpler, but the lateral position and orientation of the product cannot be continuously controlled
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses side guides as intermediary elements that provide gentle lateral constraint to the product during transport. These guides are positioned to contact the product sides and prevent excessive lateral movement or rotation while allowing the product to be easily loaded and unloaded. The guides maintain product position control without requiring complex active control systems or complicated handling procedures.
Data Source
AI summary
A food processing machine (2) wherein a food product is continuously constrained against movement laterally with respect to a product flow path (D) by a transport system as the food product travels from a forming module (8) to a cutter (18) via a sensing region (10). A forming module (8) comprises at least three dies (100, 102, 104, 106), with each die defining an inwardly facing shaping surface, wherein each die has a longitudinally extending side which moves over the shaping surface of an adjacent die when the dies move between larger and smaller transverse product profile configurations. A size-adaptive end pusher (120) for use in a forming module (8), the end pusher comprising two pusher elements (160, 162, 164, 166), wherein the pusher elements are movable between a transversely expanded configuration and a transversely contracted configuration.