Grading Robot with Adjustable Gripper for Fish Portion Handling
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional grading machines face difficulties in designing gripper arms to handle delicate food products of varying sizes, particularly in orienting and aligning them on conveyors without damaging or disturbing adjacent items, such as fish portions cut from fillets.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of an automated food processing system that includes x-ray machines for component detection, cutting machines for precise portioning, and grading robots with multiple degrees of freedom to move and align food articles while maintaining their orientation and alignment, utilizing imaging systems to adjust cutting and grading processes based on real-time data.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a gripper arm is designed to be big enough for the biggest articles, then it can handle large food products, but it requires significantly more space between small articles than would otherwise be needed
Solution Approach 1:
The gripper arm is designed with adjustable dimensions, allowing it to dynamically adapt its size to match the food product being handled. This dynamic adjustability enables the same gripper to efficiently handle both large and small articles without requiring excessive space between smaller items on the conveyor.
Solution Approach 2:
The gripper arm's physical parameters (size, shape, or configuration) can be changed to match the specific food product being processed. This parameter adjustment allows the gripper to optimize its footprint for each product size, reducing the space required between smaller articles while maintaining compatibility with larger products.
2Extent of automation
If a gripper arm is used to grasp delicate food products, then articles can be moved automatically, but it is difficult to design a gripper that can handle various sizes without damaging surrounding portions
Solution Approach 1:
The gripper arm is designed with differentiated local properties, where different portions of the gripper have specialized characteristics suited for handling delicate food products. This local quality differentiation allows the gripper to grasp articles securely while minimizing damage to surrounding portions through localized force application and specialized contact surfaces.
Solution Approach 2:
The gripper arm acts as an intermediary between the automated system and the delicate food products, using specialized grasping mechanisms that distribute force appropriately. This intermediary design enables automatic handling while protecting delicate portions from damage through controlled interaction forces and appropriate contact geometry.
3Manufacturing precision
If cutting machines are used to portion food articles, then precise portioning can be achieved, but the system complexity increases with multiple degrees of freedom required for grading robots
Solution Approach 1:
The cutting machine and grading robot are designed with multi-functional capabilities, where a single system performs multiple operations (cutting, portioning, and grading). This universality reduces overall system complexity by eliminating the need for separate dedicated devices for each function, while maintaining precise portioning accuracy through integrated control.
Solution Approach 2:
The cutting and grading functions are merged into an integrated system where the cutting machine and grading robot work as a coordinated unit. This merging reduces system complexity by consolidating control mechanisms and shared components, while achieving precise portioning through the combined capabilities of the integrated system.
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 system enables efficient and precise grading of food articles by accurately identifying and removing undesirable components like bones, maintaining the alignment and orientation of portions, and optimizing the yield of edible parts, thereby improving the processing efficiency and reducing manual intervention.
Implementation Method 1
Some embodiments include at least one x-ray machine to determine the location of undesirable components (e.g., bones) within a food article (e.g., a fish fillet)
Data Source
AI summary
This disclosure relates to apparatuses and methods for processing and grading food articles. For example, provided herein is a system for grading a portioned food article, in which the system includes: a first conveyor; a first receiving conveyor and a second receiving conveyor, defining a space therebetween; at least one spray-removal robot; and a third receiving conveyor. The spray-removal robot may include at least one valve with a nozzle, in which the valve ejects fluid through the nozzle to impact a food article being moved on the first conveyor toward the third receiving conveyor, such that at least one portion of the food article is moved by the impact through the space between the first receiving conveyor and the second receiving conveyor, and such that at least one portion of the food article is moved by the first receiving conveyor and the second receiving conveyor to the third receiving conveyor.