Movable Fish Extractor with Linkage Blade for Damage-Free Gutting
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing fish processing systems often cause damage to the gonads and fish structure during processing, leading to downgraded fish products, and struggle with variations in fish size, shape, and firmness, as well as inconsistent removal of viscera.
Innovation Solution
A fish processing system with a movable extractor that enters below the backbone and exits at the anal vent, featuring wing members to gather and sever viscera, and a blade with a linkage mechanism to track the fish profile, ensuring minimal damage and effective cleaning, along with a vacuum head assembly for cavity cleaning.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a fixed extractor is used to remove viscera, then the processing speed is maintained, but the system cannot adapt to variations in fish size, shape and firmness, leading to damage to gonads and fish structure
Solution Approach 1:
The extractor is made movable rather than fixed, allowing it to adapt its position and movement path to accommodate variations in fish size, shape and firmness. The extractor can move dynamically during the gutting process to follow the optimal path through the fish body cavity, avoiding damage to sensitive structures like the gonads while maintaining effective viscera removal.
2Ease of operation
If the extractor moves vertically only, then the mechanism is simple, but it cannot exit at the optimal location (anal vent) without impalement, causing damage to fish structure
Solution Approach 1:
The extractor movement is extended from a single vertical dimension to multiple dimensions, allowing it to navigate through the fish body in a complex three-dimensional path. This enables the extractor to enter below the backbone, travel through the body cavity, and exit at the anal vent without impalement, avoiding damage to the fish structure while maintaining ease of operation through controlled multi-axis movement.
3Productivity
If the gullet is not severed from the collar, then the fish structure remains intact, but the viscera do not separate from the fish, requiring additional labor and downgrading the product value
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary severing of the gullet from the collar during the initial extraction phase, before the main viscera removal process. This preliminary action ensures that the viscera are properly separated from the fish body, enabling complete and efficient gutting in one pass through the fish, thereby improving productivity and maintaining product value.
4Strength
If a rigid blade is used to cut the belly, then the cutting force is sufficient, but the blade cannot track variations in fish profile, leading to inconsistent cuts and potential damage
Solution Approach 1:
The blade system is made dynamic with degrees of freedom that allow it to track variations in fish profile while maintaining sufficient cutting force. The blade can adjust its position and orientation during the cutting process to follow the contours of different fish sizes and shapes, ensuring consistent and damage-free cuts without sacrificing the mechanical strength needed for effective cutting.
Data Source
AI summary
Methods and systems for processing fish are provided which enable cutting of the fish and removal of the viscera without damage to either the viscera or the remaining fish product. The systems may include an adjustable cutting device to cut the belly in a particularly unobtrusive manner and/or an adjustable gutting device to severe a gullet of the fish from the fish body and to gather and remove the viscera without significant damage to the viscera or the remaining fish product. Extractors for severing the connection between the gullet and the fish are also provided to assist in removal of the viscera, including the gonads. Vacuum head assemblies for cleaning a cavity of the fish after the viscera is removed are also provided.