Long Pasta Dosing Rotor Synchronization
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing dosing and packaging systems for long pasta often result in breakage due to rapid pouring and unsynchronized handling, leading to inefficiencies and product damage.
Innovation Solution
A dosing and packaging apparatus featuring a rotor with multiple compartments that synchronizes with a horizontal chain conveyor to pour weighed long pasta directly into trays, minimizing fall height and ensuring synchronized rotation and translation for precise and gentle dosing.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If pasta is poured through a hopper from a height, then dosing speed is improved, but pasta breakage increases
Solution Approach 1:
The dosing mechanism is segmented into multiple compartments (at least three) within the rotor, allowing pasta to be dosed in separate sections rather than falling as a single mass. This segmentation reduces impact force and breakage while maintaining dosing efficiency.
Solution Approach 2:
The rotor compartments are designed to be substantially horizontal during the dosing phase, creating an equipotential surface that prevents pasta from falling vertically under gravity. This eliminates the height-related breakage problem while maintaining dosing speed.
2Device complexity
If a single-compartment rotor is used, then device complexity is reduced, but dosing precision and synchronization are insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The rotor is divided into multiple compartments (at least three) that can be independently controlled, allowing precise dosing of pasta portions. Each compartment can be synchronized with the tray conveyor belt to ensure accurate timing and placement.
Solution Approach 2:
The rotor is designed to rotate dynamically with adjustable speed to synchronize with the tray conveyor belt. This dynamic adjustment allows precise coordination between pasta dosing and tray movement, improving dosing precision while maintaining manageable device complexity.
3Device complexity
If rotor rotation and tray movement are not synchronized, then device complexity is reduced, but dosing accuracy and productivity decrease
Solution Approach 1:
The rotor rotation speed is made dynamically adjustable to match the tray conveyor belt speed. This dynamic synchronization ensures that pasta is deposited accurately into trays without requiring complex mechanical linkages, maintaining productivity while managing device complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The synchronization mechanism incorporates feedback control to monitor and adjust rotor rotation speed based on tray movement. This ensures accurate dosing timing and placement while maintaining efficient productivity, with the feedback loop managing complexity rather than increasing it.
Data Source
AI summary
A dosing and packaging apparatus (1) for long pasta comprising at least one dosing unit (2) and a cartoner (3) below the dosing unit. The dosing unit comprises a weighing device (21, 22) for doses of long pasta, and the cartoner comprises trays (31, 33) for containing doses of weighed long pasta, a chain conveyor (32) for horizontally moving the trays, and a device for forming and filling cartons with the doses of long pasta from the trays. The dosing unit comprises a rotor (23) with more than one compartment (25) for pouring doses of weighed long pasta directly into the trays. The rotation of the rotor and the horizontal motion of the trays are synchronized so that each compartment pours a dose of weighed long pasta into a respective tray placed immediately below the rotor.