Separating Finger Lateral Article Grouping
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing devices for grouping and separating articles, such as beverage containers, often cause mechanical stress and noise due to the use of separating rollers or plungers that lift containers perpendicular to the conveying plane, leading to inaccurate positioning and potential damage.
Innovation Solution
A device using separating fingers with a triangular cross-section, inserted from below the conveying plane, that engage with the lateral edges of articles to create gaps by slowing or accelerating them, ensuring precise grouping and separation without mechanical stress, and featuring radiused edges to prevent interlocking or scratching.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If separating rollers or plungers are used to lift containers perpendicular to the conveying plane, then separation or grouping of containers is achieved, but mechanical stress and noise increase, and reliability decreases
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of lifting containers from below with rollers or plungers, the patent uses separating fingers that engage with the lateral edges of containers and push them sideways to create gaps. This inverted approach avoids vertical lifting forces that cause mechanical stress and noise, while achieving the same separation effect through lateral engagement.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces the traditional mechanical lifting system (rollers/plungers) with a finger-based lateral pushing system. The separating fingers engage with the lateral edges of containers and use horizontal forces instead of vertical forces, substituting the mechanical action to eliminate harmful vibrations and mechanical stress while maintaining separation functionality.
2Measurement precision
If separating fingers with thin cross-section are used, then precise positioning is improved, but bottles may pass through without engagement
Solution Approach 1:
The separating fingers have a non-uniform cross-section design: the engagement surface (lateral contact area) has sufficient width and appropriate curvature to reliably engage with bottle edges, while the overall finger structure remains slender to achieve precise positioning. This local differentiation of geometric properties solves the contradiction between precision and reliability.
Solution Approach 2:
The separating fingers feature rounded or curved engagement surfaces that match the geometry of bottle edges. This curvature ensures reliable engagement by distributing contact forces and preventing bottles from slipping past, while the fingers maintain a slender overall form for precise positioning control.
3Reliability
If separating elements emerge from below the conveying plane, then separation is achieved, but disturbance in container inlet and noise occur
Solution Approach 1:
The harmful lifting action is extracted and replaced by a purely lateral pushing action. The separating fingers engage with the lateral edges of containers and push them sideways without vertical movement, eliminating the disturbance and noise associated with lifting containers from below while maintaining separation accuracy.
Data Source
AI summary
A device for grouping and/or separating of articles which are transported on a conveyor device (10) along a conveying plane in at least a row in an essentially closed stream and which are grouped by at least one separating finger (16) which is inserted into the stream from below, transverse to the conveying direction (t). The separating finger (16) is inserted in the stream in such a way that a targeted article and the articles following the targeted article are slightly delayed or accelerated during their forward movement in the conveying direction (t) whereby a gap is formed. The separating finger (16) engages with a lateral edge of an outer surface of the article includes a contact area (26) that at least partially contacts and/or at least partially encompasses the outer surface of the article.