Sheet Stacking Belts With Variable Friction to Prevent Bulging
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing stacking equipment faces issues with orderly stacking of large and differently characterized sheets, leading to bulges and jamming, especially at high speeds, due to differences in smoothness and rigidity among sheets.
Innovation Solution
The equipment incorporates an arrest member, a pressure member, and a sensing device, along with transport belts having varying friction coefficients and a compensation mechanism, ensuring controlled stacking through suction and precise positioning.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If transport belts cause sheets to slide onto the stack until arrest, then stacking speed can be increased, but bulges form in the arrest area preventing orderly stacking
Solution Approach 1:
The transport belt system is divided into multiple independent belts (at least three belts) that can be individually controlled. This segmentation allows different portions of the sheet stack to be handled with different friction coefficients, preventing bulges while maintaining high stacking speed.
Solution Approach 2:
Different sections of the transport system use belts with different friction coefficients. The first transport belt has a first friction coefficient, while the second transport belt has a second friction coefficient that is lower than the first. This local differentiation prevents bulge formation in the arrest area while maintaining efficient transport.
2Adaptability or versatility
If sheets of different smoothness and rigidity are stacked together, then versatility is improved, but differences in characteristics cause bulges and jamming
Solution Approach 1:
The system changes the friction parameter by using multiple transport belts with different friction coefficients. This allows adaptation to sheets with varying smoothness and rigidity characteristics, maintaining reliable stacking across different sheet types without causing bulges or jamming.
3Device complexity
If a single friction coefficient is used for all transport belts, then device complexity is reduced, but sheets with varying characteristics cannot be stacked reliably
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of using a uniform friction coefficient across all belts, the system implements local quality by assigning different friction coefficients to different transport belts based on their specific functional requirements in the stacking process.
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
Enables reliable, high-speed stacking of sheets with varying characteristics by minimizing bulges and jams, maintaining stack integrity and preventing deformation.
Implementation Method 1
The equipment incorporates an arrest member, a pressure member, and a sensing device, along with transport belts having varying friction coefficients and a compensation mechanism, ensuring controlled stacking through suction and precise positioning.
Implementation Method 2
one or more ducts connected to a vacuum source, arranged transversally above the lower branches of the transport belts and with guide areas for the belt branches and a arrest member arranged downstream of the duct or ducts for arresting the entering and stacking sheets. The duct or ducts have openings in correspondence with the guide areas and the transport belts have longitudinal holes for ensuring a suction action on the entering sheets through said holes with traction by adherence of the sheets by the transport belts.
Implementation Method 3
The transport belts comprise a group of belts having a low coefficient of friction and a group of belts having a medium coefficient of friction.
Data Source
AI summary
Equipment for stacking sheets with a stack support, input rollers for feeding entering sheets and transport belts with lower branches arranged above the stack support. A compensation mechanism modifies the height of the stack support, while the transport belts are motorized to drag the entering sheets with the lower branches and deposit the sheets on the stack support or on stacked sheets. An arrest member is provided for the entering sheets, a pressure member for the stack to be stacked and a sensor device for a last sheet of the stack. The arrest member arrests the sheets in stacking while the pressure member is contiguous to the stop member and operates on the last sheet of the stack with a stabilizing function and in which the compensation mechanism is servoized to the sensor, for maintaining constant the height of the last sheet of the stack from a reference plane.