Food Slicer Driven Conveyor Belt Impulse Folding
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional folding devices struggle to reliably fold cheese slices and other inflexible food products due to their fluctuating properties, leading to uneven portion patterns and potential unfolding during storage.
Innovation Solution
A device with a depositing unit featuring at least one driven conveyor belt and passive folding means, such as a folding rod or rotating shaft, which applies an impulse to falling slices to control and stabilize their folding, ensuring precise folding and preventing unfolding.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional folding devices are used for cheese slices, then the device structure is simple, but the folding reliability is poor due to fluctuating product properties
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a driven conveyor belt that can be dynamically adjusted in speed and position to match the varying properties of cheese slices. The conveyor belt's speed can be varied to accommodate different product dimensions, temperatures, and hole proportions, ensuring reliable folding despite product fluctuations. This dynamic adjustment capability resolves the contradiction by making the system adaptive rather than static.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention changes the operational parameters of the conveyor belt (speed, position, direction) based on the specific product being processed. By adjusting these parameters, the system can handle different cheese slice properties (dimensions, temperature, aging, hole proportion) reliably. This parameter flexibility allows the same device structure to maintain high folding reliability across varying product conditions.
2Manufacturing precision
If a single conveying means is used for folding, then the device complexity is low, but the manufacturing precision of folding is insufficient for inflexible products
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the folding function into multiple independent folding means (at least two folding means arranged in the pane fall line). Each folding means can be independently controlled and optimized for specific aspects of the folding process. This segmentation allows for precise control over the folding action, ensuring that even inflexible cheese slices are folded accurately without requiring an overly complex monolithic device.
Solution Approach 2:
The driven conveyor belt acts as an intermediary between the falling cheese slices and the folding means. It transmits controlled impulses to the slices, mediating the folding action to achieve precise results. The conveyor belt serves as a buffer that can be adjusted to match product properties, enabling precise folding without direct rigid contact that would compromise precision or require complex mechanisms.
3Manufacturing precision
If the conveyor speed is high, then the productivity is high, but the folding precision deteriorates due to insufficient impulse transmission
Solution Approach 1:
The conveyor belt speed is made dynamically adjustable rather than fixed. The system can optimize speed for each product type and folding requirement, allowing high productivity when possible while maintaining folding precision when needed. The driven conveyor can provide variable impulse transmission based on real-time requirements, resolving the trade-off between speed and precision.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention allows changing the conveyor operational parameters (speed, direction, position) based on product characteristics and folding requirements. For products requiring precise folding, the system can reduce speed to ensure adequate impulse transmission. For more flexible products or less critical folding requirements, higher speeds maintain productivity. This parameter flexibility resolves the contradiction between productivity and folding precision.
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
The device reliably folds even the most challenging cheese slices and other inflexible products, maintaining a stable folded position and ensuring a visually appealing storage format with precise control over folding properties.
Implementation Method 1
A driven conveyor can in particular transmit an impulse to a disk
Implementation Method 2
the conveying means have the same rotational speeds and/or directions of rotation. If, on the other hand, the conveying means have different rotational speeds and/or directions of rotation, then a pane 13 is gripped at both ends by a folding means 8, 8' and conveyed through the intermediate space
Data Source
Figure 1a
Figure 1b
Figure 1c
AI summary
The invention relates to a method and devices for slicing food products, in particular high-performance slicers, with a slicing unit, in particular with a circular or sickle blade, for separating product slices, and a depositing device for depositing, in particular in portions, the slices which fall from the slicing unit.