Stickpack Conveyor with Half-Step Compartments for Pile Formation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current packaging machines lack control over the positioning of stickpacks when placing them in cartons, preventing the formation of ordered piles and limiting the ability to place multiple piles in precisely sized cartons or those with separators.
Innovation Solution
The apparatus employs a conveyor line with compartments arranged at a half-step distance, allowing precise positioning and alignment of stickpacks using synchronized drive organs and handling mechanisms to form and place piles within cartons, enabling multiple piles to be placed in a single carton while maintaining structural simplicity and reliability.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If compartments are arranged at the same interaxial measurement as dropping channels, then the handling organs can directly transfer stickpacks, but the position of stickpacks cannot be controlled and ordered piles cannot be formed
Solution Approach 1:
The conveyor line is divided into multiple compartments with different interaxial measurements. Specifically, compartments are arranged at half the interaxial measurement of the dropping channels, creating distinct positioning zones that enable controlled arrangement of stickpacks into ordered piles before transfer to cartons.
2Manufacturing precision
If compartments are arranged at half-step distance, then ordered piles can be formed with precise positioning, but the device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The conveyor line with compartments at half-step distance serves multiple functions: it positions individual stickpacks precisely, forms ordered piles through cumulative placement, and enables transfer of multiple piles to cartons. This single configuration replaces the need for separate positioning mechanisms and multiple handling stations.
3Device complexity
If the same interaxial measurement is used throughout, then the system remains simple, but multiple piles cannot be placed in precisely-sized cartons or cartons with separators
Solution Approach 1:
The system enables dynamic adaptation to different carton configurations by using compartments at half-step distance. This allows flexible formation of ordered piles that can be transferred to various carton types including precisely-sized cartons and cartons with separators, without requiring physical reconfiguration of the conveyor line itself.
Data Source
AI summary
An apparatus is situated downstream of a stickpack manufacturing machine with multiple dropping channels for forming a same number of stickpacks, which are distanced from one another by an interaxial measurement which is more than twice the width of the stickpacks. The apparatus comprises a ring-wound conveyor line, in which two batteries of walled compartments are provided, which batteries are driven independently from each other so that each battery is alternately situated either upstream or downstream; the number of compartments of each is a multiple of the number of dropping channels; the compartments are distanced by a step which is equal to half the interaxial measurement. A robotic handler is provided upstream of the conveyor line, which handler collects the stickpacks exiting from the machine and piles the stickpacks in the compartments of the battery waiting there; first the compartments in odd order, i.e. first, third and so on are filled, then the battery is made to advance by a step in order to fill the compartments in even order, i.e. second, fourth and so on, until all the compartments of the battery have been filled. In a phase relation with a return upstream of the remaining battery, the battery with filled compartments is transferred to a downstream cartoning machine, where a pusher acting transversely to the line transfers at least one pile of stickpacks of a compartment to an adjacent carton, which is carried in synchrony of position and advancement by a relative supply line which is partially flanking the conveyor line.