Patent ID: 6585580
Filing Date: 2003-07-01
Classification: A22C

Abstract:
A method of stuffing natural casings with emulsion, comprising,taking a length of hollow natural casing material, inserting into the casing material an emulsion stuffing tube having a first end and a discharge end for extruding emulsion into a casing on the outer surface of the stuffing tube, slidably mounting a collar element on the stuffing tube adjacent an end of the casing material nearest the first end of the stuffing tube, slidably advancing a first end of the casing material on the tube in a direction towards the discharge end of the tube to telescope the casing into a shirred condition along a first portion of the casing material, while leaving a non-shirred portion downstream of the shirred portion, progressively advancing the non-shirred portion of casing off of the tube and filling the same with emulsion from the discharge end of the tube, placing a sensor in the proximity of the non-shirred portion of the casing to measure the distance between the sensor and the casing to detect whether shirred or non-shirred casing is present, connecting the sensor and a collar advancement means to a controller so that the collar will be advanced to slide the casing material on the tube when the non-shirred casing is detected, and stopping the advance of the collar when shirred casing material is detected.