Automatic carton supply method

A method of supplying cartons to a carton-packaging machine, comprising the steps of providing flattened cartons stacked in a line in a container package so that two cutouts on the cartons are lined to form two grooves on two parallel sides of the cartons; inserting two bar-shaped forks into the grooves respectively in the stacking direction of the cartons; pressing the cartons to be together along the inserting direction of the bar-shaped forks by pressers, which are adjustable for a different stacking amount of the cartons, so that the cartons are placed at the central portion of the bar-shaped forks; pulling out the cartons from the package with the bar-shaped forks; and supplying the cartons to the carton-packaging machine with the bar-shaped forks.

BACKGROUND OF INVENTION 
This invention relates to a method of loading efficiently a 
carton-packaging machine with small-box packaging cartons which are 
folded, arranged in a line at least, piled up and placed in a packaging 
case. 
As shown in FIGS. 18 and 19, conventionally, small-box packaging cartons 3 
were folded flat, piled up in a line in a unit of 200 to 250 pieces as 
shown by the numeral 5, arranged in 4 rows, 2 layers, placed in a 
packaging case and packaged, carried near a carton-packaging machine, and 
unpacked; and each row of the cartons was taken out and loaded into the 
supply unit of the carton-packaging machine by hand. 
The carton-packaging machine unfolded cartons into a square pillar form so 
that the object to be packaged was inserted easily while feeding the 
folded cartons one by one according to the object to be packaged. After 
inserting the object to be packed, the flap of the carton was closed and 
glued to complete the individual packaging process and the cartons were 
collected as they were or wrapped or packaged collectively in specified 
multiple units. 
For the conventional method such as above described, when unpacking and 
loading the carton-packaging machine with cartons, someone should attend 
it. Especially in recent high-speed carton-packaging machines, collected 
cartons should be supplied in a time shorter than a minute, requiring 
considerable labor of the person who supplies and loads the cartons; one 
person is not enough for such work. Therefore, if the packing case of 
collected cartons 2 is unpacked and placed in a specified place, and a 
handling unit grasps each row of the collected cartons and carries them to 
a carton-packaging machine, the labor to supply them may be omitted. 
A container of exclusive use is possible to be provided for doing it only, 
but large dimensions and weight is required for the container which is 
difficult to handle and offers low workability. In addition, a carton 
manufacturing plant and a cartoning plant equipped with carton-packaging 
machines are generally at far distances from each other. To cause a 
container of fixed form to go and return between them, the container 
should return carrying empty cases like carrying air. This is 
non-productive transportation. 
A method of using a collapsible container may be considered for this 
purpose but it should be large in weight and complicated in form. 
Difficulties in handling and operating are unavoidable and high cost will 
be required. 
The object of this invention is to solve the subjects including such 
problems and offer a method of supplying cartons automatically to 
cartoning machines more positively, cheaply, and efficiently by using 
throwaway packing cases in which collected cartons are loaded and packed. 
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
The above-described object is attained by (1) an automatic carton supply 
method that 2 bar-shape fork members are inserted through a slit provided 
in a packing case into a gap of a flap provided on both sides of multiple 
cartons which are folded flat, arranged in a line at least in one 
direction and collected up, and enhoused in a packing case, the said 
cartons is received by the above-described gap on both sides, and a carton 
pushing member pushes the cartons towards the center in the collecting 
direction and adjusts the gap corresponding to the collected quantity at 
both edges in the collecting direction of the said cartons, thus grasping 
up the above-described collected cartons, carrying them to a specified 
position and supplying; or (2) an automatic carton supply method that 
L-shaped tip of a chuck member composed of 2 grasping plates with at least 
one tip bent in an L-shape, or center side of 2 bent bar-shape members 
with both end pieces bent in U-shape connected with movable pieces, which 
is inserted into the gap of flaps provided on both sides of multiple 
cartons which are folded flat, arranged and collected at least in a row in 
one direction, and placed in a packing case to grasp the said cartons from 
both sides, and a carton pressing member presses cartons towards the 
center in the collecting direction being provided respectively at both 
ends in the carton collecting direction and a spacer to guide the 
insertion of the said pushing member being provided on the inside of the 
above-described packing case, thus grasping the above-described collected 
cartons and carrying and supplying to a specified position.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
The first embodiment using the method according to this invention will be 
explained below referring to FIGS. 1 to 3. However, this invention is not 
limited to these conditions. 
First, as shown in FIG. 1, every 200 to 250 collapsible cartons 3 are lined 
up with the shorter flap 7 facing upward and longer flap 8 facing downward 
in one direction, multiple rows of said collapsible cartons 3 are arranged 
in contact with other between rows at least on the same plane in one layer 
and in the packing case 11, and the handling fork member is inserted into 
the gap 4 between the shorter flap 7 and longer flap 8 of each row so as 
to lift each row of the arranged cartons from both ends. It is necessary 
that the above-described pair of fork members are inserted from one end 
into a recess formed at the gap 4 between both flaps so as to receive the 
top of the gap (recess) of one row of the said collected and lined-up 
cartons from both sides and raise the cartons surely. It is also necessary 
that all of the cartons are raised positively and placed at the right 
position so that any carton near both ends of each row is not left behind, 
or falls down. For that purpose, it is necessary that the pushing member 
44 is applied at both ends of the row of the cartons to bring the cartons 
together towards the center of their row and the whole row of the said 
cartons is held sufficiently by the above-described fork member at the 
correct position. 
For that purpose, the fork member 48 should be desirably as long as 
possible. It is necessary therefore to provide a slit (notch) 26 to accept 
the pushing member 44 and fork member 48 in the carton lining-up direction 
of the carton packing case 11A. 
In the packing case 11A in FIG. 1, above-described slit (notch) 26 is 
provided at the required 8 positions, while in the packing case 11B in 
FIG. 2, some slits are made in one larger notch of the slit at reduced 5 
positions. Both slits in FIGS. 1 and 2 function in the same way but the 
one in FIG. 1 has a more complicated configuration however, it is slightly 
stronger than the other. 
It is designed so that while the fork members 48 are inserted into the gap 
(recess) of the above-described carton row, a pair of pushing member 44 
provided right above the fork member, penetrating the above-described slit 
in the same direction as the fork member and enabling to push the end of 
the carton row pushes properly the lined up cartons. By providing the 
functions of such fork member 48 and pushing member 44, the lifting 
function movable in the up and down directions, and the function to rotate 
around the vertical axis to the block carrying the above-described 
members, it becomes easy to establish a handling apparatus which enables 
the said block to move between any established positions in the horizontal 
direction. 
However, the former is more desirable from the point of view of complete 
dust-proof package. 
In this embodiment, the shorter carton flap is positioned upward and the 
longer one downward but they may be positioned inversely. In any case, 
since longer flaps are lined up with a very thin partition inserted 
between them, and the longer flaps on one side of a row of cartons 
positioned at the end of the carton packing case are in contact with the 
inside surface of the said packing case, it is possible to restrict the 
volume of the carton packing case to the required minimum. It becomes also 
possible that the above-described fork member 48 can be inserted easily 
into the upper and lower gap 4 to the flaps 7 and 8, a pair of pushing 
member 44 can enter the slit (notch) 26 easily, pushes both ends of the 
cartons positively so that the cartons can be handled with anybody 
attending when loaded to a cartoning machine while the cartons are 
prevented from falling down completely when raised by the above-described 
fork 48. 
There ore, the carton packing case used for the method of this embodiment 
is very efficient. 
The vertical gap 4 between the longer and shorter flaps should desirably be 
as large as possible. 
The second embodiment using the method of this invention will be described 
below referring to FIGS. 4-17. 
As shown in FIG. 4, every 200 to 250 collapsible cartons 3 are lined up in 
one direction with the shorter flap 7 facing upward and the longer flap 8 
downward, multiple rows of the said collapsible cartons 3 are placed in a 
packing case 11 arranged in layers in contact with each other for at least 
one level, and a handling chuck member is inserted into a gap 52 between 
the shorter flaps 7 of each row or between the packing case wall and 
shorter flap 7 of the row at the end. It is required to bring the top of 
the above-described chuck member bent in an L-shape from both sides so as 
to insert it into the recess formed by the gap 4 between the vertical 
shorter and longer flaps of the cartons and hold and grasp one row of the 
said collected and lined up cartons from both sides. At the same time, it 
is necessary that cartons near both ends of each row are not left behind 
when they are grasped. For that purpose, it is necessary that the pushing 
member is applied to both ends of a row of cartons so as to bring cartons 
towards the center in the lining up direction and the entire row of the 
said cartons are sufficiently held by the above-described chuck member. 
For that purpose, the chuck member should be desirable as long as possible. 
Therefore, gap 18 to accept the pushing member 44 and spacer 13 to make 
gap 14 to accept both ends 41a and 41b of the chuck member 41 are 
necessary to be on the inside of the carton packing case 11 in the carton 
lining up direction. Or positive chucking is also possible without using 
such a spacer to provide the gap 17 by previously pushing the cartons with 
the pushing member sufficiently to the center. 
As for the spacer, a spacer 12 bent in U-shape as shown in FIG. 5 may be 
used one each for the lower and upper layers or as shown in FIG. 4, said 
U-shaped spacer 12 may be placed on the upper layer and spacer 13 as shown 
in FIG. 6 on both sides of the lower layer or the said spacer may be 
sticked to the inside wall of the case 11. 
It is also permissible to use a spacer 13 as shown in FIG. 6 instead of the 
U-shaped spacer 12 in FIG. 5; and after packing cartons to the lower 
layer, the partition board 14 is placed as shown in FIG. 7 on the cartons 
of the lower layer and the same spacer 13 for the upper layer is used as 
that it is used for the lower layer. The spacer 13 may be pasted to the 
inside of the packing case 11 or just inserted between the carton 3 at the 
end of the carton row 5 and the inside of the packing case 11. 
Or as shown in FIG. 8, a method of sticking the spacer 16 to the inside of 
the packing case 11 in order to provide gaps 17 and 18 is also 
permissible. In this case, placing a partition board 14 on the border of 
the upper and lower layers is necessary. 
Such a method is also available that, as shown in FIG. 11 (a), without 
providing a spacer, perforations 25 are provided at both ends of the 
carton packing case 11 in the carton lining up direction, other pushing 
bar 46, which is desirably provided with a roller 47 to prevent from 
giving scratches and other damages to cartons, is bumped against the said 
perforations, to form an opened window as shown in FIG. 11 (a); the inside 
carton row is pushed from the end to form the gap between the carton row 
and inside of the carton packing case 11; the above-described pushing 
member 44 is inserted into the said gap; the carton row end is further 
pushed towards the center of the row; and the chuck member 41 is inserted 
into the recess 4 of the gap between flaps from both sides to grasp the 
lined up carton row positively without leaving anything behind. 
As for the opening window 27, perforations may be provided as shown in FIG. 
11 (a), or round hole 28 or long hole 29 may be drilled beforehand as 
shown in FIG. 11 (b). However, the former is more desirable from the 
standpoint of complete dust-proof packaging. 
As for the spacer, as shown in FIG. 9, spacer 19, formed by cutting both 
ends almost along the center line, of rectangular thick paper which is 
bent the cut ends to opposing sides may be used. In this case, the bent 
ends may be adhered to the inside of the packing case 11 when cartons are 
in one layer; but when they are piped up in 2 layers, the bent ends of the 
upper layer should be just folded. 
In such case, most of the rectangular paper between carton rows functions 
as a partition wall between carton rows. 
As a device to obtain the space effect, as shown in FIG. 10, space effect 
can be obtained by making perforations alternately on the front and back 
sides of the surface of the carton packing case which both end surfaces of 
the carton in the lining up direction are faced, and forming 
irregularities on the front or back side of the carton packing case along 
the perforations. 
In this embodiment, by packing 200 to 250 cartons compactly in a carton 
packing case in the collecting direction with positioning the longer 
carton flap upside and the longer one downside so that longer flaps are 
brought into contact with those of next layer; or even though by packing 
them roughly with positioning the cartons of each row kept in a proper row 
by providing a very thin partition board between flaps, the cartons are 
kept out of being mixed with or disturbed by each other. Since the longer 
flap on one side of a carton row at the end in the carton packing case is 
in contact with the inside surface of the packing case, the volume of the 
carton packing case may be very small as a whole to the required minimum. 
The above-described chuck member may be easily inserted into the gap of 
the shorter flap. However, when cartons are turned upside down inversely 
to this case, thick and large partition spacers of the number of the 
carton rows should be provided in the packing case to provide the gap 
between longer flaps; thus, it is resulting in undesirable larger volume, 
complicated form and increased weight. 
Therefore, the carton packing case used for the method of the second 
embodiment are very effective as in the first embodiment. 
The chuck member 41 is bent in an L-shape at its end, which may be inserted 
into the recess between the longer and shorter flaps from both sides to 
grasp the cartons as shown in FIG. 16 (a) or one side of the chuck member 
may be flat chuck member 41b as shown in FIG. 16 (b). The applicant of 
this invention has confirmed that cartons may be grasped positively by 
either one of above methods. 
As for the chuck member, a bar member 42 bent to U-shape as shown in the 
oblique view in FIG. 12 may be used. 
In this case, however, the vertical gap 4 between longer and shorter flaps 
should desirably be relatively large. The main body of the carton packing 
case of the first and second embodiments has been described so far. In 
either embodiment, after cartons are packed into the packing case, a cover 
is applied and the joints between are sealed, or more simply, paper, 
plastic or other sheet may be covered and sealed, by which the damage, 
change in quality or other accidents of important packing materials during 
transportation can be prevented. 
The packing case may be such that the cover is combined with the main body 
so that its one side shares one ridgeline with the main body of the case 
and can be opened or closed with the said ridgeline as the supporting 
axis. In this case, however, a device to retain the return of the cover 
after unsealing so as not to interfere with handling in the carton row is 
necessary. 
When cartons are supplied to a cartoning machine after transportation, the 
above described seal may be torn and cartons may be placed at a specified 
position and handled as it is being placed in the packing case 11. As for 
the handling method of the first embodiment, as shown in the oblique view 
in FIG. 3, the pushing member 44 is pushed in the carton lining up 
direction, that is in the Y direction. When handling packages of a small 
number of cartons like a package of special package film below 1000 
pieces, it is designed that the length between a pair of pushing members 
in the Y direction can be freely adjusted. Since carton packing cases used 
for the method of this embodiment are provided with a slit (notch) to 
insert a fork member 48 or pushing member 44, collecting up more than 2 
layers is possible; however, it is not so desirable in one packing case 
since the slit length becomes larger. Consequently, packing cases as shown 
in FIGS. 1 and 2 are desirable for packing cases used for the method of 
this invention. 
As for the handling method of the second embodiment, as shown in the 
oblique view in FIG. 17, the pushing member 44 is pushed in the carton 
lining up direction, that is in the Y direction. It is designed that, for 
instance, when handling packaging of a small number of cartons such as the 
package of special package film of less than 1000 pieces, the length 
between the pair of pushing members in the Y direction can be easily 
adjusted. It is designed that, when no spacer is used for the packing 
case, the pushing bar 46 corresponding to the opening such as the opening 
window 27, round hole 28, and long hole 29 pushes the end of the carton 
row, the pushing member receives it and pushes further the said carton 
row, and at that time, the said pushing bar is returned to the original 
position. In other words, the pushing bar 46 is incorporated into the 
handling apparatus so as to be operated in the Y direction. 
The chuck member 41 is designed to be movable to grasp the carton row in 
the grasping direction X. 
It is designed so that the handling apparatus is movable up and down in the 
Z direction when lifting up the carton rows. In addition, it will be 
convenient to locate after transportation to design this handling 
apparatus so as to rotate around the Z axis. 
It is clear that grasping up carton rows one by one from the position where 
carton packing cases are loaded and carrying and supplying them positively 
to the carton loading position for and packaging by the method of these 
embodiment are easily realized by incorporating the method according to 
this invention for a robot or other handling apparatuses. 
This invention has enabled to supply cartons positively and stably to a 
high-speed packing machine by loading cartons packed in a corrugated 
cardboard at a specified position and unpacking it without using 
containers of complicated shape and large volume, enabled to save 
personnel to supply cartons for operation of the high-speed packing 
machines, and contributed greatly to more efficient packing processes. 
Since no special containers such as a reciprocating box are not used, it 
also contributes largely to improvement of productivity of transportation 
and reduction of production cost.