Patent GB-1297572-A (GB)
IPC: B65B17/02
Filed: 1970-07-06
Abstract: 1297572 Container packages and methods and apparatus for assembling them L E ARNESON 6 July 1970 [7 July 1969] 32692/70 Heading B8C A number of containers such as bottles 28 having cylindrical bodies and reduced neck portions 30 and with annular shoulders 34 on conventional caps 32 are attached to a carrier 26 by first forcing them through the apertures 36 of a flat carrier member 24 by hand or, by suitable apparatus not shown, so that the member 24 tightly grips the mid-portions of the bottles and then, applying, over the shoulders 34, a carrier member 26. The latter is initially made from a flat blank of rigid material and has a number of apertures 42 which correspond to the diameters of the bottle neck portions 30 but are less than the outer diameters of the annular shoulders 34. The carrier 26 has finger apertures 118, fold lines 48 which intersect the rows of apertures 42, and laterally displaced parallel fold lines 52, each aperture having local enlargements 44, 46 for passing over the bottle tops during assembly of the package. In an apparatus for assembling successive packages 20, groups of bottles 22, with carrier members 24 previously fitted at station 60, Fig. 3, are transferred by a conveyer 58 to a station 62 for assembly of the carrier members 26, the conveyer 58 comprising endless chains 80, 82 disposed at opposite sides of a support member 78 and having dogs 74 to engage behind groups of bottles. Carrier blanks 26 are pulled out, individually, from a magazine 70 and deposited on a conveyer 68 which leads them round a guide 84 and between upper and lower pairs of guide bars 90, 90 and 88, 88 which engage an advancing blank between fold lines 48, 48 with the blank in a flat condition above a corresponding group of bottles. As each blank 26 progresses from right to left the sides 50 are bent upwardly to a vertical position by rods 92, 92, at the same time the blank descends as it is pushed down on to downwardly inclined portions of the bars 88 by resilient fingers 97. Simultaneously the two rows of bottles are tilted laterally away from each other, the tilting being accomplished by a progressively widening cam bar 98, which engages between the neck portions of the two rows of bottles, and inclined surfaces 102, 104 on the support member 78, the carrier 24 being flexible to allow tilting. The cam member 98 narrows again and the conveyer member 78 reverts to a flat condition so that the rows of bottles can move inwardly to a vertical position and the bottle necks engage the inner halves 105 of the apertures 42 beneath the shoulders 34, as sides of the bottles are also urged inwardly by inclined surfaces on guide bars 101. At the point at which blank is engaged by all of the bottles the folding bars 92 terminate, the blank edges then being folded downwards about the fold lines 48 by bars 110 so that the outer half of each aperture 42 snaps over the respective shoulder 34. Ploughs 112 subsequently fold the marginal portions 59 of the blank against back-up bars 116, the ploughs 112 having elongated extension bars 114. The bottles can be removed by folding the marginal portions of the blank inwardly. In alternative arrangements the apertures may be of equilateral triangle, or of T shape, snap action of the engagement behind the shoulders being preferable but not essential. The carrier member 26 can be made of paper board, or plastics material.