Patent GB-560157-A (GB)
Title: Improvements in means for feeding articles, such as bottles, to a machine
IPC: B08B9/44
Filed: 1942-09-14
Abstract: 560,157. Conveyers. HILL ENGINEERING CO. (HULL), Ltd., T., HILL, T. E., and HARRISON, N. C. Sept. 14, 1942, No. 12903. [Class 78 (i)] Means for feeding individual articles to a machine comprises a plurality of open troughs capable of receiving one or more articles and the floor 2 of which is formed as a conveyer for feeding the articles step by step to the end of each trough where they are delivered by an oscillating transfer element to another conveyer. The ,invention is particularly applicable for feeding bottles to washing, rinsing or soaking apparatus, glass bottles or other articles to an annealing lehr, or articles such as shell cases to enamelling machines, drying ovens, &c. In the arrangement shown, for delivering bottles to a cleaning machine, the troughs are formed by spaced partitions 3 and by the floor 2, the latter being slotted for the passage of bars 4 mounted on a carriage 5 which has brackets 6 connected by links 7 to the upper ends of levers 8 which are counterpoised by weights and are pivoted at their lower ends 9 to the frame of the machine. The carriage 5 runs on rollers 22 on a plate 23 carried on pivots 24, 25 on the ends of interconnected bell-crank levers 26, 27 fixedly pivoted at 28, 29 respectively. A walking beam conveyer is thus formed, rollers 10, 26b mounted respectively on one lever 8 and the bell-crank 26, being acted on by cams 11, 13 ona driving shaft 12. In operation, the carriage 5 is reciprocated in one direction by the cam 11 acting on the roller 10 to move the levers 8 counter-clockwise about the pivot 9 and, in the other direction, by the counterweights on the levers 8, while the carriage is raised by the cam 13, through the roller 26b, swinging the bell-cranks 26, 27 clockwise about their pivots 28, 29 and is lowered by gravity as the roller 26b moves to the right, following the movement of the cam 13. The conveyer may be modified by providing pairs of bars to lift bottles in sequence, each set having a substantially rectangular motion. A shaft 14, driven by gearing 15, 16 from the shaft 12, has cams 17, 17a periodically engaging pins or rollers 8a, 26a on the levers 8, 26 to hold the rollers 10, 26b out of operation by the cams 11, 13 at certain times. During these times, a tray 18 moves about its pivot 19 from its normal position, Fig. 3, in which it closes the end of each trough, to the position shown in Fig. 4, thus allowing bottles to slide down on to a second tray 20 pivoted on a shaft 21. While the tray 18 is moving back to its vertical position, a ram 33 is timed to run down a track 34 to a position below the pivot 21 so that when the tray 20 has returned to the position shown in Fig. 3, the ram pushes the bottles up the track into cases 35 in a rotating cage or chain conveyer for further treatment. After this treatment the bottles reach a position in which they are supported on an arcuate plate 36 and as they leave this plate they slide on to a platform 40 on an oscillating tray 38 pivoted at 39 and as this tray moves back into a vertical position, pushers 41 on oscillating arms 42 transfer the bottles to a final conveyer 43. According to the Provisional Specification, the bars 4 are connected by slotted cranks to a pin on a continuously-rotating crank disc, the slots producing a lost-motion period to allow for the tilting of trays into which the bottles are fed by the walking beam conveyer. The bottles thereafter slide into further trays pivoted on a chain or like conveyer which moves at an angle to the horizontal so that the trays are tilted and the bottles lie parallel to sockets on an endless conveyer within a soaking or washing machine, fingers on a third conveyer displacing the bottles into the sockets.