Abstract:
An apparatus and method for loading live poultry into cages for shipment to a processing station. The system comprises a trailer having an assembly and movement station to accept the deposit of live poultry. After deposit, the poultry moves by conveyor belt to a drop chute where the poultry is weighed in batches at a weighing station, and thence each weighed batch is in-turn deposited upon another conveyor at a conveying station to be moved to discrete cages at the cage loading station. The poultry is loaded by batches into individual cages arranged in stocked arrays. After each batch is loaded into cages thereby filling all cages of the stacked array, the cage array is automatically moved to a cage deployment station to be subsequently shipped to a processing plant.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
   I. Field of the Invention 
   The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for loading live poultry. The poultry (typically chickens) is gathered within a chicken house by a specialized caging system which picks the poultry up from the floor of the chicken house, and transports the poultry to a poultry loading system which conveys the poultry to a weighing station to weigh batches of poultry, and then transports each batch of poultry to a caging system wherein the poultry are loaded into cages and subsequently are then offloaded from the poultry loading system onto a conveyor for transporting the poultry to a processing plant.  
   II. Description of the Related Art 
   In the past there have been many poultry loading systems which attempt to automate the collection and loading of poultry for transporting the same to processing plants. However, the prior art suffers deficiencies in that the processing system does not fully automate the entire process. 
   A system which is indicative of the prior art is the patent to Stross (U.S. Pat. No. 5,469,815) which discloses a poultry loading system that moves poultry crates continuously along a trailer conveyor wherein the poultry is loaded during the movement of the crates. 
   U.S. Pat. No. 4,736,710 granted to Nicolai discloses a poultry loading system in which poultry is plucked from the ground surface by suction and then transported by conveyor belts to loading and transporting crates. 
   In U.S. Pat. No. 3,722,477 granted to Weldy et al., another poultry conveying and loading system is shown wherein the poultry is loaded into a chute which comprises a main conveyor system which delivers the poultry to a point adjacent to a cage system for holding the poultry for transport.  
   All of the prior art fail to show a coordinated processing system wherein the poultry is gathered, weighed, sorted and caged for shipment without human intervention. 
   SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
   In accordance with the present invention and the contemplated problems which have and continue to exist in this field, the objectives of this invention is to provide a poultry processing system which gathers the poultry, conveys the same to a weighing system, weighs the poultry and then conveys weighed batches of poultry to a cage loading station, and then loads the batches of poultry into cages and subsequently transports the cages to a deployment station for ultimate transportation to a processing plant. 
   The present invention includes a chicken loading system which collects poultry for caging prior to processing and which includes a special multi-tine pitchfork assembly which is attachable to a forklift-type truck which then gently picks up the poultry and moves the poultry to the poultry loading system trailer. The pitchfork assembly which has picked up the poultry will dump the poultry onto the assembly and movement station which comprises a series of  conveyor belts which moves the poultry to a weighing station which will weigh the poultry in batches and then, at a predetermined weight, will dump the poultry onto a conveying station belt which moves the poultry to a cage loading station and subsequently loads each batch of weighed poultry into an individual cage. The cages are formed as cage sets wherein each cage set is an assembly of four pairs of cages, two cages on each level for a total of eight cages. When all eight cages are filled, the cage assembly will then slide out of the cage station onto a cage deployment station for a subsequent movement to the poultry processing plant. 
   The process then repeats after a new cage assembly is moved to the cage deployment station from the cage storage station. 
   Other objects, advantages and capabilities of the invention will become apparent from the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings showing the preferred embodiment of the invention.  

   
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
       FIG. 1  is an overall perspective view of a trailer encompassing the poultry loading system; 
       FIG. 2  is a side elevation view of the trailer of the poultry loading system and including the loading forklift tractor and pickup cage assembly; 
       FIG. 3  is partial elevation section view of the weighing station; 
       FIG. 4  is a partial elevation section view of the conveying station; 
       FIG. 5  is a partial elevation section view of the cage loading station; 
       FIG. 6  is a partial elevation section view of the cage loading station showing poultry having been loaded into one set of cages, and showing the cage unit being moved downwardly to access another cage section for subsequent loading; 
       FIG. 7  is a partial elevation section view showing the weighing station beginning a repeat second cycle of weighing; and  
       FIG. 8  is a partial overall perspective view of the cage deployment station showing loaded cages being moved from the cage deployment station for transport to the processing plant. 
   

   DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
   Referring to the drawings wherein like reference numerals designate corresponding parts throughout the several figures, reference is made first to  FIGS. 1 and 2 . The poultry loading system  11  comprises several stations which are integral to the operation of the system. At the beginning of the system there is a deposit station  12  which leads to an assembly and movement station  13 , thence to the weighing station  14 , thence to the conveying station  15 , thence to the cage loading station  16 , thence to the cage storage station  17 , and finally to the cage deployment station  18 . The entire system is mounted upon a trailer  19  for ease of movement from one loading area to another. 
   In the poultry business, poultry is typically raised and kept in houses and, in order to gather the poultry for shipment, it is necessary to contain and pickup the poultry by some manner for ease of shipment. As might be  expected, the poultry is not suitably retrieved by hand because of the extreme amount of actual handling involved. It is much easier to pickup the poultry by mechanical means in large numbers. Typically, poultry houses are long, narrow affairs and mechanical means may be suitably introduced for gathering the poultry in large lots. To this end, the present invention contemplates a loading tractor  21  which has a lift boom  22  equipped with a pickup cage  23  which is reciprocally mounted on the lift boom to accomplish the process of picking up the poultry from the floor of the poultry house. In actual operation, the loading tractor would be driven into the poultry house (not shown) with the lift boom generally parallel to the ground and with the pickup cage  23  also generally parallel to the ground so that the bottom  24  of the pickup cage would generally rest on the ground surface. The driver of the loading tractor would then gently move the loading tractor toward the poultry in the poultry house, thereby slipping the forward edge  25  of the pickup cage under the poultry and moving the poultry into the pickup cage by the forward movement of the loading tractor  21 . Once a sufficient number of poultry are gathered in the pickup cage, the loading tractor would retract from the poultry house and move to the proximal end  26  of the trailer  19 . At this point, the lift boom  22  would be in the generally vertical position as shown in  FIG. 2  with the pickup cage  23  near the top of the boom with the poultry  27  confined within the pickup cage. At this point, the driver of the loading tractor  21  would  position the pickup cage  23  adjacent to and above the assembly and movement station  13  preparatory to depositing the poultry into the assembly and movement station  13 . 
   At this point, the driver of the loading tractor  21  would tilt the lift boom  22  forwardly at such an angle to position the pickup cage  23  over the assembly cage  28 , and will move the lift boom and the pickup cage in such a fashion as to dump the poultry into the assembly cage  23  at the assembly and movement station. 
   At this point, an operator will have already energized the power unit  29  which typically will be a diesel election generator, but, of course, could be any suitable power unit designed for the particular system. The power unit will energize the drive motor  31 , or a series of drive motors as the case may be, which, in turn, will energize the various operative systems on the trailer  19  needful and necessary to convey the poultry from one station to another, and to cage the poultry, and to move the caged poultry to the cage deployment station  18 . A control system mounted in the control housing  32  will be designed to effect all necessary controls for the entire poultry loading system. It is anticipated that the system may be manually controlled or may be fully automated as the needs may arise.  
   Returning now to the assembly and movement station  13  after the poultry have been deposited in the assembly cage  28 , it should be noted that the platform of the assembly and movement station  13  is a continuous conveyor drive belt  33 , the drive belt  33  is mounted around opposed pulleys  34   a  and  34   b  (see  FIG. 2 ) which have integral drive motors to effect the movement of the conveyor drive belt at desired times by means of the control mechanism within the control housing  32 . As the poultry is dumped upon drive belt  33 , it is moved forwardly toward the distal edge  35  of the assembly and movement station  13  to the weighing station  14 . 
   The weighing station  14  is an enclosed caged area  36  which may be divided into two compartments  37   a  and  37   b  for ease of handling the poultry. The two compartments are separated by a fixed member  38 . 
   As the poultry is moved into the enclosed cage  36  of the weighing station, they fall to a weighing platform  39  at the bottom of the cage. The platform  39  extends the full transverse length of the cage. As the poultry stacks on the weighing platform  39  (as seen in  FIG. 3 ), the total weight of the poultry is determined by the weight sensing flap control mechanism  41  which will sense the total weight upon the platform either as a total weight in the entire cage or in the alternative as total weight in each of the two caged  compartments  37   a  and  37   b . Once the desired preset weight has been measured, the flap control mechanism  41  will then activate the weighing platform  39  and cause the platform to reciprocate downwardly to discharge the weighed poultry onto the conveying station  15 . In this way, an exact amount of poultry weight will be batch loaded into the subsequent cage units each and every time the weighing cycle takes place. 
   Once the poultry has been released from the weighing station, the poultry then falls into a pair of holding cages  42   a  and  42   b  which lie atop dual cage feeder conveyor belts  43   a  and  43   b . It should be noted that the specific example of dual conveyor belts is for illustrative purposes only, as the conveyor systems described herein can be single belts or multiple belts as needed. As the poultry is released by the weighing platform  39 , the poultry then migrates into the holding cages  42   a  and  42   b  atop the dual conveyor belts and, at that time, the dual conveyor belts begin to move upon pulleys  44   a  and  44   b , and the movement brings the batch of poultry fully into the holding cages and the holding cages  42   a  and  42   b , then begin to reciprocate through the conveying station  15  toward the cage loading station  16 . The poultry is maintained in the holding cages by means of a detention bar  45  which closes the distal end of the cages, thereby maintaining the poultry within the cages. As the holding cages move toward the cage  loading station  16 , as seen in  FIG. 4 , the detention bar moves to its operative limit near the edge of the dual conveyor belts  43   a  and  43   b  at which time the holding cages  42   a  and  42   b  cease movement. However, the dual conveyor belts are continuing to move and the detention bar automatically raises, as seen in  FIG. 5 , to allow the dual conveyor belts to move the poultry to the multilevel cage unit  46  at the cage loading station  16 . As seen in  FIG. 5 , the holding cages  42   a  and  42   b  have ceased movement and the detention bar  45  has been raised, and the dual conveyor belts continue to move the poultry toward the cage unit. In addition, the entire unit comprising the dual conveyor belts  43   a  and  43   b  also reciprocate to the cage unit and project therein a suitable distance so that the poultry moving along the dual conveyor belts  43   a  and  43   b  are positioned within a first level  47  of the cage unit. As previously noted, each cage, unit will have multiple levels, in the case shown in the drawings there are four levels, and once each level has been fully loaded with the batch of poultry then the conveyor belts  43   a  and  43   b  
reciprocate out of the cage unit as shown in  FIG. 6 , thereby triggering an indexing mechanism  50  allowing the entire cage unit  46  to drop downwardly one complete level to position the next higher level even with the dual conveyor belt mechanism. As the cage section is dropping downwardly  as shown in  FIG. 6 , the cage doors  48  of the cages of the first level  47  just loaded will be reciprocated upwardly by the closure member  49  which shuts the cage doors  48  which are automatically locked closed as the cage is descending. 
   The procedure of loading the individual cage levels continue until each level of the cage unit have been fully loaded, at which time the entire cage unit  46  then rests on the lower platform  51 . At this time, the entire cage unit is then automatically moved to the cage discharge platform  52  which comprises rollers  53  to ease the movement from the platform. At this point, a suitable forklift truck, such as shown in  FIG. 2 , would then move the loaded cage unit  46 , to a suitable transportation trailer for shipment to the poultry processing plant. After a cage unit  46  is fully placed upon the cage discharge platform  51 , a subsequent cage unit  46  is automatically indexed and moves from the cage storage station  17  to the cage loading station  16  and takes its most upright position ready for the lower individual cages of the lower level  47  to be batch loaded as previously described. As can be seen from the drawings, and especially in  FIG. 7 , once an individual pair of cages have been batch loaded, the weighing and conveying process of moving a batch of poultry to the cages is repeated.  
   In addition, the specific apparatus just described, the present system contemplates a method of processing poultry utilizing the described apparatus which is entirely novel in its approach. The method generally comprises the steps of:
         providing a trailer mounted conveyor loading system having a deposit station, an assembly and movement station, a weighing station, a conveying station, a cage loading station, a cage storage station and a cage deployment station,   providing the loading system a power unit and a control system,   gathering live poultry by mechanical means into the deposit station,   loading live poultry from the deposit station onto the assembly and movement station,    conveying the live poultry from the assembly and movement station to the weighing station, weighing the live poultry by the batch at the weighing station until a predetermined batch weight is achieved, sensing the predetermined weight of the batch and automatically depositing the batch onto the conveying station,   conveying the batch of live poultry through the conveying station to the cage loading station, and   providing a cage at the cage loading station to accept the batch of live poultry, conveying the batch of live poultry into the cage, moving the loaded cage from the cage loading station to the cage deployment station for off loading to a conveyance means, moving a subsequent cage from the cage storage station to the cage loading station.       

   Therefore, the foregoing is considered as illustrative only of the principles of the invention. Further, various modifications may be made of the invention without departing from the scope thereof and it is desired, therefore, that only such limitations shall be placed thereon as are imposed by the prior art and which are set forth in the appended claims.