Patent ID: 7481640

Claim:
A scrapless thermoforming machine, comprising: a plurality of transport trays having frames configured to hold a plurality of thermoplastic billets and billet clamps; an oven configured to heat the billets; a form press configured to form the billets into containers; a loading and unloading station, the loading and unloading station having a billet loading side and a container unloading side, the loading and unloading station comprising: a clamp transfer station having a clamp transfer shuttle configured to move the clamps from the container unloading side to the billet loading side; a transport tray unloading mechanism on the container unloading side configured to unload the clamps and formed containers from a selected transport tray to the clamp transfer station; a billet placement station on the billet loading side configured to place the thermoplastic billets onto a billet shuttle, the billet shuttle configured to move the billets from the billet placement station to the billet loading side of the clamp transfer station; and a transport tray loading mechanism configured to transfer the clamps and the billets from the clamp loading station to the selected transport tray on the billet loading side.