Patent ID: 8590690

Claim:
A method for operating a device for taking over, temporarily storing and passing on elongated, hollow-cylindrical product units which come from a production line wherein the device comprises: (i) a supplying conveyor arrangement in the form of a first conveyor belt; (ii) a continuously delivering conveyor arrangement in the form of a second conveyor belt, the first conveyor belt and the second conveyor belt being disposed horizontally lying one above the other in a transfer zone; (iii) an intermediate storage arrangement in the form of a high-rack storage arrangement or a paternoster storage arrangement disposed in the transfer zone; and (iv) a handling robot disposed in a region of the transfer one between the supplying and delivering conveyor arrangements and the high-rack storage arrangement, the method comprising: (a) adapting the position and speed of the handling robot to the first conveyor belt; (b) employing the handling robot to take a number of product units from the first conveyor belt; and (c) employing the handling robot to either: (i) feed the product units removed from the first conveyor belt to the second conveyor belt after adaptation of the position and speed of the handling robot to the second conveyor belt, or (ii) feed the product units removed from the first conveyor belt to the intermediate storage arrangement.