Patent ID: 7743942

Claim:
A coin-operated vending machine, comprising: (a) a housing; (b) a merchandise storage and dispensing head adapted for holding vendable items being removably supported on said housing; (c) a dispensing mechanism attached to said head and removably supported on said housing such that said dispensing mechanism is removed with said head, said dispensing mechanism having a rotatable dispensing wheel with an outer peripheral rim thereon having a plurality of elements angularly displaced from one another in an endless row and extending radially relative to a central axis of the rotatable dispensing wheel so as to define a driven gear on the dispensing wheel; (d) a coin-operated actuation mechanism mounted to said housing and having a drive gear mounted for rotation about an axis extending in a generally orthogonal relation to said central axis of said rotatable dispensing wheel, said drive gear being disposed below said dispensing mechanism and intermeshed with at least one of said elements of said driven gear when said head is mounted on said housing such that rotation of said drive gear through a given actuation cycle will cause rotation of said dispensing wheel through a dispensing cycle via said drive gear successively intermeshing with said elements of said driven gear to thereby permit dispensing of a given number of the vendable items through said dispensing mechanism to a discharge location on said housing; and (e) a dispensing wheel alignment device having a releasable latch movably mounted to said dispensing mechanism and a detent defined on said outer rim of said rotatable dispensing wheel so as to permit releasable engagement of said latch with said detent and thereby latching said dispensing wheel at, and releasing it from, a desired orientation in the dispensing cycle such that during removing said head and said dispensing mechanism from, and remounting said head and said dispensing mechanism upon, said housing said dispensing wheel will be held in a predetermined relationship with said head by said dispensing wheel alignment device in which only the given number of vendable items can pass through said dispensing mechanism in response to a next deposit of a coin in said coin actuation mechanism and rotation of said drive gear through the actuation cycle corresponding to the dispensing cycle.