Patent ID: 8109710

Claim:
A method for continuous piece by piece separation of magnetic and non-magnetic mainly plane sheet or disc-shaped blanks, such as plates of steel, aluminum, plastic sheets and the like, which are piled up in a stack by aid of at least one separating unit, the method comprising: actuating a slide displaceable in the separating unit, the actuating being performed by a driving unit, which in turn actuates a separating arm having at least one friction surface in its front, free end and which hereby is pushed out from said separating unit in a movement direction, which is mainly 90° to a side plane of said stack in both directions, wherein the separating arm is guided in the slide by a curve of the separating arm, and when said friction surface, forming an angle to the side plane of the stack, is contacting a blank, turning the separating arm in the slide a predetermined angle at the same time as the first point on the friction surface has reached the blank stack such that formation of the angle allows the friction surface to only contact an uppermost blank of the stack, the friction from the friction surface of the separating arm gripping the uppermost blank when that point of the friction surface, which has contacted the blank, changes its movement direction in order thereafter to follow that movement direction which is mainly in parallel to the side plane of the stack and which is also the separating direction of the blank in separating the upper most blank of the stack from underlying blanks.