PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15884712
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-01
Publication Date: 2018-08
Patent Classification: ["198", "397060"]

Abstract:
A food patty aligning and separating apparatus with a conveyor belt having horizontal cleats extending through a hopper beneath patties. Dividers extend longitudinally through the hopper to form lanes. The conveyor belt's cleats urge patties along lanes up a vertical span of the conveyor, thereby aligning the patties horizontally in a line. The patties pass over a peak and slide down a curved plate to distance the aligned group of patties from a next upstream group of patties. Guide members are spaced from the conveyor belt on hopper side to shear combined patties or pivot outward and cause combined patties to roll back into the hopper.

Claim (Index 17):
A method of aligning food products, the method comprising:\n (a) disposing a plurality of food products in a hopper, each food product having a thickness; (b) driving a conveyor belt having a plurality of horizontally-oriented cleats mounted at longitudinally-spaced intervals, each of the cleats protruding from a belt surface less than the thickness, the belt being driven along an enclosed loop path, the path including:\n (i) a first span of the conveyor belt extending below the hopper defining a hopper floor; and \n (ii) a second span of the conveyor belt having a vertical component and extending upwardly from below the hopper toward a peak defining a hopper wall, \n at least one of the cleats having a downstream edge contacting at least one of the plurality of food product and displacing said at least one food product up the second span and over the peak; and (c) releasing said at least one food product from said at least one of the cleats near the from the peak toward a curved portion and extending to a horizontal component portion, said at least one food product sliding along the vertical component portion, the curved portion and the horizontal component portion.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 27.0
- Percentile: 86.0
- Lexical Diversity: 1.66176
- Patent Class: 198.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['14137406', '14269570', '14807600', '15337187', '12009616']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.6932500180344422
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.4697558352723457
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.6709005997582325
- Mean Citation Score: 214.236224
- Max Citation Score: 220.47844
- Similarity Product: 169.06382411756994

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 0
- Claim Label 103: 1
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 0
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test