GB1225659A - - Google Patents

Abstract

1,225,659. Packaging - machines. A. SCHMERMUND. 18 July, 1969 [14 Aug., 1969], No. 38786/68. Heading B8C. In a cigarette packing machine which serves to position alternate rows of fifty and fifty one cigarettes into a container S, cigarettes are fed, by means of a feed belt 31 and a drum 34 having suction troughs 32, on to the grooves of a pair of multi-start screw spindles 1, 2, driven by a servocontrolled motor M, and are held stationary for a fraction of a second while a line of cigarettes is removed by a suction plate arrangement comprising a withdrawable centre part 7 having a single cigarette receiving trough and two lateral parts 5, 6 each having twenty five troughs. In order to pick up fifty cigarettes from the spindles 1, 2 the plates 5, 6 are moved laterally together by cams 25 and linkage 23, 26 to displace the centre part 7 upwardly, and are connected to a source of suction before being lowered, by cams 20 and follower linkage 15, 17 to pick up fifty cigarettes from the spindles 1, 2 as the latter are momentarily stopped, the spacing of the cigarettes 4 on the conveyer 31 allowing feed by the drum 34 to continue without piling up cigarettes behind the drum 34. The cams 20 then raise the suction plates 5, 6 which are subsequently moved to the left, Fig. 3, by means of cranks 12, directly above a container 34, the spindles 1, 2 being rotated again immediately after the pick-up of the cigarettes, and the suction plates 5, 6 being lowered, as the cams 20 continue to rotate, to deposit the fifty cigarettes in the container S4 on top of the preceding row of fifty one cigarettes, in staggered relation, as suction to the plates 5, 6 is cut off. On release of the cigarettes the cams 20 raise the plates 5, 6 and the crank 12 returns the plates to position them above the feed spindles 1, 2 as the centre part 7, connected to the plates 5, 6 by a parallel linkage 10, 11, is lowered to extend between the plates 5, 6 by the cams 25, so that, when the suction plate 5, 6, 7 is lowered again to repeat the packing operations, it picks up fifty one cigarettes, the spindles 1, 2 feeding the cigarettes, this time, through a distance more than the previous feeding action by one half the diameter of a cigarette. The container S4 is lowered after each layer of cigarettes has been deposited, by a stepping mechanism, the containers S 1 -S 8 being moved by conveyers and pushers in directions indicated by arrows in Fig. 3. A segmental core 45 in the drum 34 blocks off suction holes 44 which are not required to convey cigarettes at any one time the drum 34 also having grooves 47 in which strippers 48 engage. A curved carry-over member 49 assists in the transfer of cigarettes which are guided by rails 51. In a modification, Fig. 6, not shown, the spindles 1, 2 are replaced by a troughed belt (101). Both spindles 1, 2 and troughed belt can be modified to carry cigarettes of different diameters, and the suction plate may have only two parts instead of three.