GB471309A - Strainer for vegetables and fruits - Google Patents

Abstract

471,309. Strainers. VANOENACKER, P. J. A. Feb. 15, 1937, Nos. 4488, 4489, and 4490. Convention dates, Feb. 28, 1936, March 12, 1936, and Oct. 31, 1936. [Class 46] [Also in Group VI] A strainer for vegetables and fruits comprises a chamber having a perforated bottom and side walls, and a number of rotating vanes which are curved in such manner that they approach the side walls of the chamber at an acute angle so that they exert a wedging action. In Fig. 1, a truncated conical hopper 1 feeds a cylindrical chamber 2, and the vanes 7 are of S-form. The shaft 8, to which the vanes are welded, is journalled in the centre of the bottom 6 and in a detachable cross-bar 10, a compression spring being interposed between the bar 10 and the top of the vanes 7. The bar 10 is provided at one end with a fork 11 which is placed under the two arms of a T- piece 12 welded to the hopper, whilst the other end is retained by a latch 15 pivoted to a folded plate 16 likewise welded to the hopper. Abutments having knife-edges, project from the walls of the chamber to prevent bodily rotation of the material, the vanes 7 being slotted to clear the projections. Alternatively, a toothed circular rail or rails may be attached to the inside of the chamber 2. Handles 20, 20<1> are provided on the hopper. In a modification, the vanes are of helical or propellerlike form, the peripheral parts of the vanes receding from the walls of the chamber and provided with upstanding flanges, likewise receding, to exert the wedging action on the material. The hopper may be cylindrical and may be of the same diameter as the chamber 2, or it may be a continuation of a truncated conical chamber. The forms of vanes may be used in combination, e.g. one vane as shown in Fig. 1, may be diametrically opposed to a helical vane with an upstanding flange. The chamber 2 may be part spherical and surmounted by a conical hopper. Fig. 12 shows a strainer with a perforated truncated conical centre piece 23 in the chamber 2 whereby the operative surface is increased. The cross-bar 10 may be slotted to receive bolts on which thumb-nuts are threaded for securing it to the hopper, or, alternatively, one end of the cross-bar may be inserted in a slot in a vertical plate rigid with the hopper, whilst the other end is swung into an open-ended slot in a diametrically opposed plate also rigid with the' hopper, a pivoted latch being provided to retain the bar in the latter slot.