Hartness International, Inc.

Sentry Equipment Erectors, Inc.

Sen-pack Inc.

David Nelson Cooley

Thomas P Hartness

Richard M Wiernicki

William R Hartness, Iii

Robert Leslie Dillard

David Lee Scott

John P Choufani

Gert B Gast

Gary D Hunt

Mark T Brogan

Christopher A Ray

J Michael Connor

Brian S Childress

Donald Peter Welch

Timothy A Woodson

William M Connor

Keith A Knowles

Kevin F Keyes

A method of accumulating products traveling in a conveyor system according to system conditions including: receiving products from an infeed conveyor onto a first conveyor in an accumulator; transferring by a carriage products from the first conveyor to a second conveyor in the accumulator; moving products from the second conveyor to an outfeed conveyor; detecting a density of products moving on the second conveyor; and moving the carriage with along the first and second conveyors if the detected density is above a certain density value.

Density-based carriage control system for accumulator and method for controlling an accumulator

A new type of pallet stacking assembly line. Two pick-and-place robots are used. The first robot has a relatively low position. The second robot is in an elevated position. A pallet dispenser dispenses a first pallet onto a pallet conveyor. The pallet conveyor then moves the first pallet to a first build position in front of the first robot. The first robot then begins picking products from a first pick position and stacking them on the first pallet. Once the products on the first pallet reach approximately half the finished height, the pallet conveyor carries the first pallet over to a second build position in front of the second robot. At the same time, the pallet dispenser dispenses a second pallet which is carried to the first build position. The second robot picks products from a second pick position and places them on the upper portion of the first pallet in order to complete the stack. Meanwhile, the first robot is picking and placing products on the lower portion of the second pallet. The process continues indexing, with both robots ideally being busy all the time. Each robot only has to build half the pallet. Thus, overall line speed is increased.

Vertically staggered pallet stacking assembly line and method

An apparatus and method for continuously transferring articles from a pickup station to a release station using a circular, continuously rotating turret is disclosed which includes a plurality of transfer arms carried in a circular motion wherein pickup heads carried by the transfer arms are converted from the circular motion to a straight-line motion during pick up of the articles to provide a case packing machine having high speed and reliable operation. In accordance with the general aspects of the invention, a first conveyor is disclosed for conveying the articles to a pickup station and a second conveyor is provided for delivering the articles away from a release station. One of the first and second conveyors includes an arcuate conveyor section disposed below a congruent path of the pickup heads. At least one of the pickup and release stations is advantageously located over the arcuate conveyor section whereby high speed operation requiring only a small amount of machine floor space is provided. When utilized as a case packing machine, both the pickup heads and grid heads, which define a plurality of guides through which the articles are released at the case packing station, are moved in a translatory motion during article pick up.

Continuous circular motion case packing and depacking apparatus and method

An apparatus is provided for controlling the flow of articles. The apparatus includes a first conveyor driven in a first direction and a second conveyor driven in a second opposite direction. The conveyors extend in a side-by-side and parallel relationship with a space defined therebetween. A movable transport member is disposed within the space between the conveyors and defines a bridge that extends across the space and is generally flush with the upper surfaces of the conveyors. The transport member is drivingly engaged by the conveyors so as to move linearly between the conveyors depending on a speed differential of the conveyors. At least one article transfer member comprising a driven article propelling member is carried by the transport member and is disposed transversely to the conveyors to contact and drivingly transfer the articles from the first conveyor over the bridge member and onto the second conveyor.

Device for transferring articles between oppositely running conveyors

A continuous motion apparatus for depacking and packing articles in cases which includes a carriage which carries a plurality of transfer arms; a plurality of article pick-up heads carried by the transfer arms for picking up a group of the articles at a pick-up station to transfer the articles to a release station. In a case packing configuration of the invention, a slug metering section includes a slug feeder continuously receiving articles from an infeed conveyor. A revolving pin bar mechanism is carried in the slug metering section having a plurality of revolving pin bar assemblies to assist in forming the articles into successive groups or slugs of articles. The pin bar assemblies include spaced upstanding pins which are received in crevices between rear articles in a first slug and front articles in a second slug of articles to separate the articles for processing. A slug metering member, which can also have upstanding posts, is carried across the slug metering section and pivots in and out of a conveyance path of the articles in synchronism with the revolving pin bar mechanism to meter the articles. In the depacking configuration, a plurality of article gripper tubes are carried by each article pick-up head arranged in a matrix corresponding to the slug of articles. The gripper tubes have a grip position in which said articles are retained by the pick-up head at the pick-up station for transfer, and a release position in which the articles are released from the pick-up head at the release station. Advantageously, the gripper tubes have a first effective axial length for gripping articles at the pick-up station when the articles are in an upright configuration, and the gripper tubes have a second effective axial length which is compressed and shortened relative to the first axial length when striking an obstacle such as an inverted article to allow sufficient travel for all other gripper tubes to grip articles.

Continuous motion case packing apparatus and method

An apparatus is provided for controlling the flow of articles. The apparatus includes a first conveyor driven in a first direction and a second conveyor driven in a second opposite direction. The conveyors extend in a side-by-side and parallel relationship with a space defined therebetween. A movable transport member is disposed within the space between the conveyors and defines a bridge that extends across the space and is generally flush with the upper surfaces of the conveyors. The transport member is drivingly engaged by the conveyors so as to move linearly between the conveyors depending on a speed differential of the conveyors. An article transfer member is carried by the transport member and is disposed transversely to the conveyors to contact and transfer the articles from the first conveyor over the bridge member and onto the second conveyor.

Growing community of inventors

Port Orange, FL, United States of America

David Nelson Cooley