Oscar Mayer Foods Corporation

General Foods Limited

James A Rattmann

Timothy G Mally

Alvin Borsuk

John A Jonovic

Larry E Daane

Terry L Holmes

Gary A Handel

Gary R Skaar

Dennis G Flisram

An apparatus and method for the automated and large scale preparation of layered stacks of one or more food items such as sandwich meats, hors d'oeuvre servings and the like ('set-ups'). The apparatus conveys a continuous web of paper through a plurality of slicer stations, each slicer station providing one or more slices of one or more food items to sequentially form set-ups of two or more stacked layers of horizontally spaced food slices. The apparatus is synchronized so that each sliced layer is conveyed to a subsequent slicer station before the next layer of food slices is deposited directly on top of that previous layer. The set-up is formed with two or more stacked layers of food slices before being conveyed to a cutter/wrapping station where the paper web is cut to separate the finished set-ups which are then wrapped by folding a portion of the cut paper over the finished set-up. The wrapper separates the set-ups when they are subsequently stacked and packaged and also allows for the sanitary handling of the set-ups when they are unpackaged and used to make sandwiches or the like. The apparatus can include a second paper supply device to interpose a second web of paper between two layers of food to thereby prevent the exchange of flavor and color components between the layers.

Automated line and method for preparing premade food set-ups

An objective measurement of the relative sharpness of a slicing blade is made in accordance with the apparatus and method of this invention by making a test cut in a test specimen in a controlled manner in a sharpness tester device which records the peak force required to cut a standard test specimen 44.

Measurement of cutting edge sharpness

An apparatus and method for the automated and large scale preparation of layered stacks of one or more food items such as sandwich meats, hors d'oeuvre servings and the like ('set-ups'). The apparatus conveys a continuous web of paper through a plurality of slicer stations, each slicer station providing one or more slices of one or more food items to sequentially form set-ups of two or more stacked layers of horizontally spaced food slices. The apparatus is synchronized so that each sliced layer is conveyed to a subsequent slicer station before the next layer of food slices is deposited directly on top of that previous layer. The set-up is formed with two or more stacked layers of food slices before being conveyed to a cutter/wrapping station where the paper web is cut to separate the finished set-ups which are then wrapped by folding a portion of the cut paper over the finished set-up. The wrapper separates the set-ups when they are subsequently stacked and packaged and also allows for the sanitary handling of the set-ups when they are unpackaged and used to make sandwiches or the like.

A stacker assembly is provided that removes a product from a conveyor moving a flow of spaced products and that transfers such products to a discharge assembly. A plurality of products are deposited in this manner onto the discharge assembly until a stack of products having a desired size is formed. A product lifter assembly is included that passes through spacings in the conveyor in order to raise the product above the conveyor, and a comb assembly passes through spacings of the product lifter in order to subsequently receive the raised product for transfer to the discharge assembly.

Stacker assembly

A product line is provided for forming a sheet product composed of products such as bacon slices resting on a pre-cut thin substrate such as a sheet of paper. The substrate sheets are pre-cut to a predetermined length, and a flow of individual products and a flow of pre-cut sheets are coordinated such that the products deposit onto the pre-cut sheets in a predetermined pattern. The line may also include an assembly for reducing the flow rate of the thus formed sheet products, after which the reduced flow is conveyed to a stacking assembly for forming stacks of sheet products of a preselected size.

Automatic sheet product line

A food product is fed to and through a slicer blade of the type included within a commercial-scale meat slicer such as that used in slicing pork bellies into bacon slices. A slidable shelf is provided for temporarily storing the food product and for depositing the food product generally along a feed path after the butt portion of a previously sliced food product hassubstantially cleared the feed path. The thus deposited food product is then pushed into a prefeed orientation and gripped for feeding to and through the slicer blade.

Growing community of inventors

Sun Prairie, WI, United States of America

James A Rattmann