E.d. Etnyre & Co.

Randal L Zerbe

Thomas R Brown

Patrick C O'Brien

James K Bertsch

A conveyor mechanism is provided for transporting objects. The conveyor mechanism, includes a single continuous belt member wrapped around a plurality of chain loops and also around a pair of spaced-apart pulleys disposed outboard thereof. A chain drive drives the chain loops and the chain loops drive the surrounding belt. A frame having substantially frictionless channel guides provides additional support to the upper track portion of each chain so that the belt member can accommodate heavy loads. The belt has at least one guide ridge formed in its substantially flat undersurface. The belt turning rollers are provide with circumferential grooves which are sized to engage the raised guide ridge on the undersurface of the belt, so that cooperation between the grooves in the turning rollers and the ridge on the belt maintains lateral tacking of the belt. Further lateral stability is provided by disposing of pair of chain guides on either side of the ridge along the upper run of the belt.

Conveyor mechanism

A conveyor mechanism is provided for transporting objects. The conveyor mechanism, in particular, includes a single continuous belt member wrapped around one or more chain loops and also around a pair of spaced-apart pulleys disposed outboard thereof. A first axle having one or more drive sprockets, a second axle having an equal number of idler sprockets, and a motor connected to the first axle are provided for driving the chain loops and the surrounding belt member. In use, the belt member maintains a constant linear velocity throughout its travel path (i.e., both inboard and outboard of the two sets of sprockets), due to the action of the pulleys. In this way, the velocities of the belt member and chains are synchronized at all points where they are in engagement (i.e., inboard of the sprockets), and slipping and/or stretching of the belt member with respect to the chains is advantageously prevented at its reversal points (i.e., outboard of the sprockets). A frame having substantially frictionless channel guide(s) provides additional support to the upper track portion of each chain so that the belt member can accommodate heavy loads.

A gooseneck hitch is held in coupled relation with a trailer platform by a pivoted link which is adapted to be rocked rearwardly by hydraulic actuators to raise the forward end of the platform to a transport position and rocked forwardly to lower the forward end of the platform to the ground and permit removal of the gooseneck from the platform. During towing of the trailer with the platform in a normal transport position, the actuators are hydraulically unloaded and the link is held against forward rocking by a pair of compression cams. The cams are manually released from the link during removal of the gooseneck but are automatically re-engaged with the link during re-installation of the gooseneck so as to relieve the trailer operator of the re-engagement task. The cams may be selectively adjusted to change the transport height of the forward end of the platform and/or to compensate for variations in the height of the fifth wheel coupler of the towing vehicle.

Apparatus for coupling a gooseneck hitch to a trailer platform

A gooseneck hitch is latched to a trailer platform by a pin which may be shifted linearly to an unlatched position against the bias of a spring so as to permit removal of the gooseneck from the platform. A first detent unit holds the latch pin in its unlatched position once the pin has been moved to that position and as long as the gooseneck remains in an installed position on the platform. As the gooseneck is removed from the platform, a second detent unit releases the first detent unit from the latch pin but continues to hold the latch pin in its unlatched position. Upon re-installation of the gooseneck, the second detent unit is automatically released from the pin and permits the spring to automatically shift the pin to its latched position.

Growing community of inventors

Rockford, IL, United States of America

Randal L Zerbe