Compact low force economical general purpose walking beam conveyor

Abstract

A walking beam conveyor is described which comprises a movable load supporting, walking beam member. A supporting truss is secured to and supports the walking beam member and comprises first and second orthogonally arrayed interconnected supporting truss arms. The first and second truss arms each include scotch yoke rollerway guides. First and second scotch yoke cam rollers engage the scotch yoke rollerway guides on the the first and second truss arms, respectively, and serve to physically support and move the supporting truss and walking beam member along horizontal and vertical axes. The cam rollers are secured to the ends of the first and second sets of crank arms which in turn are driven from first and second intermittor drives. The structure is supported on a base frame which secures the pillow block supports for the rotatable shafts that are keyed to the first and second sets of crank arms. The supporting truss is T-shaped wherein the cross arms of the T-shaped member comprise the first truss arm and form the scotch yoke rollerway guides for physically supporting and moving the supporting truss in a vertical direction and the base of the T-shaped member comprises the second truss arm and serves as a horizontal scotch yoke guide rollerway for moving the supporting truss and walking beam member forward and back in a horizontal direction. The walking beam conveyor further includes a spring driven counter-balancing torquing arrangement for applying a counter-balancing torque to the rotatable shafts that rotate the crank arms. The cam rollers on one side of the walking beam conveyor comprise roller wheels having a V-shaped outer periphery. The cam rollers on the opposite side of the conveyor are provided with smooth cylindrical surfaces.