The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 03, 1996
Filed:
Sep. 29, 1994
Daniel J Cody, Prairie du Sac, WI (US);
DEC International, Inc., Madison, WI (US);
Abstract
A meat product pasteurizer (20) includes a first conveyor (21) transporting an already-cooked and packaged meat product (22) to a loading station (24), a pasteurizing processing chamber (26) including a fluid media heating zone (28), a void zone (30), and a fluid media chilling zone (32), a second conveyor (60) transporting the meat product (22) from the loading station (24) through the heating zone (28), then through the void zone (30), then through the chilling zone (32) to an unloading station (62), a third conveyor (64) transporting the meat product (22) from the unloading station (62) to a blow-off station (66) for removing surface fluid from the packaged meat product (22). The second conveyor (60) has a plurality of flights (68) formed by paddles (70) defining variable width pockets (76) receiving the food product, the pockets (76) having a first width (78) during the conveyor run between the loading (24) and unloading (62) stations, the pockets (76) having second wider widths (80) at the loading and unloading stations. The paddles (70) have various orientations, allowing processing of differing size food products. The blow-off station (66) has a plurality of parallel longitudinally extending belts (200) transporting the food product (22) along a longitudinal run (201) and having a continuous longitudinal extension along such run without lateral cross-belts. Recirculation of blow-off air, and reclamation of fluid, is provided.