Vacuum-assisted pelletizer
AssigneeBay Plastics Machinery Company LLC
InventorRichard H. Fetter
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A thermoplastic pelletizer providing enhanced pellet yields with reduced fines contamination. The pelletizer includes a cutting rotor and a feed assembly for feeding plastic to the cutting rotor. The pelletizer further includes two chutes, wherein a first chute arranged to collect pellets, and a second chute arranged to collect fines. A vacuum is drawn on both chutes to assist in the collection of both pellets and fines in their respective chutes. Compressed air is directed past the cutting rotor to the first chute to assist in moving pellets from the cutting rotor to the first chute.
Claims6
A plastic strand pelletizer comprising:
- a cutting chamber including a cutting area;
- a cutting rotor within the chamber, the cutting rotor having a cutting periphery within the cutting area;
- a cutting rotor drive operatively connected to the cutting rotor;
- a feed assembly configured to feed plastic stands into the chamber and to the cutting periphery of the rotor within the cutting area;
- a feed assembly drive operatively connected to the feed assembly;
- and
- first and second discharge chute sections communicating with the chamber, the first discharge chute section aligned with the cutting area and configured to receive pellets that have been cut a single time by the cutting rotor, the second discharge chute section unaligned with the cutting area and configured to receive fines that have been cut a plurality of times by the cutting rotor, each of the first and second discharge chutes configured to be operatively connected to a vacuum source.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.