Handling snack food chips

A method of handling three-dimensionally curved snack food chips that are substantially triangular in plan, the method comprising the steps of:

• a) providing a plurality of three-dimensionally curved snack food chips, each three-dimensionally curved snack food chip having a convex face and an opposite concave face;
• b) conveying, by a first conveyor extending along a conveying direction, a series of the snack food chips to an inverting station located at an output end of the first conveyor, the snack food chips in the series being aligned along the conveying direction, the first conveyor having a first upper conveying surface engaging the convex face of the snack food chips, and the opposite concave face of the snack food chips being upwardly oriented;
• c) at the inverting station, sequentially transferring the snack food chips in the series from the first conveyor to an inverter, the inverter comprising an internal concave surface having an upper portion and a lower portion, wherein the inverter comprises an arcuate endless belt having an inner arcuate surface which defines the internal concave surface, the snack food chips being transferred from the output end of the first conveyor into contact with the upper portion of the internal concave surface, the concave face of each snack food chip being oriented towards the internal concave surface of the inverter;
• d) in the inverter, rotating the arcuate endless belt to cause downward movement of the internal concave surface of the inverter thereby sequentially moving the snack food chips in contact with the rotating arcuate endless belt downwardly from the upper portion to the lower portion of the internal concave surface;
• and
• e) at a depositing station, sequentially depositing the snack food chips downwardly from the lower portion of the internal concave surface onto a second conveyor, the concave face of each snack food chip being oriented downwardly towards a second upper conveying surface of the second conveyor, wherein a horizontal translational component of the direction of movement of the snack food chips is reversed when the snack food chips are deposited on the second conveyor from the inverter and wherein the inverter downwardly moves the snack food chips at a first velocity in a moving direction of the internal concave surface of the inverter and the second conveyor has a second velocity, wherein the first velocity is higher than the second velocity so that the snack food chips in the series are closer together on the second conveyor than in the inverter, wherein the snack food chips in the series on the second conveyor comprise a shingled assembly of the series of the snack food chips and wherein the shingled assembly of the snack food chips is formed on the second conveyor at the depositing station;
• and
• f) conveying, by the second conveyor, the snack food chips on the second upper conveying surface away from the depositing station.