Rotative lumber piece charger for transferring and angularly orienting lumber pieces and method for performing same

A rotative lumber piece charger for concurrently transferring and angularly orienting lumber pieces being transferred along a conveying axis, the rotative lumber piece charger comprising:

• a driving shaft extending along a longitudinal axis and substantially perpendicular to the conveying axis;
• at least one transfer wheel mounted onto a corresponding section of the driving shaft and rotating therewith;
• at least one lumber piece grasping assembly configured to grasp a section of a corresponding one of the lumber pieces, temporarily retain the section of the lumber piece and release the lumber piece, the at least one lumber piece grasping assembly being rotatably connected to a corresponding one of the at least transfer wheel and being selectively rotatable about a lumber rotation axis extending substantially parallel to the longitudinal axis to change an angular orientation of the corresponding one of the lumber pieces as it is temporarily retained;
• and
• an angular orientation control system mounted to the corresponding one of the at least transfer wheel and operatively connected to a corresponding one of the at least one lumber piece grasping assembly, the angular orientation control system controlling the rotational direction and angular travel distance of the lumber piece grasping assembly for selectively rotating the corresponding lumber piece grasping assembly about the lumber rotation axis.

A method for transferring and angularly orienting successive lumber pieces between a first carrier assembly and a second carrier assembly, for each one of the successive lumber pieces the method comprising the steps of:

• determining a desired angular orientation of the lumber piece at a rotative release position corresponding to a rotative position of a corresponding lumber piece grasping assembly for releasing the lumber piece onto the second carrier assembly;
• grasping the lumber piece from the first carrier assembly using the corresponding lumber piece grasping assembly;
• retaining the lumber piece by the lumber piece grasping assembly during rotative transfer by the lumber piece grasping assembly between the first carrier assembly and the second carrier assembly and concurrently controlling the rotational direction and angular travel distance of the lumber piece grasping assembly for selectively rotating the lumber piece grasping assembly about a lumber rotation axis and angularly orienting the lumber piece at the desired angular orientation;
• and
• releasing the lumber piece onto the second carrier assembly using the corresponding lumber piece grasping assembly.