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US 11,814,205 B2Granted
Packaging material evaluation and apparatus therefor for sensing packaging material flaws
AssigneeLantech.com, LLC
InventorsPatrick R. Lancaster, III, Michael P. Mitchell, Christian Michael Gruner, Jean-Louis Limousin
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method, apparatus and program product may evaluate a packaging material to determine various metrics associated with the packaging material. An apparatus may be used to sense flaws in packaging material, and in some instances, to accommodate such flaws by temporarily increasing a dispense rate of a packaging material dispenser.
Claims38
A method of tracking flaws in a roll of stretch wrap packaging material, the method comprising:
- conveying a web of packaging material from a packaging material roll to a body through a packaging material delivery system that applies a controlled stretch to the packaging material prior to the packaging material being wrapped around the body;
- detecting flaws in the web of packaging material as the web of packaging material is conveyed to the body with the controlled stretch applied thereto using a sensor;
- and
- counting a number of detected flaws detected by the sensor;
- wherein the packaging material delivery system includes a pre-stretch assembly including upstream and downstream pre-stretch rollers, and wherein detecting flaws in the web of packaging material includes detecting flaws at or upstream of the downstream pre-stretch roller.
2 more elements
An apparatus, comprising:
- a packaging material delivery system configured to convey a web of packaging material from a packaging material roll to a body;
- and
- a controller coupled to the packaging material delivery system and configured to track flaws in the packaging material roll by:
- controlling the packaging material delivery system to convey the web of packaging material from the packaging material roll to the body while applying a controlled stretch to the packaging material prior to the packaging material being wrapped around the body;
- detecting flaws in the web of packaging material as the web of packaging material is conveyed to the body with the controlled stretch applied thereto using a sensor;
- and
- counting a number of detected flaws detected by the sensor;
- wherein the packaging material delivery system includes a pre-stretch assembly including upstream and downstream pre-stretch rollers, and wherein the controller is configured to detect flaws in the web of packaging material by detecting flaws at or upstream of the downstream pre-stretch roller.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.