Dispenser assembly including a rotating dispensing carousel
AssigneeAutomated Equipment LLC
InventorsWilliam D. Gehn, Richard J. Curtin, Peter von Haaren, Bruce H. Koerner
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A dispenser apparatus including a rotating carousel to feed material from an inlet to a discharge outlet. In the illustrated embodiments, the carousel includes a cone shaped portion to facilitate material flow to dispense a metered quantity of material. The apparatus described has particular application for dispensing a glutinous particulate or material. In an illustrated embodiment, a scale is used to control metered quantities which as described includes cantilevered beams supporting a floating tray for measuring a dispensed quantity.
Claims33
A dispenser comprising:
- a casing having an interior portion formed by a casing wall;
- an inlet and an outlet;
- and
- a dispenser carousel disposed in the interior portion of the casing and interposed in a flow path between the inlet and the outlet and the dispenser carousel being rotatably by a motor assembly coupled to the dispenser carousel and operable to rotate the dispenser carousel about a rotation axis to feed material along the flow path between the inlet and the outlet and having a cone shaped portion having a length extending along the rotation axis and a radially expanding diameter.
A dispenser comprising:
- a casing having an interior portion formed by a casing wall;
- an inlet and an outlet;
- a dispenser carousel disposed in the interior portion of the casing and interposed in a flow path between the inlet and the outlet;
- a motor assembly operable to rotate the dispenser carousel in a clockwise and a counterclockwise direction;
- and
- a dispense controller programmed to operate the motor assembly in response to a dispense command and the controller is programmed to intermittently operate the motor assembly in the clockwise direction and the counterclockwise direction in response to sequential dispense commands.
A method for dispensing material comprising steps of:
- rotating a dispenser carousel in a first direction for a first period to dispense material during a first dispense cycle;
- and
- rotating the dispenser carousel in a second direction for a second period to dispense material during a second dispense cycle.
A method for dispensing material comprising steps of:
- slidably loading a container on a platform having raised edge portions;
- slidably removing a cover of the container;
- and
- rotating a dispenser carousel to dispense material.
A scale comprising:
- a base;
- a tray floatably coupled to the base by a plurality of cantilevered beams extending between the base and the floating tray;
- and
- a sensor coupled to the base and the tray to measure displacement of the tray relative to the base.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.