Adjustable pouch forming, filling and sealing apparatus and methods

A vertical sealer for forming transverse seals in a multiple ply web, said vertical sealer comprising:

• a vertical sealer wheel;
• a plurality of sealer lands on said wheel;
• and
• web handling apparatus for selectively tensioning and relaxing tension of said multiple ply web with respect to said sealer lands.

Apparatus for filling and sealing pouches and including a spout wheel and a filler wheel for supporting pouches to be filled through spouts carried on said spout wheel, the improvement comprising the combination of:

• a first servo drive for driving said filler wheel;
• a second servo drive for driving said spout wheel;
• said first and second servo drives respectively driving said respective filler and spout wheels independently of each other;
• and
• at least one of said first and second servo drives being controllable to adjust a phase of rotation between said filler wheel and said spout wheel.

A pouch filler comprising:

• a filler wheel;
• a plurality of gripper units mounted on said wheel
• said gripper units including leading and trailing jaws,
• one movable about a horizontal axis selectively toward and away from the other,
• each of said jaws having a pivoted clamping member rotatable about a first vertical axis for selectively clamping and releasing a portion of a pouch.

A pouch filler comprising:

• a filler wheel,
• a plurality of gripper units mounted on said wheel,
• said gripper units including leading and trailing jaws, one movable about a first vertical axis selectively toward and away from the other,
• each of said jaws having a pivoted clamping member rotatable about a second vertical axis for selectively clamping and releasing a portion of a pouch.

In a pouch forming and filling apparatus, a plurality of modules including,

• a vertical sealer pouch forming module for providing transverse seals in a folded web,
• a knife module for cutting individual pouches from said web;
• a filler wheel module having a filler wheel for receiving individual pouches in respective gripper units directly mounted on said filler wheel;
• and
• said modules being selectively and operably combined for forming, filling and sealing pouches.

A method of filling pouches comprising the steps of:

• feeding separate pouches toward a generally horizontal filler wheel,
• engaging leading and trailing edges of said pouches with respective leading and trailing jaws carried on said horizontal filler wheel;
• and
• selectively pivoting said trailing jaw on an axis generally perpendicular to said horizontal filler wheel to accommodate pouches of varied widths.

A method of cutting transversely sealed pouches from respective pouch trains along transversely spaced seals partially defining said pouches and wherein the distance of spacing between said transversely spaced seals in respective pouch trains varies, the method including the steps of:

• driving major and minor knife hubs respectively disposed on major and minor axes at least one selectively movable with respect to the other, to cut along transversely spaced seals of pouches of one train between said hubs;
• driving one of said hubs through a gear linkage, having a plurality of gears with another of said hubs;
• changing said hubs to accommodate cutting pouches from pouch trains having different transversely spaced seal spacing;
• and
• during said changing, disengaging at least one of said gears from said gear linkage and re-engaging said one gear in said gear linkage after changing said hubs to accommodate a variation of distance between said major and minor axes.

A method of handling filled, sealed and separate pouches carried between leading and trailing jaws, including the steps of:

• introducing a top portion of the leading edge of a pouch between two opposed belts;
• releasing a leading jaw from a leading edge of the pouch;
• transporting said pouch between said belts;
• and
• thereafter releasing a trailing jaw from a trailing edge of said pouch.

A method of filling pouches including:

• supporting pouches for filling on a filler wheel;
• filling pouches carried by said filler wheel through spouts disposed on a spout wheel above the tiller wheel;
• driving said filler wheel by a first servo drive;
• driving said spout wheel by a second servo drive;
• and
• independently adjusting a rotational position of one of said filler wheel or said spout wheel with respect to a rotational position of the other of said filler wheel or said spout wheel by operating at least one of said first or second servo drives independently of the other to thereby adjust the rotational phase of said filler wheel and spout wheel with respect to each other and thereby accommodate filling pouches of varied width carried by said filler wheel.