Article Slicer with Integral Pick and Placer

An article pusher for pushing articles through a plurality of blades in parallel planes with blade spaces between the blades, said article pusher comprising:

• an upper body portion,
• a plurality of fins extending in a downward direction from said upper body portion,
• said fins oriented parallel to one another and defining fin spaces between said fins for receiving said blades,
• said fins including distal ends for passing through said blade spaces,
• a passage defined by said upper body portion, including an entrance opening extending laterally from outside said upper body portion to said fin spaces for passing fluid from outside said upper body portion to said fin spaces,
• such that fluid may pass laterally from outside said upper body portion and though said passage and move through said fin spaces and contact said fins.

A method of slicing tomatoes, comprising:

• placing tomatoes over moving cutter blades in article openings of an article locator,
• moving article pushers with downwardly extending pusher fins against the tomatoes for pushing the tomatoes though the cutter blades,
• directing a flow of fluid from in front of the article pushers into front openings of the article pushers for cleaning the fins and cutter blades without disassembling the components about the article pushers,
• carrying the article pushers with a movable support plate between retracted positions behind the cutter blades and extended positions over the cutter blades,
• carrying a pick and placer by the same movable support plate so that the pick and placer moves simultaneously in the same lateral directions as the article pushers between positions over the on-coming tomatoes and over the cutter blades.