Methods for operating clipping packaging apparatus and associated computer program products
AssigneeTipper Tie, Inc.
InventorsSamuel D. Griggs, Dennis J. May, David T. Wince, William M. Poteat, Derek L. Brown
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Methods, devices and computer program products automatically package an object in a covering material such as casing and/or netting by: (a) automatically pushing at least one object through a product chute; (b) pulling a covering material upstream of the product chute off an exterior surface of the product chute to automatically enclose the object in the covering material as the object exits the product chute; and (c) applying a clip to the covering material to secure the object in the packing material.
Claims14
A method of pushing a single meat object through a netting chute, comprising:
- piercing a target meat object with a pin extending from a pusher head;
- contacting an outer surface of the target meat object with the pusher head;
- automatically pushing the target meat object through a netting chute using at least one reciprocally-acting actuation cylinder;
- and
- enclosing the target meat object in netting pulled off the netting chute in response to the automatically pushing step as the target meat object exits the netting chute.
A method of shaping a food product, comprising;
- automatically pushing at least one object through a product chute using an actuator driven pusher mechanism, the product chute sized and configured to compress a food product as the food product moves through the product chute with sufficient force to cause the food product to take on the shape of the chute cavity as the food product exits the product chute;
- pulling netting material from an exterior surface of the product chute to automatically enclose the object in the netting material as the object exits the product chute;
- then
- applying at least one clip to the netting material to secure the object in the netting material.
A method according to claim 32, wherein the object is a meat product.
A computer program product for operating a clipper mechanism, the computer program product comprising:
- a computer readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied in said medium, said computer-readable program code comprising:
- computer readable program code that controllably actuates a cutting member actuation cylinder to direct the cutting member to rise up to cut from a bottom to top direction and then retracts the cutting member.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.