Valve assembly for a filling machine with a filling level regulation probe and a filling machine provided with such valve

A filling machine for filling containers with liquids, comprising:

• a support structure;
• a rotating turret rotatably mounted on said support structure, and provided with a tank for containing a liquid to be bottled in the containers;
• a plurality of valve assemblies peripherally mounted on said rotating turret each valve assembly being suitable for filling a container;
• and
• a logic control unit suitable to automatically manage operation of said filling machine,
• wherein each valve assembly of said plurality of valve assemblies is suitable to regulate a filling of the container with the liquid contained in the tank of the filling machine and comprises:
• an adduction conduit extending along a valve axis and fluidically connectable to the tank of said filling machine to allow an inflow of said liquid from the tank to the container to be filled through a discharge mouth;
• a shutter suitable to regulate the inflow of said liquid in said container, the shutter being movably placed inside said adduction conduit to be moved along the valve axis between a closing position, in which the shutter intercepts the adduction conduit closing a flow section towards the discharge mouth, and one or more opening positions, in which the shutter does not intercept or only partially intercepts the adduction conduit leaving the flow section towards the discharge mouth open;
• a tubular control stem of the shutter internally defining a conduit axially extended along the valve axis and open at both ends, the tubular control stem being intended to cross the tank to protrude below the tank with a lower end inside the adduction conduit and above the tank with an upper end, said shutter being coaxially associated with the lower end of said tubular control stem;
• a probe for detecting a filling level of the container, the probe being provided with a single detection point near a probe tip and being coaxially inserted inside the conduit defined by the tubular control stem to be moved between at least one extracted position, in which the probe exits from said conduit so as to be inserted inside the container, and a retracted position, in which the probe does not exit from said conduit so as not to engage the container,
• wherein the valve assembly further comprises:
• a first electric motor kinematically connected to said tubular control stem to move the shutter between the closing position and said one or more opening positions, and
• a second electric motor kinematically connected to said probe to move the probe with respect to said tubular control stem between said at least one extracted position and said retracted position,
• said first electric motor and said second electric motor being controllable independently from each other to respectively regulate:
• an axial position of the shutter along the valve axis with respect to an abutment seat so as to adjust an amplitude of the flow section during the filling of the container, and
• the position of the probe inside the container to be filled so as to adjust the filling level controllable by the probe,
• and wherein the logic control unit is programmed to manage each valve assembly during the filling of the respective container according to predefined operating steps, regulating the axial position of the shutter and an axial position of the probe by the first electric motor and the second electric motor, respectively.