Form-fill-seal wrapping apparatus
AssigneeBaker Perkins Holdings Limited
InventorPeter G. Wilson
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Microprocessor 60 controlled form-fill-seal apparatus has an infeed conveyor 13, web advance and longitudinal sealing unit 19 and transverse sealing jaws 20 and 21 each of which is driven by its own separate motor M1, M2 and M3 respectively. The microprocessor maintains the operation of the motors in synchronism. The movement of the jaws is modulated in accordance with a selected pattern (15) drawn from a library 73 of modulation patterns available to the microprocessor.
Claims8
Horizontal form-fill-seal wrapping apparatus comprising an infeed conveyor which performs in a cycle to deliver at a fixed point in the cycle successive items of a train of product items to be wrapped, means for advancing a web of wrapping medium and folding and sealing the web longitudinally around the train, and a transverse sealing means which performs in a cycle to form at a fixed point in each cycle a transverse seal in the folded web between each successive items in the train, characterised in that the apparatus comprises:
- i. a first motor, to drive the infeed conveyor, and an associated positional feedback device;
- ii. a second motor, to drive the web advancing means, and an associated positional feedback device;
- iii. a third motor, to drive the transverse sealing means, and an associated positional feedback device;
- iv. a microprocessor control device to which is inputted signals from the said feedback devices and which outputs driving signals to the said motors;
- and
- v. means to input the control device with data representative of the unit length of the wrapping web to be used to wrap each said product item, and representative of the number of product items to be wrapped per unit of time.
Apparatus for making a succession of transverse seals between upper and lower sheets of a web of wrapping material in a form-fill-seal wrapping machine, the apparatus including first and second cooperating sealing surfaces for bringing said two sheets into mutual contact, with at least the first sealing surface being mounted for cyclic movement around a locus which is a closed loop, characterised by means to modulate the cyclic movement of the first sealing surface comprising means for sensing a position of the surface at a plurality of points spaced in time around the cyclic locus, a library of positional data representative of said surface positions in a plurality of different predetermined movement modulation patterns, means for selecting one pattern from the library, and means for generating the said cyclic movement in accordance with said selected modulation pattern.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.