Appliance for the alignment of onions or other vegetable bulbs

Abstract

The invention deals with an appliance with which onions or other vegetable bulbs can be oriented with their axial direction in a particular position necessary to present the onions to a processing machine for instance for the removal of top and root ends, the removal of the outermost skins and the cutting of the onions into slices. In a first embodiment the alignment appliance comprises a cylinder 2, 3 with a helical groove in the outer surface thereof, a roller 1 provided next to said cylinder and a means of driving 8 to rotate the groove cylinder and the roller, both the width of the groove and the minimum distance between the groove cylinder 2, 3 and the roller 1 being less than the diameter and axial length of the onions to be aligned. In a second embodiment the appliance comprises a cylinder 2, 3 with a helical groove in the inside surface thereof and means for rotating the grooved cylinder, the width of the groove being less than the diameter and axial length of the onions to be aligned.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.