Packaging machine
AssigneeTetra Laval Holdings & Finance S.A.
InventorsOlof Stark, Gunnar Drevfors
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A packaging machine for manufacturing packaging containers for liquid contents, e.g., milk or juice, from tubular packaging container blanks of laminated paper and plastic material. The blanks are fed through the machine by means of a main conveyor along which is disposed various stations for performing operations such as sealing the bottom ends of the blanks to form bottom-sealed packaging containers, filling the bottom-sealed packaging containers, and top-sealing the filled containers. A station can also be provided to transfer blanks from an infeed conveyor located below the main convey to the main conveyor. The stations are jointly controlled but individually driven and replaceable, which makes for a flexible and compact machine.
Claims13
A packaging machine for manufacturing filled and sealed packaging containers, comprising an endless main conveyor movable in a direction of movement, a plurality of workstations disposed along the conveyor, at least two of said workstations being in the form of replaceable machine modules, each of said at least two modules being drivable by way of an associated motor with the motors of the different modules being controlled by a common control unit, an infeed conveyor extending partly in parallel with the main conveyor for conveying packaging container blanks formed into tubes that are to be transferred to the main conveyor, said plurality of workstations including a first station located at mutually parallel sections of the main and infeed conveyors for transferring and end-sealing a first group of packaging container blanks formed into tubes, the first station including a sealing device for sealing an end of the packaging container blanks formed into tubes, the first station also including reciprocal displacing devices disposed to displace the packaging container blanks formed into tubes from the infeed conveyor to the main conveyor.
A machine for manufacturing filled and sealed packaging containers from packaging container blanks, comprising an endless conveyor having individual receiving areas for individually receiving packaging container blanks formed into tubes having a bottom end and a top end and for advancing the packaging container blanks formed into tubes along a transport path in a transport direction, a bottom-sealing station located along the transport path for simultaneously sealing the bottom ends of a first group of the packaging container blanks formed into tubes to form a first group of bottom-sealed packaging containers, a first filling and top-sealing station located along the transport path downstream of the bottom.degree. sealing station for filling simultaneously one portion of said first group of bottom-sealed packaging containers and for sealing simultaneously the top ends of the one portion of said first group of packaging containers, a second filling and top-sealing station located along the transport path downstream of the first filling and top-sealing station for filling simultaneously another portion of said first group of bottom-sealed packaging containers and for sealing simultaneously the top ends of the another portion of said first group of bottom-sealed packaging containers, an infeed conveyor located below the endless conveyor for conveying packaging container blanks formed into tubes that are to be transferred to the endless conveyor, and a transfer device located along the transport path for transferring packaging container blanks formed into tubes from the infeed conveyor to the individual receiving areas on the endless conveyor.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.