US 6,655,903 B2Granted

Method for stacking containers of thermoplastic material and device for realizing same

AssigneeAdolf Illig Maschinenbau GmbH & Co.

InventorHans Köhler

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Abstract

The invention considerably reduces the danger of deformation for containers made from a thermoplastic material during the transfer to a stacking magazine or into a locally fixed catch plate. This deformation danger results from the fact that the formed stack must be displaced within a short time by the stack distance, either through the transferred containers themselves or by components of a catch plate that is moved forward with each cycle. This is achieved through displacing the stacks in the stacking magazines or the locally fixed catch plate with a displacement device. The displacement device can be combined with the stack removal device or can be a separate displacement device. According to a modification of the invention, the method is intended to improve the cooling of the stacked containers.

Claims8

Dependent claims

A method for forming a stack of containers of a thermoplastic material, which are molded from/punched out of a heated foil web in a molding/punching tool, comprising:

transferring containers consecutively from the tool, via a transfer device to a first position within one of a stacking magazine and a catch plate;
using a displacement device that is separate from the transfer device, consecutively displacing each container in an axial direction of the stacking magazine or catch plate from the first position by a displacement distance at least equal to a distance between two adjacent containers of a stack of containers to a second position within the stacking magazine or catch plate to form a stack of containers at the second position, and displacing any stack of containers at the second position by at least the distance between two adjacent containers of a stack;
and, subsequently axially removing the stack of containers from the stacking magazine or catch plate.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.