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US 7,926,242 B2Granted
Automatic envelope handling device
AssigneeMag Systemes S.A.S.
InventorsGérard Faissolle, Michel Moreaux
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A container of generally elongate shape for receiving a plurality of envelopes is described wherein the container includes an internal housing having a substantially parallelepiped shape which is open at one of its longitudinal ends to accomodate the plurality of envelopes and closed at its opposite longitudinal end and includes a portion around the internal housing having an external surface of at least partially cylindrical shape.
Claims10
A system for grouping and temporarily storing containers comprising:
- a conveyor for moving the containers having in order an upstream first section a funnel second section and a downstream third section,
- the conveyor having lateral guides on each of its respective opposite longitudinal sides of the upstream first section and the downstream second section to guide the containers,
- wherein the lateral guides on the upstream first section are separated to be at least the width of two containers,
- the lateral guides coming closer together in the funnel second section to form a bottleneck allowing only one container to pass at a time, and
- wherein the lateral guides on the downstream third section are separated to allow only one container to fit between,
- wherein it includes at least two stations located in the upstream first section for introducing onto the conveyor containers loaded with envelopes by at least two respective envelope loading devices, and
- wherein the envelope loading device comprises:
- means for identifying a plurality of envelopes that are associated with each other in a batch and coming from an enveloping machine by recognizing envelope identification data,
- means for identifying the container by recognizing identification data carried by said container,
- means for associating envelope identification data with the container identification data, and
- mechanical means for bringing the empty container, loading the plurality of envelopes into said empty container and evacuating the container loaded with envelopes onto the conveyor.
8 more elements
A system for grouping and temporarily storing containers comprising:
- a conveyor for moving the containers having in order an upstream first section a funnel second section and a downstream third section,
- the conveyor having lateral guides on each of its respective opposite longitudinal sides of the upstream first section and the downstream second section to guide the containers,
- wherein the lateral guides on the upstream first section are separated to be at least the width of two containers,
- the lateral guides coming closer together in the funnel second section to form a bottleneck allowing only one container to pass at a time, and
- wherein the lateral guides on the downstream third section are separated to allow only one container to fit between,
- wherein the containers comprise a cylindrical outer portion, wherein the lateral guides are configured to operatively contact the cylindrical outer portions of the containers, and wherein the conveyor is configured to receive containers that are placed on the conveyor with their generally elongate shape vertical and the opening of the housing facing upwards,
- wherein it includes at least two stations located in the upstream first section for introducing onto the conveyor containers loaded with envelopes by at least two respective envelope loading devices, and
- wherein the envelope loading device comprises:
- means for identifying a plurality of envelopes that are associated with each other in a batch and coming from an enveloping machine by recognizing envelope identification data,
- means for identifying the container by recognizing identification data carried by said container,
- means for associating envelope identification data with the container identification data, and
- mechanical means for bringing the empty container, loading the plurality of envelopes into said empty container and evacuating the container loaded with envelopes onto the conveyor.
9 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.