GB1008393A - Improvements in conveyor systems incorporating transfer between main and branch lines - Google Patents

Abstract

1,008,393. Conveyers. JERVIS B. WEBB CO. Feb. 27, 1964 [March 25, 1963], No. 8109/64. Heading B7L. A conveyer has main and branch lines 10, 26 each having an endless propelling chain supported by trolleys on a trackway and pushers for engaging a tow-pin 23 of a truck 22 running on a support adjacent the trackway, and a transfer zone 12 wherein arms 56 are continuously rotated from the propelling chain of branch line 26, in a circular path which overlaps part of the path of travel of the branch line chain and to which the path of the main line chain is at a tangent; a switch 48 and a fixed plate define. the connecting path between the two lines, which overlaps the path of the pushers at each end, the remaining part of the path being swept of arms 56, the main line pushers having lateral extensions which overlap the path of the arms 56. A shaft carrying the arms 56 and a driving sprocket 34 for the branch chain is driven from the main chain by unit 50. When switch 48 is moved by a solenoid against a spring into the main line, a tow pin 23 of a floor truck is moved partly along the connecting path of the pusher extensions, the arms 56 then engage the pin to move it to a position where a pusher on the branch line picks it up; the pin actuating a mechanism to allow the switch to spring back to its shown position. Trucks are held at station 75 in branch line 26 until an empty pusher on the main chain approaches a second transfer zone 14. Transfer arms 78, 79, mounted on a sprocket 36 driven by branch chain 29, Fig. 5, move the tow pin along a path 49 which merges with main path 24. To avoid jamming between the tow-pin and a pusher on the main chain, a ramp extending from a low leading edge 83 to an edge 84 above the main track for the main chain, is positioned in path 49 so that a truck tow pin is raised relative to the truck and then drops off the edge 84 into the path of a pusher. The branch chain passes around sprockets 36, 37, Fig. 1, descends at 38 to pass under the branch line, ascends at 41 to normal level, descends at 42, passes around sprocket 42 and ascends along section 44 to pass around the driving sprocket 34.