Development of a scale prototype palletizing automated device

A ‘pusher’ mechanism was designed to transport the boxes from the conveyor belt onto the pallet.  It is more efficient for an entire row of boxes to be transported onto the pallet at one time, therefore the pusher has to gather the boxes coming from the conveyor belt before pushing them all onto the pallet.  Additionally, the system had to be operative with the various configurations of the boxes necessary to create a stable packing arrangement on the pallet.

 

From the limited materials available a design was created which used a series of free-running rollers to gather the boxes coming from the conveyor belt.  The first boxes of the row would be pushed along by the subsequent boxes until the complete row was formed and then a pusher, powered by a belt driven mechanism would push the boxes onto the pallet.  Again the subsequent rows of boxes would push the initial rows further onto the pallet.

 

The pusher was a challenging part as it had to fit around both the conveyor belt and the scissor lift, and close enough to both that there was no disruption to the flow of the boxes.

 

In an industrial setting, a part such as this would be controlled using pneumatics, however, with the mechanism was largely made from recycled parts, taken from previous projects.  Some parts with specific dimensions were laser cut at the university, and the rollers were purchased through a partnership with Interroll using the sponsorship kindly sponsored by Duro Felguera.

 

The pusher was build and tested.  It was capable of moving the rows of boxes onto the pallet and the speed was as calculations predicted at 0.5 m/s.