Patent Application
20240156144
The present disclosure relates generally to the art of food processing and water treatment equipment. More specifically, it relates to monitoring trunnions used on food processing and water treatment equipment.
Some well known types of food processing equipment include rotary components. For example, some blanchers, cookers or coolers include a drum that rotates, and others include an auger that rotates inside a stationary drum. One example of a rotating drum blancher is found in U.S. Pat. No. 7,500,426, hereby incorporated by reference. The drum is supported by trunnions and includes an auger that turns with the drum.
Prior art screw blanchers have typically included a shaft driven auger that is turned and supported by shafts with trunnions at each end. Some prior art food blanchers include an auger covered by a perforated screen (forming a cylindrical shape). The auger/screen assembly is disposed in a tank and typically sits above (six inches, e.g.) the tank bottom. One such prior art blancher is the Lyco™ 800 Rotary Drum Blancher. Other prior art rotary drum blanchers are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,234,066, 6,187,360, 10,709,161, 8,191,466, 10,112,785, 10,143,209, 10,085,477, all of which are hereby incorporated by reference. Product is discharged using a discharge mechanism. Prior art discharge mechanisms can be seen in U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,735,415 and 5,341,729, both of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
One prior art system for filtering food processing waste water applies the water to a rotating cylindrical-shaped screen (a drum). The fluid to be filtered can be introduced to the inside of the drum. The drum is oriented horizontally, and the drum rotates. The screen filters the fluid. The cleaned fluid passes out of the lower surface, and the suspended solids/food product is trapped on the screen inside the drum. The solids must be removed from the interior of the drum. This is an internally fed design. Another known design is an externally fed screen drum, where the fluid is introduced to the top or sides of the cylindrical surface of rotating and horizontal oriented drum. The fluid passes through the screen to the interior of the drum. Solids are caught on the outside of the screen drum. Scrapers are used to scrape the solids off the outside of the drum. The partially filtered water (now inside the drum) passes through the lower part of the cylindrical screen surface, and is filtered again. In both designs the drum can be supported by trunnions.
Trunnions support a wide variety of food processing equipment, including rotary drums, augers, and food processing waster water treatment systems, and provide smooth rotation for the drum, auger, etc. Failure of the trunnion can lead to equipment malfunction and possibly catastrophic failure. For safety reasons, trunnions are normally well guarded to prevent pinch points or entrapment hazards. Some operators fail to grease trunnions, which means they can fail within months. Failures include the trunnion material itself, bearings, or shafts, resulting in the machine to fail due to metal to metal contact or overloading drive components. The non-normal wear can result in catastrophic failure requiring considerable downtime and the need to make special parts, and the machine is not operable during that time.
Prior art systems include a visual window to determine if trunnions are rotating. However, maintenance personnel and operators can easily overlook warning signs. Thus, it is often difficult to determine if the trunnion is operating properly, starting to fail, or completely stalled.
Other prior art systems create an alarm when the trunnion has stopped. However, such systems only provide warning when it is too late—the line must be shut down until the repair is made.
Accordingly, a food processing or food processing water treatment system that provides a warning that a trunnion is not operating properly and/or is beginning to fail is desirable. This would allow repairs to be performed during scheduled maintenance and allow for ordering of parts in advance.
According to a first aspect of the disclosure a food processing system includes a processing compartment, two trunnions, a sensor and an alarm. The processing compartment includes a rotating component having two ends. Each trunnion includes a component for rotational movement and the trunnions are disposed to support one of the ends. The sensor is disposed to sense a rotational speed of one of the components for rotational movement and the alarm is responsive to the sensor.
According to a second aspect of the disclosure a method of processing food includes providing food product to a processing compartment that includes a rotating component having two ends and supporting the ends with trunnions having components for rotational movement. The trunnions rotate at an intended rotational speed. The actual rotational speed is sensed and an alarm is provided in response to the actual rotational speed indicating a malfunction of a trunnion.
A second sensor is disposed to sense a rotational speed of the other component for rotational movement and the alarm is responsive to the second sensor in one alternative.
An alarm module includes an intended rotational speed one of the trunnions, and the alarm is part of the alarm module, and the alarm is responsive to a function of the intended rotational speed and to the first sensor in another alternative.
The alarm includes a visual indicator in one embodiment.
The alarm can include a communications module connected to a network, and the visual indicator includes at least one of a light and a digital message, in various embodiments.
The alarm can include a communications module connected to a remote location in one alternative.
The first sensor includes a flag on the component for rotational movement and a stationary mating pickup in another alternative.
The first sensor includes an encoder in one embodiment.
There are trunnions including components for rotational movement disposed to support the second end, each with a sensor to sense the rotational speed of the components for rotational movement, and the alarm is responsive to the sensors in various embodiments.
Other principal features and advantages of will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon review of the following drawings, the detailed description and the appended claims.
Before explaining at least one embodiment in detail it is to be understood that the invention is not limited in its application to the details of construction and the arrangement of the components set forth in the following description or illustrated in the drawings. The invention is capable of other embodiments or of being practiced or carried out in various ways. Also, it is to be understood that the phraseology and terminology employed herein is for the purpose of description and should not be regarded as limiting. Like reference numerals are used to indicate like components.
While the present disclosure will be illustrated with reference to a particular food processing system that is a treatment system for food processing waste water, it should be understood at the outset that the trunnion monitoring disclosed herein can be used with other food product processing systems. Food processing system, as used herein, is a system for cooking, cooling, blanching, screening, treatment of food processing waste water, etc., and includes rotary drums systems and auger systems.
The food processing system in accordance with the preferred embodiment is a food processing water treatment system. Generally, the food processing system can be in accordance with the prior art, except that it includes monitoring for one or more trunnions, and an alarm to indicate the operational status of the trunnion. Trunnion, as used herein, refers to a structure such as a ring, wheels, pin, shaft or pivot on which the position of a trunnion ring or shaft can be adjusted relative to a tank, and includes the cradle or support structure for the pin or pivot. Trunnions include a component for rotational movement, such as a wheel, shaft, ring, etc. Component for rotational movement of a trunnion, as used herein, is the ring, wheel, shaft, etc. of a trunnion that rotates. It can be driven or freewheeling.
The system preferably includes a control panel to evaluate sensors for each trunnion. In one embodiment signals from the sensors are indicative of the rotational speed of the trunnion and are compared to the expected rotational speed of the trunnion. This expected speed is often dependent on the particular process or recipe, as well different diameters of a rotational component in the same machine. The preferred embodiment measures wheel rotation and uses the VFD to determine expected wheel rotation. Rotational speed of a trunnion or a pair of trunnions. as used herein, is the rotational speed of the wheel, ring or shaft of the trunnion or pair of trunnions.
When the comparison shows the rotational speed of the trunnion differs or varies from the expected rotational speed for a determined period of time, the control panel creates an alarm. The alarm can be a visible alarm, light (such as flashing a red LED), a negative alarm (such as turning off a green LED), an email, text, or other network or wifi signal (either positive indicating a problem or the absence of a signal indicating no problem), or an auditory alarm (either positive or negative). Alarm, as used herein, is a visual or audible signal such as a light, horn, alpha-numeric messages etc.
The trigger for the alarm can be a threshold difference, a percentage difference, or a function of the difference (the rate of change of the difference, e.g.). Function of the intended rotational speed, as used herein, refers to a function such as percentage or offset. In the preferred embodiment the difference is selected to indicate the trunnion is beginning to fail, to allow time for scheduled replacement instead of a production line shutdown.
Sensors in various embodiments can include embedded bearings and stationary shafts such as a proximity or photo sensor, laser or other appropriate stationary sensor and the corresponding mating flag attached to the rotating trunnion. Trunnions with included shafts, mounted on external bearings could use a similar arrangement with the flag attached to the shaft, or by using a shaft encoder. A flag, as used herein, is a marker on one of a moving or stationary part that is sensed by the other of the moving or stationary part. Stationary mating pickup, as used herein, is a component that detects a flag.
The trunnion monitoring described herein can be used locally on a single system, can be factory installed or retrofitted, can be used to provide remote notifications, and can be part of a complex system including multiple machines at one or more locations. Alternative embodiments include having additional inputs from other sensors to monitor other aspects of the machine's performance. Examples of this would include proper tension of the drive chain, and loads and outputs from the VFDs. The alarm would also be responsive to these additional sensors.
An example of a food processing system in accordance is a food processing water treatment system 100, shown in
End 203 is rotatably supported by a pair of trunnions 301 and 303, shown in
Trunnions 301, 303, 401 and 403 are identical, and the sensor will be described only with respect to trunnion 301, because the figure would be identical for trunnions 303, 401 and 403. A flag 501 is located on wheel 305 and a mating proximity sensor 503 is located on a stationary portion of trunnion 301. Together the flag and mating sensor are a sensor that senses the rotational speed of trunnions 301, 303, 401 and 403. Alternatives provide for a single sensor on a single trunnion, sensors on both trunnions of one end, sensors on one trunnion ion each end, or sensors on three of the four trunnions. Sensor 501/503 includes a flag on a different rotating component of trunnion 301, 303, 401 and 403 with a stationary mating pickup, and/or an encoder in various embodiments.
Sensor 501/503 provides a signal indicative of the rotational speed of trunnions 301, 303, 401 and 403 to a control panel 511 on a wire 505. Control panel 511 includes an alarm model 513 and an alarm 515. The speed signal is provided to alarm model 513, and alarm model 513 cause alarm 515 to be turned on in response to the rotational speed of the trunnions. Alarm 515 can include separate notifications for each of trunnions 301, 303, 401 and 403, or one notification for all of the trunnions. In one embodiment an alarm 516 is a distinct LED light for each trunnion. In other embodiments it is an audible alarm, a different visual indicator, an alpha-numeric message on a display, or the negative of the above (a light turns of for a display fails to say OK). Alarm 515 is responsive to sensors on each of trunnions 301, 303, 403 and 401.
Alarm module 513 includes a signal 601 (
Control panel 511 includes a communications module 701 in the embodiment of
Numerous modifications may be made to the present disclosure which still fall within the intended scope hereof Thus, it should be apparent that there has been provided a method and apparatus for processing food with trunnion monitoring that fully satisfies the objectives and advantages set forth above. Although the disclosure has been described specific embodiments thereof, it is evident that many alternatives, modifications and variations will be apparent to those skilled in the art. Accordingly, the invention is intended to embrace all such alternatives, modifications and variations that fall within the spirit and broad scope of the appended claims.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 63425086 | Nov 2022 | US |
