The high speed assembly of flexible confectionery packages

Many snack foods such as crisps and peanuts are displayed for sale on cards hanging from the walls of shops and public houses. The assembly of packets on to these cards is currently performed either entirely manually, by pulling the top of the packet through a slit on the cord, on semi-automatically by manually introducing the packet to an assembly machine. A three party project has been set up involving Birmingham University, De Montfort University and Robotec Ltd. of Nottingham in order to design and develop a fully automatic machine. The key operation in the assembly process is the location of the leading edge of the packet, gripping this edge successfully and pulling it through a slit in the display card. For this operation to be performed successfully each and every time, the packet has to be placed on the conveyor belt centrally with its leading edge perpendicular to the direction of motion. However, the packets may be orientated on the conveyor belt randomly after the dispenser delivers them onto the conveyor belt. Hence the position and orientation of the packets have to be corrected before they are introduced to the assembly machine