Abstract: The present invention relates to a device for making and transferring natural skin sausages formed in coherent chains to a smoke stick. To design a device of this type in such a manner that it is suited for automatically or semiautomatically transferring chains of natural skin sausages to a smoke stick, the filling tube has arranged downstream thereof a transportation device to which the natural skin sausages are transferred with the aid of a transfer chute which is provided with an access space for an operator's hand.

Abstract: The present invention refers to a vane pump used for dividing a pasty and compressible substance into portions and comprising a pump housing and a rotor which is arranged eccentrically in said pump housing and which is adapted to be rotated, and further comprising vanes which are supported within said rotor such that they are radially displaceable, said vanes defining with the wall of the pump housing, the base and the cover of said housing, as well as the outer surface of the rotor, vane cells and cooperating sealingly with said components, and said pump housing having an inlet and an outlet which have arranged between them a compression sector and a dosing sector, and a pressure-relief valve being arranged at least in the area of the dosing sector.

Abstract: The present invention relates to a device for supplying sausage strings made coherently in chains to a smoke stick, the device comprising a transportation device including rotating transportation hooks to which the sausages are transferred. To facilitate the closing of sausages, especially of natural skin sausage strings, the device for closing is arranged on the transportation device to be movably supported at least over part of the longitudinal extension of the transportation device.

Abstract: A process and apparatus for the subdivision of a pasty and compressible mass, in particular sausage meat, in portions by means of a vane cell pump. To achieve a high portioning accuracy in simple fashion, each conveying cell filled with sausage meat passes through a metering sector disposed between a compression sector and a discharge sector after having passed through the compression sector, an excessive amount of sausage meat being pressed back into the subsequent conveying cell still in communication with the inlet from the conveying cell with highly compressed sausage meat by means of a balancing cylinder piston unit located in the boundary area between the compression sector and the metering sector.

Abstract: A process and device for the separation and placing of a gut caterpillar 1 on a filling tube 2, the gut caterpillar 1 being withdrawn from a storage vessel 3 for storing gut caterpillars with a conveyor device, positioned in front of the filling tube 2 essentially in alignment and slipped onto the filling tube 2 from this position. A simple construction and a high functional reliability of the device, with which the processing of not perfectly formed gut caterpillars 1 is made possible without their kinking or bending is achieved by the fact that the gut caterpillar 1 is slipped onto the filling tube 2 by at least two guide surfaces 5, 22 which rest against its circumference and are driven at the same speed.

Abstract: Apparatus for feeding a chain of connected sausages and for suspending the sausages in the form of loops on a smoking rod in which the outlet end of the feeding means is located above the path described by the transport hooks and the end of the transport belt, which supports the sausage loops, extends in laterally staggered relationship with respect to the feeding means. Further the transport belt revolves in an approximately horizontal plane and the transport hooks are in each case attached to a downwardly directed supporting arm approximately vertical to the plane of the transport belt, the transport hooks branching off laterally from the supporting arm and being directed obliquely upwardly at an acute angle.

Abstract: In a method for making sausages, in which the sausage meat exiting from a filling machine is filled into a sausage skin pulled off a skin caterpillar to form a sausage rope and the rope is then divided into individual sausages by twisting it between every two adjacent sausage portions, the improvement wherein the spacing in the skin between each two adjacent sausage portions in the rope is increased by pulling the leading sausage portion forwards together with the sausage skin at a speed greater than the sausage meat expulsion speed during the dividing operation.

Abstract: In a method and apparatus for making sausages in the form of a continuous string with subsequent separation thereof into individual sausages or into groups of interconnected sausages, means are provided for varying the separating operating in a simple manner according to the length of the sausage and the number of interconnected sausages in groups thereof desired, while still ensuring an accurated separating perfomance. In the spearating operation separator elements are mounted opposite one another on either side of the string that revolve synchronously in the conveying direction along respective opposite circular paths, their revolving speed being variable over the non-operative sector of their revolutions relative to the operative sector where their speed is compatible with the sausage conveying speed.

Abstract: Apparatus for dividing a continuous sausage skein coming for a stuffing machine into individual sausages in which rotating V-shaped plates for constricting the skein, that are relatively thin in the area of their V cutouts compared to their remaining wall thickness, are obliquely disposed in opposite directions relative to one another so that they staggeredly interlock as they constrict the sausage skein.

Abstract: Apparatus for dividing a continuous sausage skein coming from a stuffing machine into individual sausages in which the rotating displacement elements for dividing the skein consist of a wire strap bent into a V-shaped contour.

Abstract: A vane pump for conveying pasty masses, in particular sausage meat, comprising a pump housing and a rotor, which is eccentrically arranged within the pump housing and which is caused to rotate. Radially continuous vanes are supported on the rotor in a radially displaceable manner that define angular conveying cells with the wall of the pump housing and cooperate with the wall to produce a sealing effect. An adjustable pressure piece is mounted in a radial recess in the wall of the pump housing, the pressure piece replacing the contour of the wall of the pump housing with its surface which faces the vanes. Adjustment of the pressure piece adjusts the pressure applied to the vanes in a radial direction in the pressure area of the pump prior to its outlet.

Abstract: The present invention solves the problem of clogging in the case of an apparatus for conducting a pasty mass, preferably sausage meat, under feed pressure through a tube, which carries said mass and the interior of which communicates via an annular groove and an annular gap with an external supply means for a lubricant which is to be forced under high pressure between the inner wall of the tube and the surface of the pasty mass, said problem being solved in such a way that an inner annular recess of the tube has arranged therein a sleeve-shaped sliding piston, the end face of which is acted upon by the lubricant in an annular groove, said sliding piston being adapted to be axially displaced within said inner annular recess against the force of a pretensioned spring in such a way that, in the case of low lubricant pressure, it closes the annular gap by means of an annular shoulder provided on the end face and protruding axially beyond the the annular groove in said end face and that, in the case of high lubric

Abstract: Apparatus for transporting sausages, which are filled in a continuous sausage casing, by suspending said sausages in the form of loops from reception hooks. The reception hooks are connected to an endless, driven conveyor belt in spaced relationship with one another, the conveyor belt circulating round two deflection wheels with the hooks being loaded with the sausage loops in the area of a first leg of the conveyor belt (transport leg) and returning without any load in the area of a second leg (free leg). To allow adjustment of the spacing between the hooks depending on the size and the nature of the chain of sausages, the hooks are positively connected to the conveyor belt in the transport leg and are frictionally connected to the conveyor belt in the free leg.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for dividing into individual sausages a sausage strand exiting from a filler machine, wherein the sausage strand is rotated about its longitudinal axis and constricted by revolving constrictor elements, the thus divided sausages being provented from being further rotated, in which the apportioned size and length of the sausages can be varied by varying the revolving speed of the constrictor elements during the inoperative phase of their revolution relative to their revolving speed during their engagement with the sausage strand by providing the constrictor elements with a separate electric drive mechanism, the rotational speed of which is controlled by an electronic contol unit during its revolution.

Abstract: Sausages leaving a sausage-making machine as a string are arranged into groups suitable for packing by transferring them onto a conveyor belt, subsequently orienting them with their respective longitudinal axis extending obliquely with respect to the conveying direction of the conveyor belt and thereafter restraining the sausages to turn them to a transverse orientation relative to the conveying direction so they can be discharged in groups.

Abstract: The invention relates to a machine for processing meat, particularly sausage meat, comprising a supply hopper disposed on top of the machine, a lift arm pivotably mounted on a horizontal axle fixedly connected to the machine, a horizontal tipping shaft rotatably mounted on said lift arm, and a carrier frame for a mobile sausage meat container secured to said tipping shaft.

Abstract: A holding device which is adapted to be flanged to a machine for filling and for automatically twisting off sausages and which acts on the front end of a twist-off nozzle of the machine via a brake ring housing for effecting automatic twisting off. For providing, on the one hand, a possibility of exactly positioning the holding device relative to the twist-off nozzle and for maintaining, on the other hand, the twist-off nozzle in a condition in which it is always accessible for the purpose of fitting new caterpillar sausage skins, the holding device is provided with a support tube, which is supported in a guide link in a manner free from play and which permits the brake ring housing of the holding device to be pivoted away in the case of a movement taking place in the horizontal direction of a pivotable lever, said support tube having, in addition, the effect that the position which has once been adjusted is re-established when the brake ring housing is pivoted back.

Abstract: A process and apparatus for drawing off deformable masses containing air, such as sausage masses. The mass is transferred in a stream from a supply space into a filling cylinder where a vacuum is generated relative to the space to remove air from the mass, and the transferred mass is then ejected from the filling cylinder by means of a piston. To transfer the mass quickly and remove air from it completely, the mass stream is guided, during its transfer into the filling cylinder in such a way that, as it enters the filling cylinder, it first moves towards the cylinder wall at an angle to the direction of the piston. Moreover, during filling the level of mass in the filling cylinder is maintained at an essentially constant filling height so that a constant volume of free space remains above the mass in the filling cylinder.

Abstract: Apparatus for automatic continuous or stepwise delivery of sausage loops hanging adjacent to one another from a receiver under which a smoking rod is arranged that is slidable in the feed direction of the receiver relative thereto.