Abstract: Outwardly extending pivoted breast shields are provided in an apparatus for poultry carcass dismemberment for protecting the poultry breast from the wing severing blades. The shields are movably mounted between a first position ahead of the severing blade and a second position rearward of the blade.

Abstract: Apparatus for disjointing and removing the leg and thigh portions from the backs of poultry leg and back carcasses pendulously supported by the feet from shackles suspended from an overhead conveyor at spaced intervals with the back of each carcass lying between the legs in a reversed direction from the normal position. The apparatus comprises an endless dismembering conveyor mounted below the level of the shackles and having conveying elements engageable with one side of the carcass backs moving along a path that diverges both horizontally and vertically at an acute angle from the path of the overhead conveyor. Retaining bars are mounted closely above the dismembering conveyor conveying elements to extend axially along the conveyor in a spaced relationship as will contact the poultry carcasses immediately adjacent the juncture of the leg thighs and the backs and retain the backs between the retaining bars and the dismembering conveyor conveying elements.

Abstract: Apparatus for splitting in half the breast of a poultry carcass comprising an elongated feed bar on which the carcass can be impaled to have the bar extending through the chicken immediately below the backbone and above the soft breastbone. A cutting blade is supported and rotated in a plane containing the feed bar with the axis of rotation perpendicular to and offset from the feed bar. A toothed conveyor extending along the lengthwise direction of the feed bar is mounted in close adjacency to the feed bar on the side opposite the cutting blade in a position to contact the back of an impaled poultry carcass and propel the carcass along the length of the feed car. An elongated breast support is pivotally supported in alignment with the feed bar for movement in the plane containing the feed bar and cutting blade about a pivotal axis offset from the feed bar on the same side as the cutting blade axis.

Abstract: An apparatus for removing the heads of poultry wherein the birds, each pendulously supported by its feet from shackles connected at intervals to an overhead conveyor, are delivered to place their heads below a neck engaging channel through which the necks pass, the channel being formed by two rods in juxtaposition alongside one another aligned to establish a horizontal divergence between the channel and the conveyor path between entrance and exit ends of the channel. A cutter blade at the exit end of the neck engaging channel is rotated in a vertically oriented plane extending along the axis of the channel.