Palletizing apparatus for piece goods

Claim 1

Apparatus for loading parcels of diverse configurations such as bags, cartons and the like, upon a plurality of pallets, with each individual pallet of said plurality of pallets having loaded thereon parcels of uniform configuration, said apparatus comprising, in combination, a gantry, a packing plate arranged in said gantry, conveyor means for supplying parcels to said packing plate, elevator means for raising and lowering said packing plate, a transfer stationed defined adjacent said conveyor means at which parcels loaded upon said packing plate may be transferred to a pallet placed beneath said packing plate, conveyor track means extending alongside said transfer station including means for moving a plurality of pallets into and out of transfer position relative to said transfer station, said pallets having said parcels transferred thereupon from said packing plate when said pallets are in said transfer position, and pallet transfer means extending transversely to said conveyor track means for selectively bringing individual pallets into and out of said transfer position in accordance with the configuration of parcels to be transferred thereto in order to enable formation upon individual ones of said pallets of stacks of parcels of generally uniform configuration, said conveyor track means being located relative to said transfer station to enable both empty and partially loaded pallets to be maintained in standby position and to be moved into transfer position relative to said transfer station when parcels having a given configuration are to be transferred to a predetermined pallet assigned thereto.