Importance

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Abstract

Apparatus for dispensing articles of regular shape, such as boxes, from adjacent compartments in which articles are stored in stacks, each of the compartments having a bottom aperture. A dispensing device is mounted below for movement in-between the compartments and includes a mobile carriage supported on guiding members to translate forward-and-back below one compartment when positioned therebelow. A reversible electric motor is connected to the carriage by a timing pulley and belt drive including a timing pulley attached to a control shaft on the carriage. A pair of fingers are mounted to the rotary control shaft. The mobile carriage is translated forward-and-back by the motor by rotating the carriage-pulley in one direction which raises the fingers where they are engageable with the lowermost article in the one compartment and then translates the carriage forward to dispense it through a bottom aperture in the compartment and reversing the motor to rotate the carriage-pulley in the opposite direction which lowers the fingers to a lower level where they are free of the compartments. Rollers are mounted on the outer end of the fingers so that a penultimate article is engaged and lifted by the rollers to raise the stack from fully bearing on the lowermost article as the lowermost article is engaged by the fingers and translated through the aperture. The control shaft shifts the fingers between their lower and upper levels depending on direction of forward-and-back movement of the carriage.

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First Claim