TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention relates to a stone sorter bucket, arranged with an interconnecting means for interconnection with a lifting arm of an excavator for direct sorting of excavated masses by means of the stone sorter bucket.

STATE OF THE ART

There is often a need to be able to sort the contents of excavated masses into different fractions, e.g. to be able to sort out larger stones from excavated masses. It is generally known that there are a number of different types of special devices for such sorting / fractionation by means of a rotating grid cage, which require their own operation and constitute a relatively bulky and expensive construction. US2011036601A1, EP0178656A1, EP0284643A1, JP2013234446A, WO2017 / 085641A1 and KR100807883BB1 show that there have long been many different such solutions. This specific type of combi bucket means that in many cases there is no financial and / or time frame for sorting excavated masses, despite the need for sorting.

A device for solving the above-mentioned problems is previously known from CN202017221. The solution is to arrange an excavator with a grid bottom, i.e. a kind of stone sorter bucket, which when the bucket is filled with material is lifted up and then shaken so that finer particles in the excavator can move down through the gaps in the grid at the bottom of the bucket. A similar principle solution is also known through US2019 / 0091726. However, this principle solution has a number of disadvantages. Firstly, it is usually not very efficient because a traditional excavator is not equipped with any shaking function, which means that the kinds of shaking needed for efficient sorting cannot be carried out. Second, the types of shaking motion required by the bucket expose the excavator to stresses that wear on and load the excavator in an undesirable manner. In addition, there is the environmental aspect. A machine that uses this type of stone sorter bucket must run at a relatively high speed, about 75% throttle, in order for the hydraulic pump to be able to perform the shaking movements, which thus means relatively large fuel consumption and negative environmental impact.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

It is an object of the present invention to eliminate or at least minimize the above-mentioned problems, which is achieved by a device or method according to what is defined in the claims. Thanks to the invention, a traditional excavator can be easily and efficiently used to sort out larger components directly in connection with excavation, e.g. stones, from excavations. The invention means that significantly lower power from the hydraulic pump is needed compared to known technology. Tests have shown that fuel savings of about 30% can be achieved thanks to the invention. In addition, the invention entails a significantly less wear on the machine than the prior art and that the tiltrotator can be mounted all the time, which is not suitable if shaking is to be done, in accordance with the method described above for known non-rotating stone sorter buckets.

According to a further aspect of the invention, the following applies: gride means are used which consist of a plurality of parallel bars with an inner end attached to an inner fastener and an outer end attached to an outer fastener, which gives a strong and durable construction which also has a kind of self-cleaning function when run. said grid cage comprises four pairwise opposite, parallel wide sides and pairwise opposite corner sides connecting said four wide sides, the width dimension of the wide sides preferably being at least twice as large as the width dimension of the corner sides, which has structural and operational advantages.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF FIGURES

In the following, the invention will be described in more detail with reference to the accompanying figures in which:

Figure 1 shows a perspective view of a stone sorter bucket according to a preferred embodiment of the invention attached to a bucket arm with tiltrotator,

Figure 2 shows a perspective view of the stone sorter bucket shown in Fig. 1, obliquely from a first side,

Figure 3 shows another perspective view of the stone sorter bucket shown in Fig. 1, obliquely from behind and from a second side, and,

Figure 4 shows an additional perspective view seen obliquely from the front and showing the underside. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF FIGURES

Figure 1 shows a lifting arm 2, e.g. arranged at an excavator, which has been arranged with a stone sorter bucket 1 according to the invention. As is generally known, the lifting arm has a movable arm 20 at the outer end of which a tiltrotator 21 is arranged with a fastening mechanism 22 in order to be able to fasten a desired working tool.

In the figure shown, a stone sorter bucket 1 is connected to the lifting arm 2 by means of a coupling mechanism 22 by means of a 14 arranged at the stone sorter bucket.

The coupling attachment 14 is attached to the bottom 10 of the stone sorter bucket 1. Opposite the bottom 10 is an opening 12. The opening 12 is formed by an outer circumferential fastening means 16. A corresponding inner fastening means 15 is arranged at the bottom 10. Between inner and outer fastening means 15, 16 there are fixed a plurality of parallel bars 110, which form a certain distance d between them. The distance d between the rods 110 is preferably substantially constant. Suitably the distance d is between them in the range 35 - 200 mm, preferably 40 - 100 mm.

The rods 110 form four uniform wide sides 11 A which are in pairs parallel and opposite each other, and four uniform corner sides 1 IB which are also in pairs parallel and opposite each other. Together these form a kind of grid cage 11 which extends a certain length H between the inner 15 and outer 16 fastening means. This length H is suitably in the range 0.7 - 2 m, preferably 1 - 1.5 m. The wide sides 11A preferably have a width dimension B1 which is substantially larger than the width dimension B2 of the corner sides 1 IB. Preferably, the width dimension B1 for the width sides 11 A is at least twice as large as the width dimension B2 for the corner sides 1 IB. Correspondingly, the outer and inner fastening means 15, 16 are arranged, i.e. with shorter corner parts 15B, 16B and longer side portions 15A, 16A.

A cutting edge 13 is provided so as to extend beyond the outer fastener 16 surrounding the opening 12. The cutting edge 13 includes a central base portion 13A having a leading edge 130 extending a distance BT suitably corresponding to the maximum overall width of the stone sorter bucket 1, the that is, the width dimension BT between 2 opposite width sides 11A. In addition, the cutting edge 13 comprises two substantially parallel opposite side portions 13B, in the form of an approximately triangular-shaped part, which partly constitutes fastening support for the middle base part 13 A, and partly forms a kind of support sides for goods on the middle base part 13 A. Each side portion 13B has an inner edge attached to the outer fastener 16, along a side portion 16A which is perpendicular to the side portion 16 A at which the central base portion 13A of the cutting edge is disposed. The inner edge of this triangular side portion 13B extends from a transition between wide side 11 A and corner side 1 IB to approximately half the width B1 of the wide side 11 A, preferably between 0.2-0.5 x Bl. The edge which can be considered to correspond to the hypotenuse suitably extends from approximately the center part of said wide side 11 A to the front edge 130 of the middle base part 13 A.

When the middle base portion 13A of the cutting edge 13 preferably extends at an angle a (relative to the plane of the wide side 11 A at which the cutting edge 13 is arranged) and there is an intermediate corner portion 13C, apart of the substantially triangular side surface 13B will be truncated so that a not entirely perfect triangle part is formed. The corner portion 13C runs along a corner portion 16B connecting an edge of the side portion 13B to an inner edge of the middle base portion 13 A.

As shown in Figure 3, the fastening means 14 is arranged at the bottom part 10, in such a way that there is a base plate 14B extending the entire width of the bottom, centrally located, and thus connected to and between two opposite inner fastening means 15A. Central to this base plate 14B is arranged a standardized fastening means 14A arranged to be able to be connected to the corresponding fastening mechanism 22 at the end of a lifting arm 2, suitably with a tiltrotator 21. Transversely between the base plate 14B and the inner fastening means 15 is arranged blocking bottom parts 100, which are preferably in the form of plates, or grids with a much smaller hole size than the distance d between the bars 110.

Use of the stone sorter bucket 1, when it is connected to a tiltrotator 21 at a lifting arm 2, begins with the use of the cutting edge 13, in basically the same way as an excavator to fill the stone sorter bucket 1 with excavated mass. Then the stone sorter bucket is lifted up with the help of the lifting arm 2 and the lifting arm swung out so that the stone sorter bucket 1 ends up above a place where you want a more finely sorted part of the excavated mass.

Then, (or before, or in connection with the movement) the stone sorter bucketl is positioned so that the angle b of the axis of rotation of the tiltrotator 21 is at least horizontal but preferably with some positive angle b in relation to the horizontal plane, preferably 5 - 60 °, more preferably 10 - 50 °. Now the rotator 21 is activated so that the stone sorter bucket 1 will rotate, repeatedly in the same direction, i.e. more 360 degrees until the excavated masses are sorted. Thereby, finer constituents in the excavator mass will be sorted out and fall down through the gaps between the bars 110 in a place directly below the stone sorter bucket while larger constituents in the excavator mass, such as stones, will remain in the stone sorter bucket 1. When sufficient sorting has been obtained, the remaining larger parts of the excavated mass can be moved with the lifting arm 2 and tipped out of the stone sorting bucket 1 at another desired location. The grid 100 in the bottom 10 enables a clear view of the machinist into the bucket 1, so that it can be easily determined when it has been sorted and that the rotation can then be terminated at the moment when the cutting edge 13 is in the desired position for digging / backfilling.

According to an embodiment that has been tested with good results, the size of the stone sorter bucket has a width measurement BH of 1 meter x 1 meter and a depth of 1 meter. The volume then becomes with cutting edge approx. 1 cubic meter, meaning a maximum working volume of approx. 650 litres. The distance between the grid bars is 45 mm, whereby what passes out of it is thus everything between 0 to 45 mm in grain size. The thickness of the grid bars is 16 mm solid steel but can be varied between 10-30 mm depending on the desired circumstances. The entire product is suitably fully welded. The cutting edge of the product is suitably made of cold rolled steel sheet, with a thickness of between 6 -12 mm, depending on the desired circumstances. Preferably, the entire product is made of cold-rolled steel and fully welded with 1.0 tubular wire and Areal force gas.

The invention is not limited by what has been described above but can be varied within the scope of the appended claims. It will be appreciated, for example, that the basic principle of the invention also works with a round construction / grid cage, as well as that square grids can be used instead of parallel bars 110.