Today in 1956, US Patent 2868247 A was issued, an invention of Aloysius J. Feit and Sydney R. Weisberg, for their “Bottle Filling Apparatus.” There’s no Abstract, although in the description it includes this summary:
Among the principal objects of the present invention are: to provide bottle filling apparatus where the opening of a valve discharging fluid or other material into a lbottle is initiated by the depression of an actuator member by the bottle as it is positioned below a supply outlet controlled by the valve, where the valve is closed preferably automatically by an automatic timer and, under certain circumstances, upon operation of a manual switch, and where the valve is thereafter prevented from again opening until the bottle is removed from the actuator member and another bottle is moved against the same to depress the actuator member to begin a new filling cycle; to provide bottle filling apparatus of the type above described wherein, although the actuator member may be spring urged to an extended position, the actuator member is held in its depressed position at least during the actual filling operation so that the bottle need not he forced against the actuator member during the filling operation, making the system particularly suitable in the filling of very light bottles where the bottles would otherwise require an externally applied force to keep the bottles in the proper filling position against the actuator member; to provide bottle filling apparatus as just described wherein the aforementioned valve is an electrically controlled valve, such as a solenoid valve, which is associated with a control circuit which selectively provides for controlling the solenoid valve either through an automatic electric timer or a manual switch, and which becomes operative to control the valve after the aforesaid actuator member has been depressed to thereby provide flexibility of operation; to provide apparatus as just described wherein there is further provided during manual or timer operation a means for instantaneously shutting off the valve should this be desired for any reason, such as due to a malfunction in the control circuit or timer control circuit which fails to shut off the solenoid valve; to provide such apparatus where means is provided for readily shifting the position of the supply outlet so that the apparatus may be readily adapted for use with bottles of different sizes; and to provide such apparatus which is inexpensive to manufacture and is reliable in operation.
In accordance with the invention, the aforesaid actuator member is preferably arranged to move the. armature of a relay into a position where the contacts controlled thereby initiate, preferably through electric timer, opening of a control valve, preferably a solenoid valve, and also the energization of the relay which holds the actuator member in its depressed position. In such case, the armature, which is spring biased away from the relay core, does not apply any backward force to the bottle which would tend to push it out of alignment with the supply outlet. Both the solenoid valve and the relay are preferably connected in series with a set of contacts controlled by the electric timer which contacts close for an adjustable interval to open the solenoid valve and energize the relay, and open at the termination of such interval to close the solenoid valve and de-energize the relay. An emergency cut-off switch in series with the solenoid valve is provided for instantaneously shutting off the solenoid valve independently of the timer, where this is necessary or desirable. The electric timer is not re-set for a new cycle of operation until the bottle is removed from the actuator member. Once the bottle is filled, the overall weight of the bottle is usually sufficient to hold the actuator member fully depressed even after the relay is de-energized. The resetting of the electric timer is effected by removing the bottle to return the relay contacts to their normal positions, and, upon subsequent closing of the actuator member, a new timing interval is initiated.
In the interest of system flexibility, switching means are provided for disabling the timer circuit from operation and for inserting the relay in series with its own contacts and also the latter in series with the solenoid valve so that, upon depression of the aforementioned actuator member, a holding circuit is established for the relay and the solenoid valve is opened. Closing of the solenoid valve and defenergization of the relay is effected through manual operation of the switching means.
