US3755934A

US3755934A - Identification means

Info

Publication number: US3755934A
Application number: US00078885A
Authority: US
Inventors: A Porcher; M Lis
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 1969-10-10
Filing date: 1970-10-07
Publication date: 1973-09-04
Anticipated expiration: 1990-09-04
Also published as: DK124048B; FR2062117A5; NL7014846A; GB1332908A; ZA706748B; BE757335A

Abstract

A booklet of tickets suitable for identification purposes comprising a plurality of metallic tickets each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes; a plurality of metallic counterfoils each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, and each being detachably affixed to a ticket; each counterfoil being affixed to the remaining counterfoils which together form a stub having means for attachment of the booklet to an item to be identified; and each ticket having the same three-dimensional identification mark and having means for attachment to an item to be identified.

Description

Unite States Patent 1 Porcher et al.

[451 Sept. 4, 1973 IDENTIFICATION MEANS [76] Inventors: Alain Porcher; Michael L. Lis, both of 16 Rue Dumont, DUrville, Paris 16c, France [22] Filed: Oct. 7, 1970 [21] Appl. No.: 78,885

[30] Foreign Application Priority Data Oct. 10, 1969 France 6934783 [52] 111.8. Cl 40/2 F, 283/18 [51] Int. Cl. G09f 3/08 5 8] Field of Search 283/18-21; 40/300-304, 2 F, 10 C; 119/1, 106

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,494,204 5/1924 Zgol et al 283/18 384,237 6/1888 Dewitt 283/19 1,530,680 3/1925 Linden et al 40/2 R X 1,682,540 8/1928 Schlegelmilch 283/18 FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS 77,672 6/1954 Denmark 28l/l6 Primary Examiner-Wm. H. Grieb Attorney-Delio and Montgomery [5 7 ABSTRACT A booklet of tickets suitable for identification purposes comprising a plurality of metallic tickets each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes; a plurality of metallic counterfoils each, lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, and each being detachably affixed to a ticket; each counterfoil being affixed to the remaining counterfoils which together form a stub having means for attachment of the booklet to an item to be identified; and each ticket having the same three-dimensional identification mark and having means for attachment to an item to be identified.

5 Claims, 6 Drawing Figures PATENTEDSEP 4 ma 13.755934 INVENTORS ATTORNE Y5 'PATENTEBSEP 4 ma SHEEI 2 (IF 2 T Z WEN 5 i 123456 0 l I RENE H5456 IDENTIFICATION MEANS The present invention relates to means for identifying an integral whole or aggregate which is divisible into its constituent parts.

In industry and commerce there are many cases where it is desirable to be able to identify products of all of the same type, or a group or series of products or objects. In a number of cases, this identification can be effected without difficulty, by simple marking with a liquid or the attachment of labels.

However, the direct marking of certain products, such as foodstuffs, is often not practicable. In addition where consignments of products have to be split up, it is desirable to be able to identify the different parts of a group to which these parts pertain or from which they are derived.

Correlating the identification of such products involves certain difficulties when they are of a type on which it is difficult, if not impossible, to stick labels or on which it is impossible to mark with a liquid.

The aim of the invention is to provide a simple practical means which can be conveniently employed, whenever it is desired to accurately identify all the elements of a group or all the separate parts of an integral whole, after it has been split up, and to correlate the elements or parts with the group or whole respectively.

This problem is particularly acute where the whole or its parts to be identified, undergo soiling or rough handling which may obliterate, damage or destroy the identifying mark. In such cases the failure of an identification system can be serious and lead to wastage of the goods, or at least attempts to reidentify the parts or the whole, resulting in confusion and additional expense.

One particular area where this problem has been met is the livestock industry where it is desirable to mark an animal due for slaughter and to subsequently identify the parts of the animal as originating from a particular beast. This need frequently arises where parts of an animal, for example the liver, may be diseased, and all or some of the other parts or organs of the same animal have to be recovered from a collection of similar parts or organs from a multiplicity of different animals.

Thus for example, it is common practice in the slaughterhouses of many countries to inspect the collection of livers from slaughtered beasts to determine if necrosis due to liver fluke disease is present. Such a liver may be condemned as unsuitable for human consumption, and it is necessary to know from which beast the liver originated, and to identify the remaining organs of the same animal.

Attempts to provide a successful identification system to meet this type of problem have frequently failed in the past for a variety of reasons. Thus a marking liquid frequently cannot be satisfactorily applied to the animal on the hoof at the entry to the slaughter house, where a record of its identity is needed. The same difficulty can occur with the use of paper or cardboard labels, and these meet a further problem that the animal may be scorched to remove skin fur or hair, and the labels damaged or destroyed. In addition, the conditions of many slaughterhouses would lead to the soiling of such labels so that their markings would be totally or partially obliterated.

It has now been found that a satisfactory identification means comprises a booklet of labels suitable for identification purposes comprising a plurality of metallic tickets each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes,

a plurality of metallic counterfoils each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, and each being detachably affixed to a ticket,

each counterfoil being affixed to the remaining counterfoils which together form a stub, the stub having means for attachment of the booklet to an item to be identified,

and each ticket having a same three-dimensional identification mark and having means for attachment to an item to be identified.

The tickets and counterfoils are preferably made from the same material, and form an integral whole from which a ticket can be easily detached, for example, by providing a line of weakness between the ticket and its counterfoil, such as a line of perforations. Conveniently a strip of two or more tickets may form an integral whole with each counterfoill, each of the tickets being readily detachable from one another and from the counterfoil and each ticket bearing a same mark as the counterfoil to which it is attached. Mild steel or aluminium sheets or foil are two particular substances which may be used with advantage to make the tickets and counterfoils, but other suitable metallic materials or metallic coated materials may also be employed.

It is also preferable that the tickets be of a flexible nature so that they give way to incidental rough handling and do not readily break. If sheet. metal aluminium is employed, the use of thin sheets provides this property and facilitates the detachment of the tickets from their counterfoils.

The tickets are normally disposed one above the other in substantially parallel planes, but of course the use of flexible material will readily give rise to a change of disposition upon handling.

The counterfoils may be affixed to one another by any known means, and the means for attachment on the stub of counterfoils may also take any form, but preferably it takes the form of a hole.

The use of the same three-dimensional mark on each ticket provides a multiplicity of tickets for attachment to different parts of a whole, and this mark is threedimensional by virtue of its being imprinted, impressed, punched, embossed or stamped onto or into the ticket, and may take the fonn of one or moreholes or a portion elevated above or depressed below the plane of the remainder of each ticket. The specific form of the mark is naturally one which a customer desires and may be a sequence of letters, numerals or special marks, or a combination of one or more of them.

Other characteristics of the invention will become apparent in the course of the following specific description which is provided by way of example, and is not to be construed as limiting the invention.

The attached drawings illustrate as follows:

FIG. 1 is a plan view of a booklet of tickets in accordance with the invention.

FIG. 2, is a side view of a section through FIG. 1 on an enlarged scale along the line A--A.

FIG. 3, is a plan view showing several such booklets of tickets manufactured by sequential production.

FIG. 4 shows a fastening element of a type which may be used for the attachment either of a whole booklet of tickets or an individual ticket.

FIG. 5 is a partial view of a device employed for the attachment of a booklet or a ticket thereof by means of a fastening element, such as that illustrated in FIG. 4.

FIG. 6 is a plan view showing several booklets of tickets each counterfoil having attached to it a strip of tickets.

With reference to the FIG. 1 and 2, the booklet of tickets which is indicated, as a whole, by reference numeral 1, comprises several tickets 2 stamped, for example, out of a thin sheet of aluminium. The tickets 2 are held together in a wad containing any appropriate number, for example eight, or any other number, by means of a conventional flange-fastened eyelet 3, located in the vicinity of one of the ends of the tickets.

The booklet of tickets 1 may be made by fastening together a wad of blank tickets with a flange-fastened eyelet 3. The wad thus obtained is then placed in an embossing machine or punch of the conventional type, so as to provide all the tickets 2 of the wad with one or more identifying marks which are exactly similar and thus tally with each other, such as those identified by

reference numerals

4 and 5 in FIG. 1. A transverse perforated line 6 is simultaneously punched through the booklet in the vicinity of eyelet 3, between the latter and the

markings

4 and 5 on the tickets to form the counterfoils 2a of a stub 16. In addition a hole 7, is punched near the free end of the tickets.

The embossing or punching of the identifying marks or perforations may, of course, be carried out in several steps or by means of other suitable machines.

In this way a booklet of tickets 1 is obtained, whose tickets 2 can be detached from their counterfoils 2a and fastened to the animal or its various parts by way of the hole 7, for example, by means of a fastening element, the attachment of which will be described in greater detail below.

The tickets 2 may, of course, consist of a material other than aluminium; however, as regards their application to the slaughtering trade, aluminium is particularly suitable. It may be anodised or painted in various colours.

FIG. 3 illustrates a series of booklets l of tickets 2 in accordance with the invention, obtained from several sheet aluminium blanks. By means of blank aluminium strips and appropriate punching means, the bookelts ll of tickets 2, complete with counterfoils 2a, can be rapidly and inexpensively produced in sequence, identifying

markS

5,5" being identical in respect of each individual booklet 1 and different with regard to each con- I secutive booklet.

FIG. '4 illustrates a fastening means 8 of a known type, which may be conveniently employed for attaching a booklet of tickets to the ear, for instance, of the animal on the hoof, before it arrives at the slaughtering area.

The fastening means 8, may be made of any flexible material, for example, of nylon, and comprises a shaft 9, provided at one of its ends with a transverse stop element 10, which is produced in one piece with shaft 9 and the other end of which comprises a plate 11. The shaft 9 is of approximately the same diameter as stop 10 except at the junction therebetween where the shaft 9 is of a smaller dimension than the remainder of the shaft 9.

The device used to attach this fastening means 8 is of a known type, for example that described in U.S. Pat. Specification No. 3,103,666.

This device includes a housing 14 and a hollow pointed tube 12, in which is arranged the stop element 10 with its shaft 9 and plate 11 protruding from the rod 12 through an axial slit (not shown) therein.

As shown in FIG. 5, tube 12 is passed through the central hole (3a) of an eyelet 3 of a booklet 1 of tickets 2, then, for example, through an ear 13 of an animal, and a pusher rod 15 is released into tube 12 which drives the stop element 10 through the hole 3a in the eyelet 3, and through the ear 13, drawing with its shaft 9, until stop element 10 is ejected from tube 12, and by its natural flexibility assumes a right angled disposition to the shaft 9. The booklet 1 of tickets 2 is now secured to ear 13 since stop element 10 and plate 11 effectively hinder the escape of shaft 9 and booklet 1.

As the slaughtered animal is cut up, the operative detaches each ticket 2 of booklet 1 in turn from its counterfoil 2a and fastens it by the same fastening means 8 and attachment device to each part of the animal which has been removed, using to this end the hole 7, provided for this purpose at the end of each ticket 2 which is remote from the set of counterfoils 2a of the booklet.

The last ticket 2 may be left attached to the counterfoil 2a so that clearly, when the whole cycle of operations has been completed, it will always be possible to identify to which animal, of which a record is preferably made prior to its entering the slaughter house, each part belongs, no matter where or with what these parts have been stored. Alternatively, the same identifying mark present on each ticket 2 of a booklet 1 may be incorporated on the counterfoil 2a, so that all the tickets 2 may be detached.

The tickets may be of any desired size, as also may be the identifying marks which are preferably legible at a distance of approximately 2 metres.

According to a modified embodiment, tickets may be longer and comprise two or more consecutively arranged tickets, the first ticket being joined to the set of counterfoils, a second ticket being joined to the first ticket by means of a further perforated line, and so on. This modified embodiment is illustrated in FIG. 6 wherein the reference numerals have the same significance as described with reference to FIGS. l-5.

What we claim is:

1. A booklet of tickets suitable for identification of an item and for correlation of a plurality of items comprising the parts of a whole when a ticket is attached to each item, comprising a first plurality of more than two metallic tickets corresponding in number to said parts, said tickets having identical indicia thereon and each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes,

a plurality of metallic counterfoils corresponding in number tosaid tickets, each counterfoil lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, and each being detachably affixed to a ticket,

each counterfoil being affixed to the remaining counterfoils which together form a stub having means for attachment of the booklet to an item to be identified,

said booklet of tickets including a second plurality of tickets each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, each ticket being detachably affixed to a ticket which is itself detachably affixed directly to a counterfoil, said second plurality of tickets each having a same three-dimensional identification mark as the mark in or on the tickets detachably affixed to the counterfoils,

and each ticket having the same three-dimensional identification mark and having means for attachment to each item to be identified,

said three-dimensional identification mark comprising a portion of each ticket elevated above or depressed below the plane of the ticket.

2. A method of identifying and correlating the parts of a slaughtered animal comprising the steps of:

a. providing a booklet of tickets, comprising a plurality of more than two metallic tickets corresponding in number to said parts, said tickets having identical indicia thereon and each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, a plurality of -metallic counterfoils corresponding in number to said tickets, each counterfoil lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, and each being detachably affixed to a ticket, each counterfoil being affixed to the remaining counterfoils which together form a stub having means for attachment of the booklet to an item to be identified, and each ticket having the same three-dimensional identification mark and having means for attachment to each item to be identified,

b. attaching said booklet to an animal prior to its slaughter wherein said attachment is effected via the stub of the booklet,

c. detaching a ticket from the booklet after the animal is slaughtered, and

d. attaching said ticket to a part of the animal requiring subsequent correlation with a residual part of said animal or other part of said animal.

3. A method as in claim 2 wherein the threedimensional identification mark comprises a portion of each ticket elevated above or depressed below the plane of the ticket.

4. A method as in claim 2 said booklet includes a second plurality of tickets each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, each ticket being detachably affixed to a ticket which is itself detachably affixed directly to a counterfoil, said second plurality of tickets each having a same three-dimensional identification mark as the mark in or on the tickets detachably affixed directly to the counterfoils.

5. A method as in claim 4 wherein the threedimensional identification mark comprises a portion of each ticket elevated above or depressed below the plane of the ticket.

Claims

1. A booklet of tickets suitable for identification of an item and for correlation of a plurality of items comprising the parts of a whole when a ticket is attached to each item, comprising a first plurality of more than two metallic tickets corresponding in number to said parts, said tickets having identical indicia thereon and each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, a plurality of metallic counterfoils corresponding in number to said tickets, each counterfoil lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, and each being detachably affixed to a ticket, each counterfoil being affixed to the remaining counterfoils which together form a stub having means for attachment of the booklet to an item to be identified, said booklet of tickets including a second plurality of tickets each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, each ticket being detachably affixed to a ticket which is itself detachably affixed directly to a counterfoil, said second plurality of tickets each having a same threedimensional identification mark as the mark in or on the tickets detachably affixed to the counterfoils, and each ticket having the same three-dimensional identification mark and having means for attachment to each item to be identified, said three-dimensional identification mark comprising a portion of each ticket elevated above or depressed below the plane of the ticket.

2. A method of identifying and correlating the parts of a slaughtered animal comprising the steps of: a. providing a booklet of tickets, comprising a plurality of more than two metallic tickets corresponding in number to said parts, said tickets having identical indicia thereon and each lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, a plurality of metallic counterfoils corresponding in number to said tickets, each counterfoil lying one above the other in substantially parallel planes, and each being detachably affixed to a ticket, each counterfoil being affixed to the remaining counterfoils which together form a stub having means for attachment of the booklet to an item to be identified, and each ticket having the same three-dimensional identification mark and having means for attachment to each item to be identified, b. attaching said booklet to an animal prior to its slaughter wherein said attachment is effected via the stub of the booklet, c. detaching a ticket from the booklet after the animal is slaughtered, and d. attaching said ticket to a part of the animal requiring subsequent correlation with a residual part of said animal or other part of said animal.

3. A method as in claim 2 wherein the three-dimensional identification mark comprises a portion of each ticket elevated above or depressed below the plane of the ticket.

5. A method as in claim 4 wherein the three-dimensional identification mark comprises a portion of each ticket elevated above or depressed below the plane of the ticket.