591778-Cutting sticks from a conveyed soft cheese bar A mass of soft cheese such as mozzarella cheese, is shaped into a wide bar 11 of predetermined thickness, and feed to a cutting apparatus on a conveyor belt at a conveying speed. The bar is cut into parallel longitudinal strips lying on the conveyor by a gang of rotating cutting wheels and then cut into sticks by a transverse cutter including a cutting knife 12 that bridges at least part of the width of the cheese bar. The degree of movement of the cutting knife can be controlled and as the cutting knife is cutting the cheese it is moved along the X axis with the cheese bar at the conveying speed by eccentric drive 20 whilst the vertical movement of the cutting bar in the cutting direction in the Z axis is controlled independently of the X axis movement by the eccentric drive 18. When the cheese sticks are cut by the transverse cutting bar the sticks initially remain on the conveyor to be conveyed to a wrapping station.
