a portable separating device which can be taken from stack to stack . at a desired stack , it is placed onto and supported by the top of the stack . it has opposed , vertically staggered , stack - engaging pads so located that one engages an edges of the top panel , whereas the other engages the edges of one or more of the lower panels . a mechanism moves the pads toward one another to apply shearing force to the top panel to shift it together with the device relative to the remainder of the stack . the grip is then released and the device lifted off . then the top panel is removed , and the device applied to the next lower panel and the separating step repeated .