Winding – tensioning – or guiding – Convolute winding of material – With spool loading or coil removal
Reexamination Certificate
2001-11-29
2003-12-02
Matecki, Kathy (Department: 3654)
Winding, tensioning, or guiding
Convolute winding of material
With spool loading or coil removal
C242S533100, C242S533700
Reexamination Certificate
active
06655629
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD
The present invention relates to an apparatus for preparing winding mandrels with corresponding tubular winding cores fitted on them for introduction into rewinding machines or other winding machines.
STATE OF THE ART
In various industrial sectors, for example in the paper converting industry, the textile industry and the production of nonwoven textiles, it is frequently necessary to wind on to rolls of smaller or larger diameter a web material taken from a reel of greater diameter. Frequently, a plurality of rolls of smaller height are formed simultaneously by winding strips of web material generated by longitudinally cutting a single strip taken from the reel of greater diameter. The strips are wound on tubular cores adjacent to each other and carried by an expanding winding mandrel. An example of a machine for carrying out this type of winding is described in EP-A-0747308.
In some cases, the rolls which are formed simultaneously on the cores fitted on to the mandrel have heights (in other words, axial lengths) which differ from each other. Usually, one or more operators prepare the tubular cores which have previously been cut from a continuous tube, fitting them on to one or more mandrels positioned outside the rewinding machine, and then, at the start of each winding cycle, insert the individual mandrels, fitted with the corresponding tubular cores, into the rewinding machine. This procedure is time-consuming, tiring, and labor-intensive.
Moreover, since the individual tubular cores fitted on each mandrel generally have different lengths from each other, errors may frequently occur as a result of the operator's failure to fit the cores in the correct order. Consequently there will no longer be a match between the sequence of the axial lengths of the tubular cores and the sequence of the transverse widths of the strips of web material which are fed to the mandrel for winding.
Furthermore, when this conventional procedure for preparing the mandrels is followed, the various tubular cores fitted on them are necessarily adjacent to each other. This means that the individual rolls which are formed on the mandrel are also necessarily adjacent to each other. This causes considerable problems, since the windings of one roll may interfere with those of an adjacent roll, giving rise to difficulties in the subsequent separation. The necessity of winding rolls on cores adjacent to each other entails further problems in cases in which the wound material is subject to shrinkage in respect of its width. This is because in this case there is a risk that the tubular cores will project from one or both ends of the finished roll, giving rise to difficulties in the subsequent operations of handling the rolls.
At the present time, if shrinkage of the wound material occurs during the rewinding stage, then, in order to prevent the projection of the cores from the finished rolls, the operator inserts a spacer between each core and the next in such a way that the cores remain inside the roll in each case. These spacers are in the form of open rings, to allow them to be inserted even when the cores have already been fitted on to the mandrel. The spacers are usually made from plastic material and are recovered at the end of the rewinding stage after the mandrel has been extracted. This system is unsatisfactory in that it is complicated, labor-intensive, and a source of errors on the part of the operator.
In rewinding machines of the aforementioned type, a set of cutters is placed upstream of the winding area in order to divide the web material taken from the reel into strips of the desired width. A computerized system is normally used to position the individual cutters correctly with respect to the transverse direction of the web material. The tubular cores, however, are cut to size (with core lengths which must match the widths of the individual strips into which the cutters divide the web material) in a different area of the plant, with a consequent risk of failure of matching between the positions of the cutters which cut the web material in the longitudinal direction and the axial dimensions of the individual tubular cores.
OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
The object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus or device which makes it possible to overcome the disadvantages, the limitations and the possibilities of error of the conventional systems.
More particularly, a first object of the present invention is to provide a device and a method which permit the fast and accurate preparation of the mandrels with the corresponding tubular cores fitted on them for subsequent introduction into the rewinding machine.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a device and a method which make it possible to reduce the labor-intensiveness of cycles of winding or rewinding web materials.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a device and a method which make it possible to reduce or eliminate errors in the preparation of the mandrels for winding.
The object of an improved embodiment of the invention is to provide a method and a device which make it possible to automate the operations of preparing the cores and coordinating the cutting of the cores with the cutting of the web material, to achieve greater precision and speed.
An object of the present invention is also to provide a method and a device which avoid the disadvantages which are found in the rewinding of web materials which tend to shrink in the transverse direction, and also the problems arising from the difficulties of detaching rolls wound on adjacent cores carried by a single mandrel.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
These and other objects and advantages, which the following text will make clear to those skilled in the art, are essentially achieved with a device comprising, in combination, an extraction station with an extractor mechanism for extracting a mandrel from one or more rolls of web material which has previously been wound and for inserting the extracted mandrel into a tube or core of cardboard or the like; a cutting station with cutting means for cutting the tube fitted on the mandrel, transforming it into a set of tubular cores aligned on the mandrel; and an insertion station with insertion members for inserting the mandrel with the tubular cores fitted on it into a rewinding machine or other winding machine.
These three stations enable the operations of preparing the tubular cores on the mandrel to be carried out in a partially or completely automatic way.
In the preferred embodiment of the invention, the three aforementioned stations are distributed spatially along a path which extends in a direction preferably orthogonal to the axis of the mandrel. This is particularly advantageous since it simplifies the design of the device and makes it possible to move the mandrel, while the tubular cores are being prepared on it, from the extraction position to the position of reinsertion into the rewinding machine, said two positions being normally spaced apart because of the presence of the winding members in an intermediate position. The use of three stations spaced apart also yields the advantage that it is possible to handle three mandrels simultaneously, one in the extraction station, one in the cutting station and the third in the insertion station.
On the other hand, the location of a plurality of stations, particularly two stations, in the same position in space is not excluded. For example, the cutting station can be spatially superimposed on or coincident with the extraction station, or the cutting station can be spatially coincident with or superimposed on the insertion station.
In a particularly advantageous embodiment of the invention, the extractor mechanism causes, by a single movement, the extraction of the mandrel from the finished roll or rolls and its insertion into the tube. On the other hand, the extraction from the finished roll or rolls and the insertion into a new tube by two separate movements is not excluded.
The extractor mechanism can be made with a pair of shaped whe
A. Celli S.P.A.
Kim Sang
Matecki Kathy
McGlew and Tuttle P.C
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