Adhesive bonding and miscellaneous chemical manufacture – Surface bonding means and/or assembly means therefor – With work feeding or handling means
Reexamination Certificate
1999-02-08
2002-03-19
Crispino, Richard (Department: 1734)
Adhesive bonding and miscellaneous chemical manufacture
Surface bonding means and/or assembly means therefor
With work feeding or handling means
C156S570000, C156S571000, C156S572000, C156S573000, C156SDIG002
Reexamination Certificate
active
06357505
ABSTRACT:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED CASES
This application claims the priority of German patent application Serial No. 198 05 697.4 filed Feb. 6, 1998. The disclosure of the German patent application, as well as that of each US and foreign patent and patent application mentioned in the specification of the present application, is incorporated herein by reference.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to improvements in apparatus for transferring flexible strip-shaped objects or commodities (such as labels, blanks, tabs or the like) from the underside of a magazine (e.g., an upright or a downwardly sloping chute or duct) to a conveyor, e.g., to a continuously or intermittently driven rotary drum-shaped conveyor in a machine for packing plain or filter cigarettes or other smokers' products in a production line.
For example, the apparatus of the present invention can be utilized with advantage for the delivery of revenue labels to successive soft or hinged-lid cigarette packets in machines which confine arrays of (e.g., twenty) plain or filter cigarettes in blanks made of metallic foil, cardboard, paper, transparent platic foil or in a combination of two or more such blanks.
Apparatus of the type to which the present invention pertains can be utilized with equal or similar advantage for the application of adhesive-coated or un-coated labels, stamps or other flexible objects to all kinds of containers or receptacles as well as for the application of postage stamps to letters, post cards or the like.
Reference may be had, for example, to published German patent application Serial No. 41 33 404 A1 which describes and shows an apparatus for the application of flexible labels or the like to various types of products including cigarette packets or other block-shaped or otherwise configurated goods.
A revenue stamp or label is normally applied to a cigarette packet in such a way that the packet becomes tamper-proof, i.e., that the revenue stamp or label must be damaged or destroyed by the person who is in the process of gaining access to the contents of the packet. This is intended to ensure that the label or stamp cannot be reused by the manufacturer of cigarette packets or of packets or containers for other types of products for which taxes or duties are payable to Federal authorities, to State authorities and/or to local authorities.
For example, a revenue label can be applied to the overlapping flaps and/or tucks at one end of a flexible transparent outermost envelope which is normally provided with a tear strip. Alternatively, the revenue label can be applied in part to the exterior of a closed hinged lid and in part to the adjacent part of the main portion of a hard cigarette packet which contains a housing made of cardboard or the like so that the label must be destroyed when the lid is pivoted to open position in order to enable the purchaser of the hinged-lid packet of plain or filter cigarettes, cigarillos or the like to gain access to the contents, e.g. , an array of twenty cigarettes in the customary so-called quincunx formation. The same holds true when the revenue labels are applied to packets which contain arrays of five, ten or twentyone cigarettes.
A modern cigarette packing machine can turn out cigarette packets at a very high rate. By way of example, the so-called COMPAS 500 cigarette packer (distributed by Topack Verpackungstechnik GmbH, Grabauer Strasse 49, D-21493 Schwarzenbek, Federal Republic Germany) can turn out up to and well in excess of 500 cigarette packets per minute. In such mass-producing machines, revenue labels must be supplied at a very high frequency and with an extremely high degree of accuracy and reproducibility in order to reduce to a minimum the number of rejects which are discovered during the final quality review of the finished packets.
Additional problems arise when the labels are relatively small or extremely small because this evidently aggravates the problem of reliably transporting such objects between one or more magazines or makers of labels and one or more processing stations, e.g., past an adhesive applying paster and into a cigarette wrapping or packing machine (such as the aforementioned COMPAS 500 machine) or an overwrapping machine (such as that known as Pewo-Fold overwrapper, also distributed by Topack).
OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
An object of the invention is to provide an apparatus which can manipulate labels, stamps and like flexible objects with a high degree of accuracy regardless of whether such objects must be supplied to a consuming machine at a low, medium high or extremely high frequency.
Another object of the invention is to construct and assemble the apparatus in such a way that the flexible objects are treated gently regardless of the frequency at which such objects are furnished to a cigarette packing or another labelling machine.
A further object of the invention is to provide the above outlined apparatus with novel and improved means for transferring successive flexible objects from one or more sources to a conveyor, e.g., to a conveyor in a cigarette packing machine.
An additional object of the invention is to provide the apparatus with novel and improved means for reliably holding successive flexible objects in optimum positions during lateral, orbital, linear or any other required movements in the path between an object making or storing station and a device which receives and further transports and/or otherwise manipulates successive objects of a short or long series of such commodities.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a novel and improved object transferring device which can be utilized in the above outlined apparatus.
A further object of the invention is to provide a novel and improved synchronizing system for use in the above outlined apparatus to ensure predictable and reliable cooperation between various moving parts of the above outlined apparatus.
An additional object of the invention is to provide a cigarette packing machine which embodies at least one apparatus of the above outlined character.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a novel and improved method of manipulating adhesive-coated or uncoated labels or analogous flexible objects between one or more sources and one or more consuming or processing machines.
A further object of the invention is to provide a method of removing successive flexible objects from the bottom region of an upright or downwardly sloping magazine to one or more processing stations in such a way that each of a short or long series of objects is adequately controlled during each and every stage of the manipulation.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention is embodied in an apparatus for delivering successive flexible sheet-like commodities (such as labels, tabs, stamps, blanks or the like) from a source (such as an upright or downwardly inclined magazine) to a conveyor which is spaced apart from the source. The improved apparatus comprises a suction generating device (such as a pump, a blower or the like), a transfer member which is rotatable about a predetermined axis and has at least one air-admitting inlet, means for moving the transfer member between a first location at the source and a second location at the conveyor, and means for rotating the transfer member about the aforementioned axis relative to the moving member between at least one first position, in which the at least one inlet communicates with the suction generating device to attract a commodity at the first location and during movement from the first location to the second location, and at least one second position at the second location in which the suction generating device is at least partially sealed from the at least one inlet to thus enable the conveyor to accept commodities from the transfer member.
The source can comprise a magazine for a stack of superimposed commodities including a lowermost commodity at the first location.
The conveyor is preferably provided with suction ports which serve to attract commodities at the second location.
The improved a
Crispino Richard
Kinberg Robert
Purvis Sue A.
Spencer George H.
Topack Verpackungstechnik GmbH
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