Method and device for making a double-toothed belt

A method for making a double-sided toothed belt, which is equipped with teeth on both sides, in a manufacturing device in which a loop made of an elastomer and a textile inlay is arranged radially between a cylindrical inner mold and a cylindrical outer mold in a deformation space, wherein the inner mold, on its radial outer side, has teeth oriented parallel to the longitudinal axis of the inner mold, which teeth are in each case spaced apart from one another by a tooth space, wherein the outer mold includes a multiplicity of mold segments which are arranged parallel to the longitudinal axis of the inner mold and adjacent to one another in a circumferential direction of the inner mold and which, at their side pointing toward the inner mold, have in each case at least one tooth and at least one section of a tooth space and/or at least one complete tooth space, wherein the mold segments are surrounded radially at the outside by a flexible and hollow cylindrical force transmission element which is surrounded by the cylindrical wall of a pressure vessel, and in which method the force transmission element is fastened with its axial ends in the pressure vessel so as to be sealed off radially to the inside, the method comprising the steps of:

• conducting a heating fluid through the mold segments of the outer mold and through the inner mold, the temperature of the heating fluid being sufficient to plasticize the elastomer of the loop;
• for the deformation of the loop that has not yet been vulcanized, injecting a fluid at a positive pressure into a ring-shaped space between the cylindrical wall of the pressure vessel and the force transmission element, as a result of which the force transmission element bears with a pressing force against the outer side of the mold segments of the outer mold and material of the loop is forced into the tooth spaces of the inner mold and of the outer mold;
• conducting a heating fluid through the inner mold and through the mold segments of the outer mold, the temperature of the heating fluid being sufficient to vulcanize the elastomer of the loop;
• after complete vulcanization of the loop, introducing a cooling fluid through the inner mold and through the mold segments of the outer mold;
• connecting the ring-shaped space between the cylindrical wall of the pressure vessel and the force transmission element to ambient pressure or to a negative pressure;
• removing the deformed and vulcanized loop from the manufacturing device;
• and,
• cutting the deformed and vulcanized loop into individual double-sided toothed belts of predetermined width.