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US 11,053,094 B2Granted
Folding apparatus and corresponding method
AssigneeI.M.A. Industria Macchine Automatiche S.P.A.
InventorGabriele Brunetti
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An apparatus for folding sheets and corresponding method, including at least a conditioning body, at least a folding unit and at least an extraction mean suitable to fold sheets in sequence of variable formats, maintaining high cadences and at the same time simplifying the structure for the maintenance operations and/or format-changes.
Claims21
A folding apparatus for sheets, the apparatus comprising:
- at least a conditioning unit, at least an extractor element cooperating with a winding shaft and moveable along a longitudinal axis of said conditioning unit, and at least a folding unit cooperating with said conditioning unit, said conditioning unit being coupled to a sheet feeding unit which feeds a sheet to the conditioning unit, wherein said conditioning unit comprises a containing body and a housing guide associated with a limiting body.
A method to fold sheets by using a folding apparatus, said method comprising:
- providing a folding apparatus for sheets, the folding apparatus comprising a conditioning unit, an extractor element cooperating with a winding shaft and moveable along a longitudinal axis of said conditioning unit, and a folding unit cooperating with said conditioning unit, said conditioning unit being coupled to a sheet feeding unit which feeds sheets to the conditioning unit, wherein said conditioning unit comprises a containing body and a housing guide associated with a limiting body;
- and
- a step of introducing at least a sheet into the conditioning unit,
- a step of winding said sheet inside the containing body of said conditioning unit to create a tubular element,
- a step of extracting said tubular element by an extractor mean from said containing body,
- a step of inserting said tubular element into the folding unit,
- a step of compressing said tubular element to obtain a folded sheet, and
- wherein said step of introducing provides that said sheet reaches a limiting body associated with the housing guide of said conditioning unit.
5 more elements
A folding apparatus for sheets comprising
- a conditioning unit comprising a rotating winding shaft extended along a longitudinal axis and configured to wind a sheet around the outer surface of the winding shaft as the winding shaft is rotated in order to prepare the sheet to be folded,
- an extractor element movable along cooperating with the winding shaft and the longitudinal axis in order to remove the wound sheet from the winding shaft while keeping the winding shaft stationary, and
- at least a folding unit configured to fold the sheet, said conditioning unit being associated with a sheet feeding unit which feeds sheets to the conditioning unit,
- wherein said conditioning unit comprising a containing body which has a conditioning seating extending along the longitudinal axis and configured to house the winding shaft.
1 more element
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.