Apparatus for cooling and handling preforms in plastic material

An apparatus for handling and cooling plastic preforms comprising:

• a rotatable handling station provided with a plurality of retaining and cooling pins for preforms and adapted to cooperate with an extraction plate adapted to extract the preforms from an injection mold;
• an aeraulic circuit connected to said rotatable handling station, said aeraulic circuit comprising:
• an aspiration duct for aspirating air from inside the rotatable handling station;
• a delivery duct for sending air to said rotatable handling station;
• a cooler arranged along said delivery duct for cooling the air sent to said rotatable handling station;
• and
• an aspirator connected to said aspiration duct and to said delivery duct;
• wherein the aeraulic circuit is operative to switch between a first circuit configuration, in which air is permitted to flow from the delivery duct to the rotatable handling station, and a second circuit configuration, in which air is permitted to flow from the rotatable handling station to the aspiration duct, such that when the aeraulic circuit is switched to the first circuit configuration, the plurality of retaining and cooling pins are operative to blow air therethrough, and when the aeraulic circuit is switched to the second circuit configuration, the plurality of retaining and cooling pins are operative to aspirate air therethrough;
• and
• a valve actuatable to switch the aeraulic circuit between the first and second circuit configurations via the valve being configured to transition between a first and a second position, wherein when the valve is transitioned to the first position, the valve places the delivery duct in fluid communication with the rotatable handling station and prevents the aspiration duct from being in fluid communication with the rotatable handling station, and when the valve is transitioned to the second position, the valve places the aspiration duct in fluid communication with the rotatable handling station and prevents the delivery duct from being in fluid communication with the rotatable handling station;
• wherein a body of the valve comprises a first duct and a second duct independent from one another;
• wherein, when the valve is transitioned to the first position, the first duct puts the delivery duct into communication with the rotatable handling station while the second duct puts the aspiration duct into communication with an internal environment of a casing of said apparatus;
• and
• wherein, when the valve is transitioned to the second position, the second duct puts the delivery duct into communication with the internal environment of the casing while the first duct puts the rotatable handling station into communication with the aspiration duct.