Shoulder assembly for tire building machine
AssigneeDavian Enterprises, LLC
InventorsWilliam A. Jones, Stuart J. Hassell
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A shoulder assembly for mounting on a tire building drum is provided that includes a plurality of sections configured to interlock with another to form a shoulder ring to be mounted on a tire building drum when the tire building drum is in an expanded state, and a plurality of magnetic elements provided about a surface of the shoulder ring that is configured to contact a side of the tire building drum. The magnetic elements correspond to holding magnetic elements in the tire building drum. The shoulder ring is configured to maintain contact with the tire building drum during forming of a tire carcass, and the shoulder ring is configured to maintain its shape and stay with the formed tire carcass when the tire building drum is collapsed.
Claims18
A shoulder assembly to be mounted on an expandable and collapsible tire building drum, the shoulder assembly comprising:
- a plurality of arcuate sections, each section having at least one tenon extending from a first end and at least one groove extending from an opposite second end, the tenons and grooves being configured to allow the sections to slidably interlock with one another along an axial dimension thereof to form a shoulder ring to be mounted on a tire building drum when the tire building drum is in an expanded state;
- a first plurality of magnetic elements provided about a surface of the shoulder ring that are configured to magnetically secure the shoulder ring to a side of the tire building drum;
- and
- for each of the first plurality of magnetic elements, an adjustment mechanism configured to adjust a distance between the corresponding magnetic element and a corresponding portion of the side of the tire building drum;
- wherein the shoulder ring is configured to maintain contact with the tire building drum during forming of a tire carcass, and
- wherein the shoulder ring is configured to maintain its shape and detach from the tire building drum when the tire building drum is collapsed.
An expandable and collapsible tire building drum comprising:
- a plurality of arcuate segments supported about a central hub and configured for movement between an expanded position and a collapsed position, whereby in the expanded position, the segments cooperate to define a central portion of a cylindrical working surface having a pair of oppositely disposed circumferential edges;
- a shoulder assembly for defining an end portion of the working surface, the shoulder assembly comprising a plurality of arcuate sections, each section having at least one tenon extending from a first end and at least one groove extending from an opposite second end, the tenons and grooves being configured to allow the sections to slidably interlock with one another along an axial dimension of the shoulder assembly to form an outer portion of the cylindrical working surface;
- wherein the shoulder assembly is removably magnetically securable to one of the circumferential edges of the central portion of the working surface;
- a first plurality of magnetic elements provided about a surface of the shoulder ring, each magnetic element of the first plurality of magnetic elements configured to form a pair of magnetically secured elements with one of a second plurality of magnetic elements provided about a corresponding circumferential edge of the central portion of the working surface;
- and
- a plurality of adjustment mechanisms, each adjustment mechanism configured to adjust a distance between a corresponding pair of magnetically secured elements when the shoulder assembly is magnetically secured to a circumferential edge of the central portion of the working surface.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.