Wire bundling and removing apparatus and method

Abstract

There is provided an apparatus for bundling a plurality of wires placed on a receiving plate. The apparatus is provided with a bundling pawl mechanism that includes a plate and a pair of pawl members. The pawl members are respectively supported at pivot points provided on the plate in spaced-apart relation and interconnected with driving units for opening and closing movement. The pawl members also respectively extend beyond an edge portion of the plate. A wire bundling region is formed between inner surfaces of the pawl members and the edge portion of the plate when at least one of the pawl members rotates toward the other of the pawl members in a closing direction. The bundling pawl mechanism further includes a wire catch prevention member that projects into the wire bundling region from an angled inner corner formed between the inner surface of the at least one pawl member and the edge portion of the plate when the at least one pawl member rotates in the closing position. With the above construction, since the wire catch prevention member projects into the bundling region from the inner corner, even if the angle of the inner corner becomes acute as the wire bundling region becomes narrower, the wires can be prevented from becoming caught in the angled inner corner, thereby preventing the wires from becoming damaged in the angled inner corner.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.