Method of charging a hollow valve with metallic sodium and an apparatus therefor

An apparatus for charging a hollow valve with metallic sodium, the apparatus comprising:

• a workpiece support that supports a workpiece as a semi-finished product for a hollow poppet valve, a cavity of the workpiece having an opening at a free end of a valve stem, the workpiece support supporting the workpiece such that the opening is directed upward at a working position;
• inert gas feeding means comprising a nozzle that can come into a cavity of the workpiece disposed at the working position and can jet an inert gas from an end and elevating means that elevates and lowers the nozzle;
• a holder that can hold vertical rod-like metallic sodium and can move between a feeding position where the metallic sodium is positioned right above the cavity of the workpiece at the working position when the nozzle moves up and a receiving position beside the feeding position;
• a metallic sodium extrusion device pressing down the metallic sodium stored in a vertical cylinder by a piston to move the metallic sodium like a rod out of a nozzle at a lower end of the cylinder to charge the holder with the rod-like metallic sodium;
• and
• a cutter cutting the rod-like metallic sodium pressed out of the nozzle of the metallic sodium extrusion device.