Alignment apparatus for hairpin-shaped heat exchanger tubes

An alignment apparatus for aligning hairpin-shaped heat exchanger tubes to be inserted into through-holes in a fin stack for heat exchanging, the alignment apparatus comprising:

• a plurality of arrangement plates that each have an inclined portion whose upper surface is downwardly inclined toward an insertion position side, that have bent portions of the hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes disposed on the inclined portions, and that are aligned in a horizontal direction,
• wherein on the insertion position side, the plurality of arrangement plates construct a regular pitch alignment unit where the arrangement plates are disposed at intervals that are double a pitch of the through-holes in the fin stack, and
• wherein on an upstream side in an inclined direction, the plurality of arrangement plates construct a wide pitch alignment unit where the arrangement plates are disposed at intervals that are an integer multiple of two or higher times the interval of the arrangement plates in the regular pitch alignment unit,
• wherein the regular pitch alignment unit includes a stopper apparatus that stops at different positions on an upstream side and a downstream side in the inclined direction for each arrangement plate so that the hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes disposed on the arrangement plates of the regular pitch alignment unit do not become adjacent at a same position, and
• wherein the wide pitch alignment unit is provided so as to be movable along an alignment direction of the arrangement plates so as to allow the hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes disposed in the wide pitch alignment unit to move in order starting from arrangement plates, out of the arrangement plates of the regular pitch alignment unit, where the hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes are stopped at a more downstream position.