Reserve fibre sliver feeding apparatus

A sliver feeding arrangement for simultaneously feeding a plurality of moving active slivers to related textile machine means, comprising a plurality of first sources for providing a plurality of said active slivers, each of said first sources providing at least one active sliver, means for guiding each of said plurality of active slivers in their movement in predetermined paths so that said active slivers during at least a portion of said paths are moving generally parallel to each other, means for operatively engaging said active slivers as to draw said active slivers from said first sources, move said active slivers along said paths and feed said active slivers toward said textile machine means, a second source for providing a reserve sliver, guide means for operatively engaging and guiding said reserve sliver, restraining means effective to at times operatively engage and hold said reserve sliver against movement relative to said guide means, transporter means operatively supporting said guide means and said restraining means, detecting means effective to detect the existance of each of said plurality of said active slivers and being further effective to detect the occurrence of a break or run-out in any of said plurality of said active slivers, said transporter means being effective upon said detecting means detecting the occurrence of a said break or run-out to transport said guide means and said restraining means to a first position of close proximity to said predetermined paths as to thereby present a leading portion of said reserve sliver carried by said guide means to a trailing portion of the detected broken or run-out sliver, and said restraining means being effective upon being transported to said first position to release said reserve sliver and permit said reserve sliver to move relative to said guide means and with said trailing portion of the detected broken or run-out sliver.