Machine for roughing a peripheral vamp edge of a shoe

A machine for roughening a peripheral edge of a vamp of a shoe mounted in upside-down position on a last, comprising:

• a turntable rotatable about a principal vertical axis;
• a carriage linearly reciprocable on said turntable;
• mounting means on said carriage for removably supporting a pair of vertically spaced templates with profiles respectively conforming to those of a pair of shoes whose vamps are to be peripherally roughened;
• a first and a second arm mounted on a baseplate for independently swinging about respective collateral vertical axes;
• a feeler on a free extremity of said first arm positionable to contact either of said templates;
• a rotary roughening brush carried on said free extremity above said feeler;
• a beam hinged to said second arm above the level of said mounting means;
• a vertical shaft journaled in said beam at a location remote from said second arm and provided with coupling means for releasably connecting said shaft with said mounting means;
• a shoe-supporting unit mounted on said shaft above said beam and provided with clamping means for gripping a shoe to be roughened in upside-down position and in line with the corresponding template at a level within reach of said brush;
• drive means for rotating said brush;
• first actuating means for moving said first arm into a position of engagement of said feeler with the template corresponding to a shoe gripped by said clamping means;
• second actuating means for displacing said brush relatively to said first arm for working contact with the peripheral vamp edge of the shoe gripped by said clamping means;
• third actuating means for linearly reciprocating said carriage on said turntable between respective terminal positions in which the heel and the toe of the gripped shoe are substantially centered on said principal axis;
• and
• fourth actuating means operative in each of said terminal positions for rotating said turntable through 180.degree..