Apparatus for feeding longitudinal heterogenous goods

An apparatus for feeding elongated parts piled with at least approximate parallelism, to a process machine having an infeed spaced from an end of the pile of parts and adapted to receive the parts endwise, said apparatus comprising an arm adapted to be positioned at a level above said pile and so as to span the space from the pile to the machine when positioned at least approximately in alignment with said parts, said arm having a pivoted inner end adjacent to said infeed and a vertically swinging outer end, an endless traveling series of interspaced grapples carried by said arm through a span running longitudinally under the arm from its outer end to its inner end, actuating means for causing the grapples to sequentially clamp one or more of said parts when over said pile so as to engage and pull the part or parts endwise to said infeed, means for causing the grapples to release the part or parts at said infeed, and means for causing said travelling series of grapples to momentarily travel in an upward direction relative to said arm substantially as soon as they are caused to clamp and to thereafter travel more directly towards said infeed.