Cradle for a twisting machine

A cradle for a twisting machine for filamentary material comprising:

• a reel shaft for a half reel of filamentary material and rotatably mounted upon a support;
• and a tensioning device for the material, the tensioning device comprising:
• a brake disc coaxial with and rotatable together with the reel shaft and axially immovable relative to the shaft;
• two opposed brake pads disposed one on each side of the disc and located in position radially outwards on one side of the axis of the reel shaft;
• a rotatable tensioning pulley having biasing means to urge the pulley with its rotational axis in one direction of movement and being movable in an opposite direction by a force acting against the biasing means;
• and
• a brake activator comprising:
• (a) two brake arms extending one on each side of the brake disc, and the pads mounted one upon each of the arms, the arms being pivotally movable towards and away from one another to move the pads towards one another to apply or increase a braking force upon the disc and away from one another to reduce or cancel the braking force;
• (b) a brake operating means comprising a brake release linkage extending across the plane of and outwardly from the disc, the linkage pivotally connected to the two brake arms at two pivotal positions and actuable to move said pivotal positions and the brake arms towards each other and away from one another;
• and
• (c) a brake release connector positively connected to the brake release linkage and to the pulley to activate the linkage, when the pulley moves in said opposite directions, to move the said pivotal positions and the brake arms controllably away from one another and to activate the linkage, when the pulley moves in said one direction, to cause said pivotal positions and the brake arms to move controllably towards one another.