US 4,588,544 A · Method and apparatus for forming concrete articles containing one or more projecting elements

Abstract

A method and an apparatus for producing concrete articles, such as shaft rings, with projecting elements such as climbing irons or stirrups, by means of an automatic inserting mechanism which removes the climbing irons from a magazine and automatically inserts them into a mold core. These climbing elements are guided automatically to a core segment and are brought into housings therein during a time interval between the ejection of a completed concrete article from the mold cavity in a first working cycle and the next following work cycle in timed overlap with carried out work steps during this time interval. This automatic process takes place while the operator withdraws and takes away a completed article from the machine at the end of a work cycle and prepares the machine for the next work cycle. This leads to equally short machine cycle times for completion of concrete articles with or without climbing elements.

Claims81

Dependent claims

A method for molding concrete articles with one or more projecting elements, comprising the steps of:

providing a mold core having a core segment and a remaining portion, the core segment having one or more housings corresponding to the one or more projecting elements, and said housings being movable relative to the remaining portion of said mold core into a release position and a closed position;
providing a mold jacket relative to said mold core so as to form a mold cavity;
starting a first work cycle by moving said core segment into the closed position, and bringing in and holding the one or more elements in said housings;
pouring concrete into the mold cavity to form the article;
completing the first work cycle after hardening of the concrete with the elements therein, by moving the core segment into the release position and removing the concrete article from said mold cavity;
and automatically bringing projecting elements for a next work cycle into said housings of said core segment during a time interval between said first work cycle and said next work cycle and in timed overlap with the working steps which may occur during this time interval.

3 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Method and apparatus for forming concrete articles containing one or more projecting elements

Life of this patent

Method and apparatus for forming concrete articles containing one or more projecting elements

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims81