Cloth spreading apparatus

A cloth spreading apparatus for spreading a plurality of superimposed layers of cloth from a cloth roll assembly onto a transversely extending work surface, said apparatus comprising:

• a carriage assembly at least partially supported on a work surface and capable of being moved across the work surface between first and second locations;
• a mounting frame assembly carried by said carriage assembly and including a cloth roll supporting portion having a pair of spaced apart arm means;
• tension sensing means carried by said carriage assembly and capable of sensing the tension of the cloth being spread;
• and
• prefeed motor means associated with one of said arm means and engageable with said cloth roll assembly to either prefeed cloth from said cloth roll assembly or to brake said cloth roll assembly in response to the sensed tension.

A cloth spreading apparatus for spreading a plurality of superimposed layers of cloth from a cloth rol assembly onto a transversely extending work surface;

• said apparatus including
• a carriage assembly at least partially supported on a work surface and capable of being moved across the work surface between first and second locations;
• a mounting frame assembly supported on said carriage assembly;
• a mandrel carried by said mounting frame assembly, said mandrel being assembled to a cloth roll for rotation therewith;
• tension sensing means on said carriage assembly capable of sensing the tension of the cloth being spread;
• and
• electric prefeed motor means coupled to said mandrel and capable of either driving said mandrel when the sensed tension in the cloth being spread is excessive or dynamically braking said mandrel when the sensed tension in the cloth being spread is insufficient.

A cloth spreading apparatus for spreading a plurality of superimposed layers of cloth from a cloth roll assembly onto a transversely extending work surface;

• said apparatus including:
• a carriage assembly at least partially supported on a work surface and capable of being moved across the work surface between first and second locations;
• a mounting frame assembly supported on said carriage assembly and including a pair of spaced apart outwardly extending arm means mounted for movement between an upright operative cloth spreading position and a downwardly extending position for loading and unloading a cloth roll assembly, each of said arms being provided with a J-slot;
• a mandrel disposed within a cloth roll for rotation therewith, spaced apart portions of the mandrel being engaged by said J-slots when the cloth roll and mandrel assembly is loaded onto the mounting frame;
• a prefeed motor means having an output engageable with said mandrel and capable of driving said mandrel to prefeed cloth from said roll;
• and
• tension sensing means supported on said carriage assembly and capable of sensing the tension in the cloth being spread and operatively interconnected with the prefeed motor means in such a manner that the prefeed motor means is caused to be driven in a first direction to cause cloth to be discharged from the cloth roll assembly when the cloth tension is excessive.

A cloth spreading apparatus for spreading a plurality of superimposed layers of cloth from a cloth roll assembly onto a transversely extending work surface, said apparatus comprising:

• a carriage assembly at least partially supported on a work surface and capable of being moved across the work surface between first and second locations;
• and
• a mounting frame assembly supported on said carriage assembly and including
• a subassembly including a first portion pivotal about a first axis transverse to the direction of movement of said carriage and a second portion mounted on the first portion and rotatable 180.degree. between first and second operative positions about a second axis perpendicular to the first portion, said second portion including a pair of spaced apart outwardly extending arm means capable of supporting a cloth roll assembly, and
• operating means capable of causing said first and second portions of the frame assembly to pivot about said transverse axis so as to cause the arm means to be moved between an upright operative cloth spreading position and a downwardly extending cloth roll assembly loading and unloading position.