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US 4,833,906 AGranted
Machine for making star-shaped fasteners
AssigneeStar Fasteners International, Inc.
InventorFrank R. Potucek
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A wire straightener and multiple preform rollers prepare a continuous length wire for further forming by multiple form rollers having multiple spaced apart notches formed in an annular edge of the rollers. Some notches skip a section of the wire to be headed, and other notches serve to form barbs in the wire. In a first embodiment, after the formed wire is fed to a gripper housing where the wire is cut to a predetermined length, the skipped section is punched to create the fastener head. In a second embodiment, the formed wire is cut and fed to a rotary heading machine.
Claims50
In a nail-making machine that forms a continuous length of wire into individual nails of preselected length, comprising:
- a preform roller station including a first set of plural rollers that are radially disposed relative to a path of travel of said wire;
- each of said preform rollers having a substantially flat annular working surface;
- said preform rollers specifically positioned to collectively impart a polygonal cross section to said wire;
- a form roller station including a second set of plural rollers that are radially and equidistiantly disposed relative to a path of travel of said wire and equiangularly spaced relative to one another about the circumference of said wire;
- each of said second set of rollers having a convex annular, working surface;
- means mounting said second set of rollers for radial movement between a radially innermost position, a radially outermost position, and a plurality of functional intermediate positions therebetween for forming, at each of said respective radial positions of said second set of rollers, a wire having a star-shaped cross-section including a plurality of radially-extending fin members, said fin members of said respective wires having varying angular intervals in the range of about 70.degree.-100.degree. therebetween;
- and
- said wire having complementally formed concave bight portions formed about its circumference by said second set of rollers, there being as many bight portions as there are rollers in said second set of rollers;
- each of said bight portions being disposed intermediate a pair of said radially extending fin members, there being as many fin members as there are rollers in said second set of rollers.
6 more elements
A nail-making machine, comprising:
- a wire supply means for supplying wire having a round cross section to said machine on a substantially continuous basis;
- a wire straightening means;
- a preform roller station;
- said preform roller station including five preform roller members having substantially flat annular edges to form said wire having a round cross section into wire having a generally pentagonal cross section;
- a form roller station being axially aligned and longitudinally spaced in relation to said preform roller station;
- said form roller station including five form roller members radially and equidistantly disposed with respect to a path of travel of said wire, said path of travel being coincident with a longitudinal axis of symmetry of said wire;
- said form roller members being equiangularly spaced relative to one another about the circumference of said wire;
- each of said form roller members having plural deep notches formed on its outer edge at equidistantly spaced intervals to skip roll said wire;
- means mounting said form roller member at radial positions which are spaced from the longitudinal axis of symmetry of said wire by a radial distance effective for forming said wire into a star-shaped cross-section including five radially-extending fins which are tapered along their radial extent, said fins having angular intervals of about 85.degree. therebetween;
- said fins being of a common radial length and having their respective outermost edges coincident with an imaginary circle the diameter of which is between three to four times greater than a core diameter of said wire;
- a pointing and cutting station including plural cutter roller members having pointed projections formed on their respective outermost edges at equidistantly spaced intervals, said pointing and cutting station operative to cut preselected lengths of wire;
- and
- a nail-heading station;
- whereby wire is formed into nails having a non-circular cross section.
11 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.