Applying labels to blow molded articles

In a method for forming hollow blown plastic articles by blow molding parisons into conformity with cavities of a longitudinally spaced array of mold sections wherein parisons are extruded in the form of tubes into an array of neck molds on a head,

• the head is moved axially away from the extruder to define the parisons,
• the array of mold sections are closed about the parisons,
• the parisons are blown outwardly to form hollow blown articles, and the blown articles are grasped by a take out mechanism and the mechanism is reciprocated generally horizontally in a first direction away from and a second direction toward said molds after the mold sections are opened,
• the improvement for applying labels to the hollow blown plastic articles comprising
• positioning a label carrier having an array of spaced vacuum pick up devices movably supported on said carrier mounted adjacent said molds for reciprocating movement generally horizontally in said first direction past a source of labels, at which the array of vacuum devices are actuated to pick up labels, to a position between the open mold sections and in said second direction generally horizontally away from said molds and toward the sources of labels,
• and moving the carrier in a reciprocating movement in said first direction to a position between the longitudinally spaced array of mold sections substantially at the same time as the take out mechanism is moved in said second direction adjacent the mold sections to grasp the blown articles and then moving the take out mechanism in said first direction to remove said blown articles as the labels are being applied to the array of cavities of the mold sections so that the labels are delivered with substantially no delay in cycle time such that the vacuum devices can be actuated to deliver the labels to the cavities of the array of open mold sections.