Surface-treating apparatus for can body blanks

A surface-treating apparatus for producing can body blanks, comprising:

• original sheet-cutting means for cutting an original sheet into a plurality of can body blank materials each having a predetermined width and being further dividable into a plurality of blanks for a plurality of can bodies;
• a conveying path for conveying the can body blank materials obtained by the cutting means by separately holding the can body blank materials between a plurality of pairs of feed rolls;
• material-feeding means for intermittently feeding the can body blank materials to the conveying path;
• heating means provided along the conveying path for heating the can body blank materials which are conveyed in a row in a conveying direction along the conveying path;
• a continuous biaxially-stretched polyester film on which a print pattern corresponding to a blank for a single can body and an identification mark have been printed successively at predetermined intervals, the film having a width shorter than said predetermined width of said can body blank materials;
• first film-feeding means provided on one side of the can body blank materials for feeding said biaxially-stretched polyester film to one side of the can body blank materials along the conveying direction of the can body blank materials, said first film-feeding means comprising feed rollers having predetermined widths and disposed with respect to said conveying path such that said biaxially-stretched polyester film is fed to a predetermined position on said one side of said can body blank materials wherein side edges of said can body blank materials extend beyond both side edges of said biaxially-stretched polyester film;
• first press-bonding means for successively press-bonding under heat the biaxially-stretched polyester film fed by the first film-feeding means to said one side of the can body blank materials heated by the heating means at said predetermined position according to a traveling position thereof, and the first press-bonding means moreover coupling the can body blank materials forming a row in the conveying direction in a continuous form by the biaxially-stretched polyester film while defining metal-exposed areas, the metal-exposed areas being used as welding parts of the blank for a single can body and being disposed at edge portions of the can body blank materials along said both side edges of the biaxially-stretched polyester film;
• a continuous plain polyester film having a width shorter than said predetermined width of said can body blank materials;
• second film-feeding means provided on another side of the can body blank materials for feeding said plain polyester film to the other side of the can body blank materials along the conveying direction of the can body blank materials, said second film-feeding means comprising feed rollers having predetermined widths and disposed with respect to said conveying path such that said plain polyester film is fed to a predetermined position on said other side of said can body blank materials wherein side edges of said can body blank materials extend beyond both side edges of said plain polyester film;
• second press-bonding means for successively press-bonding under heat the plain polyester film fed by the second film-feeding means to the other side of the can body blank materials heated by the heating means of said predetermined position according to a traveling position thereof, and the second press-bonding means moreover coupling the can body blank materials forming a row in the conveying direction in a continuous form by the plain polyester film while defining metal-exposed areas, the metal-exposed areas being used as welding parts of the blank for a single can body and being at edge portions of the can body blank materials along said both side edges of the plain polyester film;
• blank material-cutting means arranged on a downstream side of the first and second press-bonding means along the conveying path for cutting a continuous sheet of the blank materials along a width direction thereof at a space area between the adjacent print patterns when the identification marks printer on the biaxially-stretched polyester film on the blank materials are detected, thereby obtaining surface-treated can body blank materials;
• driving-out means for driving the surface-treated can body blank materials out of the conveying path;
• and
• dividing means for dividing each of the surface treated can body blank materials driven out of the conveying path according to the individual print patterns, thereby obtaining a plurality of blanks for a plurality of can bodies.