Apparatus and method for manufacturing a tire bead core assembly
AssigneeRobert Franke
InventorsAdri Verschoor, Rob Franke
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An apparatus for manufacturing an assembly of an annular bead wire core and a surrounding ring of filler material attached thereto comprising at least one former, typically mounted on a turntable, and a number of stations. At a first station, rubber-coated bead wire is wound around the former to produce the annular bead wire core. At a second station, the ring of filler material is arranged over the previously wound rubber-coated wire core to form the bead core assembly and at a third station the bead core assembly is unloaded from the former. Conveniently the former(s) is(are) moved from station to station by indexing movement of the turntable. The invention also relates to a method of manufacturing a tire bead core assembly.
Claims16
A method of manufacturing a tire bead core assembly of a bead wire material and a surrounding ring of a filler material having tapered sides extending radially outward from a base, comprising:
- coating wire material with rubber at a coating station to form a rubber-coated bead wire material;
- feeding the rubber-coated bead wire material in a continuous length from the coating station to a rotatable former;
- rotating the former to wind at least one layer of the rubber-coated bead wire material fed thereto onto an annular winding surface of the former to form a bead wire core;
- extruding a length of elastomeric filler material to a desired cross-section and supplying it to the former;
- without removing the at least one layer of rubber-coated bead wire material from said annular surface of the former, rotating the former to wind the filler material in a single turn directly onto the wound bead wire core and causing the base to be simultaneously pressed against, and securely retained on, the underlying bead wire core to form a bead core assembly consisting of the wound bead wire core and the filler material, wherein the filler material and the bead wire core are held together entirely by the direct adhesion of the filler material to the bead wire core;
- and
- unloading the formed bead core assembly from the former prior to the formation, on a tire building drum, of a tire incorporating said formed bead core assembly.
Apparatus for manufacturing a tire bead core assembly, the assembly consisting of a rubber-coated bead wire material and a surrounding ring of elastomeric filler material having tapered sides extending radially outward from an inner base, the apparatus comprising:
- mounting means movable between at least first, second and third stations;
- coating means for coating wire material with rubber to form a rubber-coated bead wire material;
- a former rotatably supported on said mounting means having an annular winding surface and a bead wire material gripping device;
- rotating means for rotating the former;
- means for feeding said rubber-coated bead wire material in a continuous length from said coating means to said first station;
- first means located at said first station including a feeding unit arranged to feed the leading end of the rubber-coated bead wire material to the gripping device so that, when said leading end is gripped by the gripping device and the rotating means are subsequently operated to rotate the former, at least one layer of the rubber-coated bead wire material is wound onto the annular winding surface, and a pressing unit arranged to press the bead wire material against the winding surface to form an annular bead wire core on the former;
- second means located at said second station including means for receiving the filler material, aligning the filler material with the core so that the filler material is wound directly onto the core, while the core remains on the former, as the former is rotated and pressing the base of the filler material onto the annular bead wire core as the former is rotated to wind the filler material onto the core and simultaneously securely retain the filler material on the formed annular bead wire core to form a tire bead core assembly;
- and
- third means located at said third station for unloading the tire bead core assembly from the former.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.