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US 5,683,145 AGranted
Brush finishing machine and a method of profiling toothbrush bristle tufts
AssigneeG.B. Boucherie N.V.
InventorBart Gerard Boucherie
Life of this patent
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AssigneeG.B. Boucherie N.V.
InventorBart Gerard Boucherie
Estimating the term…
A toothbrush finishing machine and method are provided for producing toothbrushes with profiled, or contoured, patterns of bristle tufts. The bristles are selectively trimmed to different lengths using successively a plurality of different rotating cutting devices which each have a substantially cylindrical cutting surface with an axial gap therein. The axial gap of each preceding cutting device is wider than the corresponding axial gap of a succeeding axial device. Each rotating cutting device is followed by a rounding device provided for rounding the free end of the bristles. Each rounding device has deflecting members to selectively deflect bristles other than those trimmed in the preceding trimming step, so that the trimmed bristles have their ends projecting beyond the deflected bristles. The projecting bristle ends are engaged by the rounding device to be rounded.
A brush finishing machine comprising a plurality of succeeding finishing stations for profiling bristle tufts and indexing means for successively moving brushes through said finishing stations, said finishing stations comprising a plurality of bristle trimming stations, each of said trimming stations having at least two generally cylindrical rotating cutters mounted on a common shaft in an axially spaced relationship to define an axial gap therebetween, and each trimming station following a preceding trimming station having an axial gap between said rotating cutters which is narrower than a corresponding axial gap in said preceding trimming station, thereby cutting bristles to a greater length than said preceding trimming station.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.