Compact post-mold cooling device and method for thermally conditioning molded articles

A thermal conditioning station for thermally treating molded articles comprising:

• means for keeping separate different batches of said molded articles;
• said keeping means comprises a plurality of columnar tubes;
• internal means for holding said molded articles in respective ones of said batches at different levels in said station;
• and
• means for simultaneously thermally treating said molded articles in said batches.

An apparatus for thermally conditioning molded articles outside of a molding machine comprising:

• means for removing said molded articles from said molding machine while said articles are warm and not fully solidified;
• a thermal conditioning station external to said molding machine, said thermal conditioning station including at least two internal thermal conditioning levels;
• means for transferring said molded articles to said thermal conditioning station;
• said thermal conditioning station having means for subjecting said molded articles to at least one thermal conditioning treatment at a first one of said internal levels to improve the quality of the molded articles without increasing the mold cycle time of the molded machine;
• and
• said thermal conditioning station comprising a plurality of tubes for receiving said molded articles and internal means associated with each tube for holding a molded article therein at said first one of said levels and subsequently at a second one of said levels.