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US 8,770,250 B2Granted
Thermoformable web joining apparatus
AssigneeJere F. Irwin
InventorsJere F. Irwin, Dale L. Vantrease
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An apparatus is provided for splicing together old and new thermoformable sheets in order to supply a continuous thermoforming operation. The apparatus is used to join together thermoformable sheets by: providing a first thermoformable sheet with a trailing edge and a second thermoformable sheet with a leading edge; forming a terminal edge portion with a hot element along the trailing edge and a complementary terminal edge portion along the leading edge by severing a scrap sheet from each portion; laterally retracting each scrap portion away from the trailing edge and the leading edge; and joining together the first thermoformable sheet and the second thermoformable sheet by interlocking together the terminal edge portion with the complementary terminal edge portion.
Claims20
An apparatus for joining together thermoformable sheets, comprising:
- a frame;
- a nip roller assembly carried by the frame and having a pair of counter-rotating nip rollers and a drive motor configured to drive at least one of the nip rollers in forward and reverse rotation to move at least one of a new sheet and an old sheet along a sheet travel path;
- an entrance sheet clamp assembly supported by the frame downstream of the nip roller assembly and having a pair of opposed entrance sheet clamping members supported by the frame each provided on opposite sides of the sheet travel path for translation of at least one relative to another between an extended position and a retracted position generally perpendicular to the sheet travel path, both entrance sheet clamping members having a vacuum surface, wherein one of the entrance sheet clamping members is further supported by the frame for lateral retraction and extension substantially parallel to the sheet travel path;
- an exit sheet clamp assembly supported by the frame downstream of the entrance vacuum clamp bar assembly and having a pair of opposed exit sheet clamping members supported by the frame each on opposite sides of the sheet travel path for translation of at least one relative to another between an extended position and a retracted position generally perpendicular to a sheet travel path, both exit sheet clamping members having a vacuum surface, wherein one of the exit sheet clamping members is further supported by the frame for lateral retraction and extension substantially parallel to the sheet travel path, the one exit sheet clamping member provided on an opposite side of the sheet travel path from the one entrance sheet clamping member;
- a sheet severing mechanism for severing an overlapped old sheet and a new sheet provided along the sheet travel path;
- and
- at least one actuator carried by the frame and configured to move the one exit sheet clamping member and the one entrance sheet clamping member toward and away from a splice location on the sheet travel path to retract scrap sheet away from the splice location between the entrance sheet clamp assembly and the exit sheet clamp assembly.
4 more elements
An apparatus for joining together thermoformable sheets, comprising:
- a frame;
- a sheet feed assembly carried by the frame configured to drive at least one of a new sheet and an old sheet along a sheet travel path;
- an entrance sheet clamp assembly supported by the frame downstream of the sheet feed assembly and having a pair of opposed entrance sheet clamping members supported by the frame each provided on opposite sides of the sheet travel path for translation of at least one relative to another between an extended position and a retracted position, both entrance sheet clamping members having a vacuum surface, wherein one of the entrance sheet clamping members is further supported by the frame for lateral retraction and extension generally parallel to the sheet travel path;
- an exit sheet clamp assembly supported by the frame downstream of the entrance sheet clamp assembly and having a pair of opposed exit sheet clamping members supported by the frame each on opposite sides of the sheet travel path for translation of at least one relative to another between an extended position and a retracted position generally perpendicular to a sheet travel path, one of the exit sheet clamping members further supported for retraction and extension in a direction generally parallel to the sheet travel path, both exit sheet clamping members having a vacuum surface;
- a sheet severing mechanism for severing an old sheet and new sheet while provided in overlapped relation alongside the sheet travel path;
- and
- at least one actuator carried by the frame and configured to move the one exit sheet clamping member and the one entrance sheet clamping member toward and away from a splice location on the sheet travel path to retract scrap sheet away from the splice location between the entrance sheet clamp assembly and the exit sheet clamp assembly.
4 more elements
A thermoformable sheet joining apparatus, comprising:
- a frame;
- a nip roller assembly carried by the frame and having a pair of counter-rotating nip rollers and a drive motor configured to drive at least one of the nip rollers in forward and reverse rotation to move at least one of a new sheet and an old sheet along a sheet travel path;
- an entrance sheet clamp assembly supported by the frame downstream of the nip roller assembly and having a pair of opposed entrance sheet clamping members supported by the frame each provided on opposite sides of the sheet travel path for translation of at least one relative to another between an extended position and a retracted position, both entrance sheet clamping members having a vacuum surface, wherein one of the entrance sheet clamping members is further supported by the frame for retraction and extension generally parallel to the sheet travel path;
- an exit sheet clamp assembly supported by the frame downstream of the entrance sheet clamp assembly and having a pair of opposed exit sheet clamping members supported by the frame each on opposite sides of the sheet travel path for translation of at least one relative to another between an extended position and a retracted position generally parallel to a sheet travel path, one of the entrance sheet clamping member and the exit sheet clamping member further supported for retraction and extension in a direction generally parallel to the sheet travel path;
- a kinematic linkage carried by the frame and configured to move the one exit sheet clamping member and the one entrance sheet clamping member toward and away from a splice location on the sheet travel path to retract scrap sheet away from the splice location between the entrance sheet clamp assembly and the exit sheet clamp assembly.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.