AU719876B3

AU719876B3 - A wire stripping apparatus for stripping insulation from insulated wire

Info

Publication number: AU719876B3
Application number: AU10170/00A
Authority: AU
Inventors: Frank Michael Ghidella
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2000-01-07
Filing date: 2000-01-07
Publication date: 2000-05-18
Anticipated expiration: 2001-05-18

Description

AUSTRALIA

Patents Act 1990 COMPLETE SPECIFICATION FOR A PETTY PATENT Name of Applicant: Actual Inventor: Address for Service: Invention Title: Frank Michael GHIDELLA As above CULLEN CO., Patent Trade Mark Attorneys, 240 Queen Street, Brisbane, QId. 4000, Australia.

A WIRE STRIPPING APPARATUS FOR STRIPPING INSULATION FROM INSULATED WIRE The following statement is a full description of this invention including the best method of performing it known to me: A WIRE STRIPPING APPARATUS FOR STRIPPING INSULATION FROM INSULATED WIRE This invention relates to a wire stripping apparatus which can strip the insulation (usually plastic) from insulated wire, and allows the (valuable) wire to be recovered.

Insulated cables generally have a copper wire running through the centre the wire being insulated by thick plastic or plastic composite material to prevent a shock hazard. The copper wire is valuable but needs to be stripped from the remainder of the cable. The cable is usually quite tightly bonded to the copper wire and is not easily removed.

The present invention is directed to a wire stripping apparatus which can remove the wire from a cable and can retrieve the wire for re-sale or recycling.

In one form, the invention resides in a wire stripping apparatus for stripping metal wire from an insulated cable, the apparatus comprising a cable inlet, means to pull the cable through the apparatus, a shaving means which shaves off part of the insulation to expose part of the wire in the cable, and a separating means to remove the remainder of the cable from the wire.

In a more particular form, the invention resides in the apparatus as described above wherein the shaving means is a horizontal cutting blade which shaves off a top wall of the insulation, and the separating means has a U-shaped leading edge which is positioned to remove the wire from the remainder of the insulation, to pass the stripped wire between the walls of the U-shaped edge and to pass the remainder of the insulation along the outside of the U-shaped leading edge.

In the manner described above, a length of waste cable can have a top part shaved off with a cutting blade to expose part of the wire, or to at least make it easier to pull the wire out of the cable, and has a separating means which allows the remainder of the cable to be removed from the wire.

The apparatus may pull the cable through the apparatus by initially removing part of the wire from the cable, clipping this part to a winding means (for instance a winding drum) and rotating the winding drum to pull the remainder of the cable through the apparatus.

Various rollers and the like can be used to keep the cable tensioned to facilitate removal of the insulation from the cable.

The apparatus can be adjusted to remove wire from cables having different diameters or sizes. This can be achieved by allowing the shaving means to be adjustable and also allowing the separating means to be adjustable.

An embodiment of the apparatus will be described with reference to the following drawings in which Figure 1 illustrates a general flow diagram of a cable being stripped.

Figure 2 is a plan view of an apparatus according to an embodiment of the invention.

Figure 3 is a close-up view of the shaving means.

Figure 4 is a close-up view of the separating means.

Figure 5A illustrates a preferred arrangement for attaching the shaving means to the remainder of the apparatus and allowing adjustment of the shaving means.

Figure 5B illustrates a sandwiched shaving blade which can be used as part of the shaving means.

Figure 5C illustrates a plan view of a different type of shaving blade.

Figure 6 illustrates various components of a pressure roller assembly.

Referring to Figure 1, there is shown a general flow diagram of the wire stripping apparatus. In the diagram, an insulated cable 10 is passed through the various stations in the apparatus ultimately to extract the central wire core 11 which can be recovered for re-sale.

The insulated cable enters the apparatus and initially passes under and over a pair of rollers 12A, 12B which function to straighten the possibly twisted cable and to assist in tensioning of the cable. The cable then passes between a pressure roller assembly 13 and then to a front alignment and pressure roller 14 before the top wall of the cable is shaved off via a shaving means which in the embodiment is in the form of a cutting blade Thereafter, the partially shaved cable passes to a separator 16 which functions to remove the wire core 11 from the remainder of the cable. In essence, this means that the insulation material is removed at two points with the top being shaved off by blade 15 with the remainder of the insulation being prised away or cut away by separator 16.

Referring now to Figure 2 which shows an embodiment of the lO apparatus in detail and the various general parts 12A-16 are illustrated in Figure 2 as part of the overall apparatus.

The apparatus has a main base 17 having a length of 600mm, a width of 152mm, a height of 55mm and is formed from 5mm thick steel channel. The entry area 18 is provided with two guide poles 19, 20 with guide pole 19 being straight having a height of 80mm and a diameter of 12mm with guide pole 20 being curved having a height of 70mm and a diameter of 12mm. The guide poles are used to hold the cable in line for feeding through the apparatus.

The base 17 supports on top of it, a running floor 21 which has a length of 365mm, a width of 50mm and a height of 55mm. The floor is also formed from shaped steel. The running floor is formed separately from base 17 and is attached to the top of base 17 through appropriate fasteners. The front area 22 of running floor 21 is pivotally mounted to base 17 to allow it to pivot about a horizontal axis, or said otherwise, allows the running floor to tilt up and down. The other end of the running floor supports a threaded bolt 23 and rotation of the bolt 23 adjusts the height of the running floor with respect to base 17. The running floor is somewhat channel-shaped and the floor of the running floor is slightly V-shaped in cross-section and sloped about 2mm to the central longitudinal axis of the floor, the reason for this being to assist in centering the cable which passes over the top of the floor as it is pulled through the apparatus. The front area 22 has a 450 angled 53mm long Vshaped piece of steel attached to ensure that the wire runs along the centre of the floor.

The running floor 21 rotatably supports a transversely extending horizontal roller 24 this being better illustrated in Figure 1. In Figure 2, the top of roller 24 is just visible through a cut-out in the side wall of the running floor. Roller 24 runs on a pair of roller bearings and a shaft. The roller is 38mm long and has a tapered cross-section again to assist in centering of the cable. The running floor 21 extends from the front area 22 up to separator 16 where the side walls of running floor 21 diverge away from each other to form an outlet.

io Reference will now be made to the separating means 16 and the components which form part of the separating means.

Separating means 16 is positioned just behind the rear end of running floor 21. The arrangement consists of firstly a lower main plate which is a shaped 5mm thick steel section. Main plate 25 is pivotally attached to base 17 via a vertically extending bolt 26 to allow main plate 25 to pivot about a vertical axis. The degree of pivoting (or adjustment) is controlled by an adjustment bolt 27. Not illustrated is a compression spring which sits within main plate 25 and which functions to naturally bias main plate against the nut on bolt 27. By adjusting the position of the nut on bolt 27, the degree of pivoting of main plate 25 relative to base 17 can be adjusted.

Attached to the top of main plate 25 is a roller block 28. Roller block 28 has a diameter of 80mm and a height of 16mm and is formed from thick steel. Roller block 28 supports a fixed vertical shaft 29, and a vertically extending tapered roller 30 is rotatably attached to shaft 29. A collar 31 is attached to the upper end of roller 30 to minimise stripped wire from falling off roller Just behind roller 30 (and better illustrated in Figure 4) is an Lshaped bracket 32 having a height of 50mm and a width of 40mm and being formed of 3mm steel. Bracket 32 is mounted to roller block 28 and is positioned close to roller Attached to bracket 32 is a V-shaped steel separator 33 which is more clearly illustrated in Figure 4. Separator 33 is bolted to bracket 32 via two bolts 34. The separator has a depth of 40mm in the V and tapers from a top width of 11mm to a rounded V-shaped bottom. The leading edge of separator 33 is chisel-shaped underneath to enable the chisel-shaped edge to pass between the wire and the surrounding insulating plastic to separate the plastic from the wire.

The plastic falls away and typically travels around the outside of bracket 32 (illustrated in Figure 4) while the removed wire passes through the V-shaped separator and about roller body 30 and onto a winding handle 34.

By having the separator 33 bolted to bracket 32, the separator can be changed for resharpening, maintenance, repair and the like.

The inside section of the V-shaped separator remains smooth and the separator is only sharpened and shaped underneath the leading edge of the separator and is horizontal and is not angle-shaped.

Bracket 32 is fastened to roller block 28 via a single bolt which allows adjustments to be made between the brackets (and therefore the separator) and the roller block 28.

Referring now to the winding handle 34, the winding handle is a preferred method to pull the cable through the apparatus and to wind the separated copper wire core into a roll for re-sale. Winding handle 34 has a hand grippable handle 36, a horizontal winding shaft 37 which rotates a pickup wheel 38 which in the embodiment is square and cone-shaped for easy and quick pick-up of the wire core after separation from the insulation. The cone has a length of 120mm and a width of 50mm. Two 5mm round rods 39 run the full length of the cone and protrude about 20mm from the end of the cone to lock on the wire core. This assists in winding and pushing along the wire without bunching. The winding handle 34 sits at an angle of approximately 750 to the remainder of the apparatus which allows for the pulling through of larger wires and multi-core wires, where the winder is not used. This saves having to remove this part from the remainder of the apparatus.

Reference will now be made to the shaving means and the parts around it, this being illustrated in a very simple form in Figure 3, and in a more detailed form in Figure The function of the shaving means is to shave off the top wall of the insulation in the cable. Figure 3 illustrates in a simple form how this is achieved by having a horizontal blade 15 which is positioned to cut off the top wall of the insulation. Immediately in front of blade 15 is a roller 14 which aligns and tensions the cable for easy removal of the top wall by blade Referring in greater detail to the parts in Figure 5A, blade 15 in Figure 5A is bolted to an L-shaped bracket 40 which has a height of and a width of 74mm and is formed of 4mm thick steel. Figure 5A illustrates one type of blade 15 which can encompass the blade illustrated in Figure If a "stanley"-type blade 43 (see Figure 5B) is to be used (for instance for rubber covered insulation), it is sandwiched between an upper and lower steel plate 41, 42 plates 41, 42 being attached to L-shaped bracket Bracket 40 comprises two L-shaped parts 44, 45 one part illustrated in Figure 5A but both parts being illustrated in Figure 2.

The L-shaped parts 44, 45 are interconnected by a horizontal rod 46, rod 46 being pivotally connected to a rigid arm 47 which forms part of a rear carrier 48. Therefore, raising and lowering of carrier 48 will raise and lower blade 15 relative to running floor 21.

The upper end of each L-shaped part 44, 45 is interconnected by a transverse strut through which a threaded rod 49 passes with an adjusting nut 50 being on each side of the strut. Nuts 50 can be adjusted to adjust the pivot angle or attack angle of blade 15 on the cable being pulled through the apparatus.

Therefore, the attack angle of blade 15 can be adjusted by adjusting nuts 50 while the height of blade 15 above the running floor can be adjusted by carrier 48.

The lower part of carrier 48 also rotatably supports roller 14 (roller 14 being better illustrated in Figure 3).

Reference will now be made to rear carrier 48 and front carrier 51. Each carrier comprises a vertical square-shaped tube 52. The bottom of tube 52 of carrier 41 supports a roller assembly 13 which comprises two spaced apart horizontal rollers both being tapered and which straddle the roller 24 which is supported by running floor 21. This arrangement keeps pressure on the cable as it passes along the apparatus. The degree of pressure can be adjusted by a top winder 53 which can be wound to increase or decrease the pressure on the cable.

Carrier 48 also has a winder 54 and rotation of this winder will inter alia lift or lower blade 15 to allow the blade to shave a thin strip of plastic off the wire. Blade 15 remains at the set depth until adjusted by winder 54.

Both carriers 48, 51 can be lifted to allow wire to be placed under the blades and the blade depth remains the same such that when the carriers are lowered, further adjustment of the blade is not required. This minimises the possibility of the blade cutting into the metal wire resulting in wire splinters.

Springs 55 each 100mm long and consisting of 1mm thick wire are positioned on either side of each carrier. The springs hold tension inter alia in the rollers at the bottom of each carrier.

Both carriers can be lifted by a rear lever arm 56 which, when pulled downwardly, will cause both carriers to raise thereby allowing new cable to be placed on the apparatus. Handle 56 can be locked in the down position by any suitable manner to keep the carriers raised to allow new cable to be placed in the apparatus.

It should be appreciated that various other changes and modifications can be made to the embodiment described without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as claimed.

Claims

1. A wire stripping apparatus for stripping metal wire from an insulated cable, the apparatus comprising a cable inlet, means to pull the cable through the apparatus, a shaving means which shaves off part of the insulation to expose part of the wire in the cable, and a separating means to remove the remainder of the cable from the wire, the shaving means being a horizontal cutting blade which shaves off a top wall of the insulation, and the separating means has a U-shaped leading edge which is positioned to remove the wire from the remainder of the insulation, to pass the stripped lo wire between the walls of the U-shaped edge and to pass the remainder of the insulation along the outside of the U-shaped leading edge.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to the accompanying drawings. DATED this 81 day of March 2000 Frank GHIDELLA By his Patent Attorneys CULLEN CO.