GB1407061A - Process and apparatus for filling a chamber made between two coaxial cylindrical elements of a cigarette filter - Google Patents

Abstract

1407061 Tobacco-smoke filter manufacture F J BURRUS & CIE 10 Nov 1972 [10 Nov 1971] 52028/72 Heading A2C [Also in Division B1] Different fluent filter materials, stored separately in two or more distinct reservoirs, are homogeneously mixed during free fall into a loading funnel 8 which opens laterally into a channel through which spaced filter elements 3, 4 are conveyed, to fill the chambers 5 formed by the spaces between successive elements 3, 4 with mixed filter materials, while an upward flow of air through the funnel 8 in the free fall area removes dust particles. A container 9 is divided into two reservoirs by a partition 23 the position of the lower edge of which is adjustable to control the relative proportions of the different fluent materials that pass out of the reservoirs through a square tube 36 and into a mixing tube 37. The tube 37 is provided with baffles 39 and is subjected to suction applied through a tube 43 at its top end. The rate of feed of the fluent materials into the tube 36 is controlled by a rotary device shown in Fig. 3 in response to photo electric detection by a device 11 of the level of the mixed filter materials in the bottom of the funnel 8. The chambers 5 are subjected to suction, applied via a tube 18, prior to filling, and the resultant composite filter rod filler is wrapped and cut as described in Specification 1332423. In another embodiment, Fig. 4 (not shown), the filter materials are first allowed to fall against baffles that take the form of fins helically disposed around a stationary vertical shaft and then pass through a succession of horizontally disposed wire mesh grids in the free fall mixing region.