GB2127858A

GB2127858A - A method of raising capability of a shuttleless loom and the like

Info

Publication number: GB2127858A
Application number: GB08227697A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Liou Shu-Lien
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 1982-09-28
Filing date: 1982-09-28
Publication date: 1984-04-18

Abstract

The momentum of a tape wheel, or other loom part, is absorbed, upon reversal of movement, by springs etc, which impart their energy to the tape wheel to assist reversal. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Improvements in shuttleless looms and the like This invention relates to shuttleless looms and the like.

In a known shuttleless loom, the filling thread is inserted from one side of the loom up to approximately the centre of the shed by means of a gripper which is arranged at the end of a flexible tape and the thread is turned over there to a second gripper arranged at the end of another flexible tape on the other side of the loom. Upon each change in the direction of rotation of the tape wheel, it must be stopped and then again accelerated. On the occasion of change in the direction of rotation of the tape wheel, a large amount of moment of inertia is caused becaue of its relatively heavy weight and its size. This further limits the operational speed of the tape wheel and a lot of driving power is thus wasted, so that the operational speed of the conventional tape shuttleless loom is limited to 200 to 300 RPM.

It has been proposed in U.S. Patent No.

3,987,822 that the tape wheel should be of lightweight metal or plastic. Also a compensative method of variation moment for rotational mechanic elements has been disclosed in Japanese patent publication No. 55-63032. In fact, these two proposals still cannot completely eliminate the moment of inertia caused by the tape wheel and its related mechanism.

It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a method of breaking-through conventional technical thoughts and raising the capabilities of a shuttle less loom.

According to the invention there is provided a method for elimination the moment of inertia of a loom and the like comprising the excessive moment of inertia produced before every reversal direction on non-working operation coming from the reciprocating drive motion of the mechanism for insert the filling thread, or before every reversal rotation of straight-line reciprocating stroke operation system for a loom, particularly to a shuttleless loom, or coming from a swinging mechanism of unidirectional reciprocating operation, is entirely absorbed and stored by an elastic energy storing means, making it fully transformed into a part of reversal rotation motivation force, and then both the transformed reversal motivation force and the prime motive force of the original mechanism are supplemented each other to greatly reduce the prime motive force originally required.

Thus, the excessive moment of inertia before every reversal rotation of the tape wheel type of shuttleless loom can be entirely absorbed, stored and transformed into a part of the driving force for every reversal rotation. During the reversal rotation both the stored drive action force and the motive force supplement each other so as to substantially shorten the time required by the motivation of reversal rotation and then capable of enhancing to a large extent the productive speed and economical efficiency of the tape shuttleless loom.

The present invention also provides a method of raising the capabilities of the shuttleless loom and the like, in which, the moment of inertia being originally excessive and detrimental to the loom body is entirely absorbed, stored and transformed into a part of the drive action force during every reversal rotations to reduce the driving force required, enabling the force to be fully effective without unnecessary wastage to ensure accomplishment of energy source savings.

Also the method is capable of eliminating the moment of inertia of a tape shuttleless loom and the like to raise its capabilities, in which, the drastic moment of inertia produced by the loom during reciprocating movements can be entirely absorbed and stored, capable of eliminating entirely the powerful impact originated on the loom parts by the moment of inertia during the loom's cease of action before every reversal rotation and further extending substantially the using life of the loom parts.

All the reversal rotation and reciprocating drive members such as idle gear plate, idle gear wheels and their indirect members, as well as the driving devices of prime motive force can be simplified and diminished to lower the manufacturing cost of loom parts.

Because of the elimination of the inertia moment from the tape wheel of the invention mentioned above, the diameter of the tape wheel can be increased and a greater width of cloth may thus be obtained to lower the cost of production.

The invention will now be described, by way of example, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: Fig. 1 shows schematically a front view of one application of the preferred embodiment of the present invention which is arranged on one side of the tape wheel; Fig. 2 shows schematically a perspective view of transformed mechanism foithe tape wheel; Fig. 3 shows schematically a front view of another manner of the present invention; Fig. 4 shows a cross-sectional view of the tape wheel of the present invention.

For the purpose of easy explanation, the preferred embodiment of the present invention is taken an example of the tape wheel of shuttleless loom through which the filling thread is inserted from one side of the loom up to the center of the shed.

As shown in the Figs. 1, 2, 3 and 4 of the appended drawings, the original structure is explained in the part of a tape drive mechanism, the transmission of the tape wheel shaft 20 on the bracket 10 connected at the left and right sides of the loom platform is done by the crank 21 through a crank arm 22, driving reciprocatingly the idle gear plate 23 and further transmitting idle gear wheel 24 and the gear 25 of tape wheel shaft 20, by means of the left and right reciprocating rotation of gear 25 of the tape wheel shaft 20, making a tape wheel 30 on a same arbor also in a left and right oriented reciprocating rotation; a tape 50 of said tape wheel 30 fixed at its base end by a tape bolt 51 is also led through shoe-shaped wooden rails 6 and tapeguide 7 to follow the left and right reciprocating rotation of the tape wheel 30 to produce an elongation and contraction motion, and at the end of tape 50 is fitted a gripper 52 to constitute a reciprocating tape driving mechanism.

Known tape looms stagnate at an operation speed of 200-300 RPM because the moment of inertia is very large, particularly that of tape wheel 30 making the members such as idle rack 23, idle gear wheel 24, and gear wheel 25 of tape wheel shaft 20 although manufactured considerably robust stili not capable of bearing the drastic impact and the moment of inertia during operation, for in every reversal rotation the powerful impact action force at the place of engagement between various gears and between bearings incur frequently burning out and breaking off with a high damage rate, and again it can not raise the driving speed.

According to one construction of an embodiment of the present invention as shown in Figs. 1,2, 3 and 4, on the motion bracket 10 is fitted two sets of fixed or movable and adjustable spring seat 61, 61A that are fitted with springs 60, 60A and are not in a planar positon but out of line in the left and right directions; the top ends of said sets of springs 60, 60A are covered by caps 62, 62A at the ends of respective support 63, 63A fitted on the bushing of the tape wheel shaft 20 and independently swinging one by one; outside of said caps 62, 62A, are additionally fitted elastic pads 64, 64A. And at a proper position is fitted a projection 31 (see Fig. 4) to facilitate the drastic moment of inertia before every reversal rotation of the tape wheel 30 can strike the elastic pad 64 (or 64A) through the projection 31 inside said tape wheel 30 and therefrom impact/presses on the spring 60 (or 60A), then the drastic moment of inertia will be absorbed and stored by the spring 60 (or 60A) of one embodiment of energy storing device according to the present invention, until at the instance of the tape wheel is to reversally rotate again (i.e. at the moment stoppage of left or right rotation) the strength of the moment of inertia applied to said tape wheel 30 directly or indirectly just in equilibrium with the elastic force absorbed and stored by the spring 60 (or 60A) of energy storing devices, and at that time the elastic force absorbed and stored is transformed into the driving force during reversal rotation, which will rapidly spring back the tape wheel 30 by reversal rotation from said spring 60 (or 60A) through the projection 31 of tape wheel; thus the uninterrupted reciprocating movements, reversal rotation and spring-back produce supplemental elastic shock momentum and then smoothly achieve the aim of raising the operation speed.

Therefore, the present invention is able to utilize a very simple energy storing setup, not only avoiding the occurence of impact and torque detrimental to loom parts in every reversal rotation, but also storing and absorbing elastically the entire moment of inertia before every reversal rotation and springing back alternately to produce an economically valuable balanced elastic shock movement to raise loom's operation speed and enhance its economical efficiency, and, in addition, a very large benefit of energy source saving is assured.

The embodiment as described above uses springs as the elastic energy storing devices to show their feasibility; however, other elastic or flexible energy storing devices, for example, plateshaped spring, or pneumatic or hydraulic elastic energy-storing body can certainly be used instead.

The foregoing description is only the basic conception of the present invention, in which, a physical structure is applied to a tape wheel type shuttleless loom; the present invention can nevertheless be applied to the tape rod type and the tape gear type looms as well as other wide applications which are capable of absorbing, storing and springing back the moment of inertia to raise their productive speed and save energy.

Claims

1. A method for elimination the moment of inertia of a loom and the like comprising the excessive moment of inertia produced before every reversal direction on non-working operation coming from the reciprocating drive motion of the mechanism for insert the filling thread, or before every reversal rotation of straight-line reciprocating stroke operation system for a loom, particularly to a shuttleless loom, or coming from a swinging mechanism of unidirectional reciprocating operation, is entirely absorbed and stored by an elastic energy storing means, making it fully transformed into a part of reversal rotation motivation force, and then both the transformed reversal motivation force and the prime motive force of the original mechanism are supplemented each other to greatly reduce the prime motive force originally required.

2. A method according to claim 1 in which the elastic energy storing means is a coil spring means.

3. A method according to claim 1 in which said elastic energy storing means is mounted at the location in an operative relationship with a tape wheel.

4. A method according to claim 3 in which one end of said coil spring means is fitted at spring supporting means and the free end of said coil spring means is connected to a swinging arm means and the other end of said swinging arm means is rotatably mounted at the shaft of said tape wheel.

5. A method according to claim 4 in which the free end of said coil spring means is additionally fitted an elastic pad.

6. A method according to claim 4 in which a projection is formed on said tape wheel in an operative relationship with said free end of said coil spring means.

7. A method according to claim 2 in which said elastic energy shoring means comprises a pair of coil spring means, both of which are mounted at the same radius position and their fixed ends are opposite so as to enable said projection formed at said tape wheel to impact on either one of the free ends of both coil spring means when said tape wheel is rotated.

8. A method according to claim 7 in which one end of said swinging arm means of said pair of spring means is pivotally mounted at the shaft of said tape wheel independently.

9. A method according to claim 1 wherein the elastic energy storing means is a plate-shaped spring means.

10. A method according to claim 1 , wherein said elastic energy storing means is a kind of pneumatic elastic energy-storing device.

11. A method of eliminating the moment of inertia of a loom and the like substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawings.

12. A loom having a reciprocating drive in which elastic means are provided to absorb and store the inertia of the drive when it is reversed, and then the stored energy in the elastic means are used to supplement a prime motive force.

13. A loom substantially as herein described with reference to the accompanying drawings.