GB380364A - Improvements in or relating to the manufacture of electric incandescent lamps and the like - Google Patents

Abstract

380,364. Attaching electric lamp filaments. GENERAL ELECTRIC CO., Ltd., Magnet House, Kingsway, London. -(Assignees of Patent-Treuhand-Ges. fur Elektrische Gl³hlampen; 11, Ehrenbergstrasse, Berlin.) Feb. 29, 1932, No. 6071. Convention date, March 3, 1931. Addition to 283,890, [Class 39 (ii), Electric lamps, Incandescent]. [Class 39 (ii).] The machine claimed in the parent Specification is modified by the provision of filamentmounting apparatus wherein at each step of the machine a filament is fed through a funnel into a clamp, where one of its ends is clamped within the hooked end of a current supply wire attached to a lamp pedestal which is carried by one of a series of vertically movable holding- heads, after which the holding-head, with the filament hanging from one supply wire, is raised, moved forward a step, and again lowered so that the free end of the hanging filament is seized by grippers and inserted within the hooked end of the other current supply wire and clamped therein by another set of clamping-jaws. The filaments are fed either manually or automatically through a funnel 222, Fig. 1, mounted with its outlet end 223 adjacent to one of a pair of fixed jaws 207 disposed at the extremities of a strip 209 forming part of a vertical block 211. The sides of the block 211 correspond to two consecutive operating positions of a rotary carrier supporting the lamp pedestals 6, and two rotatable clamping-levers 213 each formed with a jaw 208 to coact with a fixed jaw 207 are operated simultaneously by a head 218 fixed on a vertically movable rod 217. The lamp pedestals each mounted in a holding-head 5 consist of a foot tube 6, centre support 8, and two current supply wires 9, the alignment of the holding-heads being such that, when lowered, the hooked end 9<1> of the left-hand supply wire 9 comes between the jaws 207, 208 adjacent to the funnel 222. A filament is then placed in the funnel and slides down until its lower end projects through the nozzle 223 and abuts against the plate 209, whereupon the rod 217 is lifted and the jaw 208 clamps the hooked end 9<1> of the supply wire into the end of the filament. The rod 217 is next lowered, and the lamp pedestals are raised to their original position, so that the filament is drawn out of the nozzle 223 and hangs freely from the wire 9, after which the carrier is moved forward a step to bring the pedestal and filament above the left-hand clamp 207, 208. To ensure that the passage of a filament through the delivery nozzle is not retarded by dampness the delivery tube is surrounded by a heating resistance 224. A blast of air from a supply tube 225 is also blown through the nozzle after each upward movement of the holding-heads 5 to prevent a filament being retained therein in the event of there being no pedestal or supply wire when the holding-head is in its clamping position. In the second and left-hand clamping position of the machine the pedestal is lowered above a funnel-shaped guide formed of two relatively movable parts 242, 243, Figs. 6 and 8, and the filament 45 assumes a coiled shape, with its free lower end projecting through an aperture 239 in a horizontal plate 230 which has a pair of gripping-jaws 237, 238 mounted on its underside, the jaw 238 in this position being held apart from the jaw 237 by a detent finger 255 at the end of an arm 254 on a lever 252 controlled by a vertically movable rod 253, Fig. 1. At the end of the downward movement of the pedestal the rod 253 is moved upwardly, causing the lever 252 and arm 254 to swing, so that the finger 255 is moved to allow the jaws 237, 238 to grip the lower end of the filament and, on the continued movement of the lever 252, the arm 254 strikes a cam surface 258 at the rear end of the pivoted portion 243 of the funnel-shaped guide, which is thus opened to release the filament. The horizontal plate 230 is mounted on a shaft 229 pivoted in the upper end of a member 228 mounted on a rod 227 which is moved upwardly after the funnel-shaped guide is opened, whereupon a pin 232 carried by an arm 231 on the shaft 229 is pulled down along the edge of a plate 235 by a tensioned spring 234, thereby rotating the arm 231 and plate 230 anticlockwise until the plate 230 assumes the vertical position shown in Fig. 3, with the filament hanging in a loop behind the plate. Subsequently the rod 227 is rotated to swing the member 228 through 180‹, bringing the closed jaws 237, 238 of the gripper mounted on the plate 230 adjacent to the hooked end 9<1> of the right-hand current supply wire, a slight downward movement then being given to the rod 227 to insert the end of the filament in the bent-up part of the hook. The clamping- levers 213 are again operated by an upward movement of the rod 217, and on the downward movement of the latter an abutment 261, Fig. 1, on the left-hand clamping-lever 213 strikes the rear end 256, Fig. 3, of the transferring gripper jaw 238 which is thus opened to release the filament. The filament being now secured at both ends to the supply wires 9 is carried upwardly and forwardly by the conveyer, and the rod 227 is actuated to return the member 228 and plate 230 to their normal position. Specification 335,839, [Class 39 (ii), Electric lamps, Incandescent], is referred to.