GB427125A - Improvements in the manufacture of filter tips for cigarettes - Google Patents

Abstract

427,125. Cigarette-making machines ; cigarettes. MAY, R. F., 9, Manor Road, Potters Bar, Middlesex. Nov. 9, 1933, No. 31292. [Class 130] Filter tips or like mouthpiece insertions for cigarettes are produced by subjecting a length of strip material to the acti.on of a series of folding devices arranged successively at right angles to one another, whereby the strip is folded transversely in stages and at each stage the folded strip is positioned in relation to the folding device next in the series or in a final receiving chamber. A length of the material is fed to the first folding device at each stroke or operation thereof, so that more than one length of material is simultaneously subjected to a folding operation, and at each stroke or operation a complete filter tip or mouthpiece insertion is produced. In the apparatus shown, a length 1 of material fed from a spool by rollers 18 and severed by a cutter 5 is located so that its mid point is disposed over a slot 6<a> in a member 6, into which slot the strip is folded by a reciprocating blade 2. The folded strip is then folded by a second blade 3 into a lateral slot 6b, and by a third blade 4 into a slot 6<c>, terminating in a tubular chamber 6<d> from which the completed filter tip formation is ejected by a plunger 7 into a receiving tube. The blade 4 may move in the opposite direction to the blade 2, or in the same direction, producing tips of the form shown in Figs. 6 and 8 respectively ; and may be carried by a member 4<c> shaped to provide, in conjunction with the chamber 6d, a bore in which the filter tip is shaped to a circular cross-section. From the receiving tube, the filter tip may be delivered into chambers in an intermittently rotated drum or other carrier or into a receiving spoon for transfer into a cigarette, or the tube itself may be a spoon for this purpose. To prevent the folded material from being retracted from the slots 6a, 6<b>, 6<c>, these may be formed with reduced necks, with inlets of barbed or like form, or with lightly loaded spring parts. The blades 2, 3 are adjustably mounted on slides connected by links to the ends of a bell-crank lever actuated by a crank on a shaft parallel to the feed rollers 18, and the blade 4 is adjustably mounted on a slide connected by a link to a bell-crank actuated by an eccentric on a second shaft at right angles to the first and driven therefrom through bevel gearing. The ejecting plunger 7 is actuated by eccentrics on the second shaft which also drives a shaft carrying a disc on which the cutter blade 5 is mounted. In modifications, the folding blades feed the strip material between pairs of rollers, which may be driven to complete the folding operation and discharge the folded material into positioning means associated with the next folding device or the discharging means ; the folds may be such that one limb of the fold is longer than the other, so that the successive folding operations produce a spiral or S-shaped formation ; and the folding blades may be carried by pivoted arms and cooperate with curved slots in the folding unit.