Appts. to produce two stiffened edges on thermo-formed plastic trays - has trays singly from stage, folds over longitudinal edges and feeds flat strip into fold at same time, heats and finally cools assembly

摘要

Appts. produces a folded-over holding strip at each side of a transparent moulded plastic tray so that it can be fitted over the edges of a rigid sheet. The appts. has a folding device fed singly with the moulded trays taken from a stack to a reciprocating feeder tool which is suitably shaped and is moved along a straight path; on each side of the path of the moving tool there is a folding rail to engage and turn over the outer edges of the cover; the next part is heated by heating cartridges in guides which wrap over the folded strips formed; similarly the next part guides and cools the material; finally the products are fed to a stacking and/or packing station. Thermoformed trays (10,11) are taken off a stack one at a time and moved into the layout in Fig. 5 by an endless belt type of device. Here the edge strips (13) of the trays move into tracks (20) which fold them ober. At the same time flat strips (22) are also fed in. The total effect is to continuously produce series of trays with edges formed by the original tray edges (14), wrap-over folds (15) and covering strips (16). The appts. then passes through guides in a heating station, where it is consolidated; finally it is passed through correspg. cooling guide guides. ADVANTAGE - The equipment can produce consumer packs at a high output rate (blister type packs). It is fully automatic and needs minimal supervision. It lends itself to a number of useful variations.