Improved apparatus for alternately reducing and increasing the atmospheric pressure within a zone, particularly for use in machines for filling containers with powdered material

摘要

630,189. Moulding powdered substances. CARTER, C. F. June 29, 1945, No. 16596. Convention date, Aug. 18, 1944. [Class 87 (ii)] [Also in Group XVII] The Specification as open to inspection under Sect. 91 comprises a filling-machine including a hopper 30, Fig. 1 (Cancelled), having a plurality of filler heads 32, Figs. 1 (Cancelled) and 6 (Cancelled), and driven by a motor 48 through chains 38 and 40, Figs. 1 (Cancelled) and 3 (Cancelled), and sprockets 19, 18 secured to the hopper casting 13 to rotate about a stationary hollow shaft 12. Containers 22 are each fed on to a plate 21 and carried by the chains to a position under a filler head, whereafter an arm 26 is released from a cam track and a spring 28 raises the plate 21 and presses the mouth of the container into filling position against the gasket 86 of the filler head; which rotates with the container during filling, the plate 21 then being lowered and the container carried on to an unloading position. Powder is drawn rapidly into the container through a head 32 by means of reduced pressure in the container, and towards the end of the filling cycle a compressor at the lower end of a member 33 on a shaft 34 compresses the powder in the container to allow more to enter, the member 33 having agitators along its length to shake the powder in the head. Each shaft 34 has at its upper end a pulley 36, Fig. 2 (Cancelled), and is thus rotated by a belt 56 driven by a motor 53 during part of the cycle, the belt being positioned around idler pulleys 57, 58. A pump attached to a pipe 70 produces a vacuum in a chamber 71 in the casting 13. By means of apertures 73, 77 in a stationary ring 72 and a rotating ring 76 embracing the chamber 71, and flexible tubes 80, 81 connected to the screened apertures 84, 85 and rotating with the ring 76 to register in predetermined order with the apertures 73 and with ports 75 leading to atmosphere, air is withdrawn from the container alternately through the apertures 84, 85. In another form, the tubes 80, 81 of each filling head are connected to the ports 122, 124 of a valve device (see Group XVII), the parts 70, 71, 72, 76 being dispensed with, and the shaft 34 being stopped some time before removal of the container to allow removal of dust therefrom. Each filling head may have several tapered openings. The apparatus may also be used for supplying powdered resins, plastics, wood fibre, clays, &c., to mould-forms, and may supply several moulding-machines, being synchronised thereto. This subject-matter does not appear in the Specification as accepted.