Patent GB-703982-A (GB)
Title: Improvements in or relating to a method of and apparatus for making mouthpiece cigarettes
IPC: A24C5/52
Filed: 1949-09-23
Abstract: 703,982. Cigarette-making machines. MOLINS, D. W., and MOLINS MACHINE CO., Ltd. Sept. 20, 1950 [Sept. 23, 1949; March 30, 1950], Nos. 24545/49 and 8018/50. Class 130 Mouthpiece cigarettes are made by forming and feeding an unwrapped tobacco stream the leading end of which passes over a faster-moving endless conveyer which continues the feed as tobacco lengths extending above the conveyer are severed from the stream and immediately engaged by movable accelerator means which press them, as at their rear ends, against the conveyer to move therewith and form spaces for the insertion of mouthpiece portions. Tobacco showered from a hopper on to an endless conveyer belt 2 passes beneath compression rollers 3, 4 and through a guide tube 5 on to a second endless conveyer belt 6, moving as much as 40 per cent faster than the belt 2 and situated in a slightly lower horizontal plane, where, after severance by a rotating knife 7 having a blade of small arcuate extent, each leading length of tobacco is gripped between the belt 6 and a radially extended segmental portion of a drive roller 17 and is accelerated so that spaces are provided between the cut lengths for the insertion of mouthpiece portions delivered by a further drive wheel 9 from a fluted feed drum 15 of the kind described in Specification 669,557, the composite rod thus formed passing via an openwork bridge 23 and suction device 24 of the kinds described in Specification 703,984, to a third endless conveyer band 19 carrying a web of cigarette paper 20 and moving at or above the speed of the first belt 2 but more slowly than the second belt 6 so that when the rod is finally reduced to the speed of the web 20 any gaps between the rod elements are closed up. The operative portion of the roller 7 moves at or slightly above the speed of the belt 6. The wheel 9 is in the form of a disc carrying internally pawls 12 reacting against a stationary cam 13 which projects them through perforations in the concave rim of the disc to remove mouthpiece portions from the drum 15 and carry the portions into position between the tobacco lengths, the cam 13 then allowing the pawls 12 to retract into the disc and release the portions. A shield 16 prevents the carried portions from leaving the wheel 9, and a scraper 18, which may also act as a compression shoe for the composite rod, cleans the wheel rim of tobacco and ensures that the mouthpiece portions are properly stripped therefrom. The composite rod passes finally beneath a tongue 21, where it is acted on by accelerating fingers 22 of the kind described in Specification 685,761, and through a garniture (not shown) which grips the rod and reduces it to the speed of the web 20 which is then folded and secured thereabout after which the rod is cut at the middle of each tobacco length and mouthpiece portion to form cigarettes. The mouthpiece portions may be of paper and may be, non-absorbent or include absorbent material, or they may be cardboard or other tubes. According to the second Provisional Specification the rear end of each cut length may be trimmed by a pair of cam-operated knives disposed between the knife 7 and the wheel 9 and which dwell momentarily in the path of the lengths after trimming to sweep fragments against the front of the succeeding tobacco length. According to the first Provisional Specification, the knife 7 may be replaced by one which moves simultaneously across and with the tobacco stream, a suitably modified form of the screw-bladed cutter of Specification 12913/97, [Class 130], being described. Also, the roller 17 is replaced by a plain roller which is periodically moved bodily to engage the tobacco lengths; the wheel 9 is provided with diametrically-opposed peripheral stub-holding pockets from which the stubs are ejected by movable pocket bottoms or by a spring finger projecting from the scraper 18; and to enable the wheel 9 to be located nearer the knife 7, without gripping the tobacco lengths before severance, its periphery is cut away to the rear of each pocket.