Patent GB-191126096-A (GB)
Title: Improvements in Machines for Straightening Light Bars, Needles and the like.
IPC: B21G1/00
Filed: 1911-06-20
Granted: 1912-05-16
Abstract: 26,096. Singer Manufacturing Co., Singer & Tivendale, W., and Noon, H. E. June 20. Straightening.-In a machine for straightening sewing-machine needles, light bars, wires, and the like by means of a hammer, the needle &c. is rotated in its support during straightening by a friction driver maintaining a substantially invariable yielding pressure on its shank. The hammer-operating shaft 21 and cam shaft 7 are driven from the shaft 10 by belt gear and worm gear respectively, the shaft 10 being driven by a loose pulley 13, a tooth on the hub of which is put into connexion by a hand-lever 25 with a tooth on the hub of the hammer-operating pulley which is fixed to the shaft. The hammer 45 is pivoted on the shaft 34 and raised by a cam 29 engaging the arm 31, and returned by its own weight and the spring 38. The needles are fed into a semicircular groove in a hardened bushing mounted together with a wearing-strip in a block 74 mounted on a carriage 65 which is reciprocated by a cam 69. The needles are rotated during the rearward or operative motion of the carriage by a rotary friction wheel 82 with a facing of rubber or leather &c. which is mounted on a shaft 83 inclined to the semicircular groove and also to the direction of travel. The rear ends of the blanks abut against a stop plate 81 on the block 74. The shaft 83 is driven by gear 102, 101, 100, the wheel 100 of which is carried by a hub 94 loosely mounted in a tilting bearing-block 96 and carrying a spline engaging a groove in the shaft, so that it may be raised during the insertion of blanks. This is effected by a cam 108 and lever 103 engaging the journal box 87 which is pressed down by a spring 91. The downward motion of the shaft is limited by an adjustable stop-plate 112 engaging the journal box 87. The needle is carried over an anvil 53. The needle engages the jaws 198, 199 of the feeler which controls the impact regulator 167 as described in Specification 26,094/11. The blanks are fed into the groove in the block 74 from a hopper 141 down which they are pressed by a weighted bar 158, Fig. 4. The lower end of the needle hopper is of a width several times the diameter of the needle, so that abnormally bent needles may be fed into the machine. The hopper has an adjustable lining plate at one side to provide for needles of different lengths. The bottom of the hopper consists of a slide plate 117, which is reciprocated by a lever 131, Fig. 4, and a notch 134 in a cam 133, and is also given a series of jogging movements near its retracted position by the depressions 135 so as to shake the needles into position. The plate has a slot 121 with an inclined bevel edge 121<Î> at the shank receiving end so that the needle enters at this end first and the blade portion may thus disengage itself from adjacent needles. The needle blade rests on the finger 119 on the plate, which is guided in a groove in the platform on which the plate slides. The forward end of the plate carries pivoted ejecting arms 146, 147 pressed down by a spring, Fig. 7, and has also an inclined body 145 pressed by a spring 157 on to the needle so as to control its motion off the block. The arms 146, 147, on reaching the end of the platform, enter bevelled recesses in its edge and then remove the finished needle from the groove in the block and carry it along an extension 151 of the block, also provided with a supporting- finger for the blade, to the inclined discharge shoot 203, Fig. 4, the new blank at the same time falling throngh the slot 121 into the groove, the forward edge of the plate being cut out in its underface to form a clearance space. In the travel of the carriage 65, the extension 151 engages an arm 208 extending from a gate 206, which is thus raised on its pivot to allow the finished needles to pass down the shoot into the holding-receptacle 210, which is connected by hooked lugs to the plate 212. In a modification, the needles may he mounted on a stationary support, the inclination of the axis of the friction wheel producing the longitudinal movement of the needle by omission of the stop-plate 81. The machine as a whole is described in Specification 28,625/10.