Patent GB-329325-A (GB)
Title: Improvements in or relating to the conditioning or tempering of boot or shoe stiffener or other boot or shoe part blanks
IPC: A43D95/12
Filed: 1929-02-15
Abstract: 329,325. British United Shoe Machinery Co., Ltd. Feb. 15, 1929. Softening. - An apparatus for conditioning or tempering shoe part blanks comprises means adapted to increase the porosity or permeability of the blank and means for thereafter subjecting it to the action of a conditioning medium. The blank is pressed on to a pricking roll, carried by the roll under conditioning liquid and then separated from the roll. The blanks may be of the kind comprising a fabric base impregnated with celluloid, in which case the softening liquid is acetone. The vapour is inflammable; the apparatus is, therefore, substantially enclosed, the treating tank is small, and means are provided for preventing passage of flame from the treating tank to a reservoir which maintains the treating liquid level. The pricking roll 10 is built up of laminated units each comprising a group of circular-saw blades with spacing membars of less diameter. Each group is clamped, tugether by bolts 12, the heads of which engage holes in the adjacent group without clearance, the assembly of groups being clamped between a nut and collar on the shaft 8. The blank B is pressed on to the points of the pricking roll by a wooden roll 64 covered with sandpaper. This roll is yieldingly pressed towards the pricking roll, a stop preventing contact. A guide plate 112 and a second presser roll 90 similar to the first are provided. The yielding pressures of the rollers are independently adjustable. The roll 10 dips into conditioning liquid in a tank 18, divided into two compartments by a dipping partition 24, the compartment 19 being supplied with liquid on the barometric feed principle from an inverted container 33. To prevent the passage of flame, partitions are provided comprising a plate 34 notched to receive the tank 18, and a continuation plate 38 below the tank. A wiper plate 130 engages the blank as it emerges from the liquid, this wiper being pivoted to the tank 18 and spring pressed against the roll 10. To adjust this spring pressure, the tank may be moved longitudinally by eccentrics on a shaft 28 provided with a handwheel. The blank is separated from the roll 10 by stripping fingers 126 entering between the circular-saw blades, and tails on to a conveyer 144 of rubberized fabric faced with a multiplicity of upstanding wires, as card cloth. The other surface of the blank is wiped by a brush 158 adjustably pressed towards a supporting plate 164 below the conveyer belt. The brush is adjustable longitudinally of the machine, so that a long thin blank may not be crumpled. Finally, fingers 170 separate the blank from the conveyer. The apparatus is driven by a constantly running pulley adapted to be clutched to gears driving the shaft 8 which is geared to one of the conveyer belt rollers. Means are provided for turning the roll 10 and belt 144 by hand when the clutch is disengaged. In a modification, the belt is geared to the roll 64, so that it is only driven while the rolls 10, 64 are connected by a blank passing between them.