Patent ID: 10773295

Abstract:
An alignment apparatus is capable of suppressing widening of legs of hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes and aligning the hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes in the horizontal direction at a regular pitch. The alignment apparatus includes: a plurality of outer guide plates that have rollers, which contact upstream sides of legs of the hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes that have been stopped by a stopper apparatus, and that contact outer side surfaces of the legs; a horizontal movement apparatus that moves the outer guide plates in a horizontal direction; an up-down movement apparatus that moves the outer guide plates in an up-down direction; and a control unit that drives the horizontal movement apparatus to move the outer guide plates a predetermined distance toward an insertion position, and then drives the up-down movement apparatus to raise the outer guide plates by a predetermined distance to change an orientation of the hairpin-shaped heat-exchanger tubes to the horizontal direction.