Abstract:
An apparatus for cleaning trash from cotton lint utilizes a combing cylinder having a plurality of teeth covering its surface and extending therefrom in a manner to release the cotton lint to a cleaning cylinder. The combing cylinder surface moves slower than the cleaning cylinder to comb the lint as it is delivered to the cleaning cylinder. Means are provided to vary the speed of the combing cylinder to match the lint processing parameters, including negating lint combing all together.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0001]    The present invention relates to the field of cotton processing and represents a further improvement on the lint cleaners of U.S. Pat. No. 6,088,881 and U.S. Pat. No. 7,779,514 B2. U.S. Pat. No. 7,779,514B2 describes apparatus that reduces fiber damage by eliminating the formation of the cotton tufts into a batt, but rather, individually applies the tufts of cotton as they come from the gin stand in an airstream directly onto the teeth of the lint cleaner cleaning cylinder teeth without mechanically restraining the tufts. Such a device is for use with lint cleaners that have short, densely spaced teeth on a solid cylinder which currently are universally used in saw gins on upland cotton. 
         [0002]    Other prior methods and apparatus include those such as illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 6,088,881, incorporated herein by reference, wherein a revolving perforated drum is used to allow air flow through the drum such that a cleaning cylinder may remove cotton fiber from the perforated drum and carry it past a plurality of cleaning grid bars, thereby separating the airstream, and removing foreign matter from the fibers, before the fiber is doffed from the cleaning cylinder for subsequent air flow to downstream processing. 
         [0003]    As mentioned above, U.S. Pat. No. 6,088,881 and U.S. Pat. No. 7,779,514 B2 have shown that they preserve the spinning quality of the lint, and countries that use scientific lint quality evaluation systems such as H.V.I. (High Volume Instrumentation) generally reward the lint produced on these lint cleaners. However, many countries and merchants value the well combed, “smooth” appearance above the H.V.I. evaluations, and thus the use of lint cleaners using the features of these patents has been somewhat limited. 
       SUMMARY OF THE PRESENT INVENTION 
       [0004]    The Objects of This Invention are:
       To increase the combed, smooth appearance of the lint produced.   To increase the color grade of the lint produced.   To reduce the trash content of the lint produced.   To accomplish the above objects without substantially increasing lint fiber breakage and nepping.   To make the degree of combing variable in response to manual or automatic control means.       
 
         [0010]    These and other objects and advantages of the invention will become apparent from the following detailed description of the preferred embodiment of the invention. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0011]    An apparatus for cleaning lint is depicted in the accompanying drawings which form a portion of this disclosure and wherein: 
           [0012]      FIG. 1 , is a sectional view of the apparatus of prior art U.S. Pat. No. 7,779,514 B2; 
           [0013]      FIG. 2 , is a sectional view of a Preferred Embodiment of present invention; 
           [0014]      FIG. 3 , is an end view of a Preferred Combing Cylinder; 
           [0015]      FIG. 4A , is a partial side elevational view substantially tangent to the surface of the Air Separator Cylinder showing the Preferred Toothed Axial Channels spaced around Air Separator Cylinder; 
           [0016]      FIG. 4B  is an end view of a Preferred Toothed Axial Channel shown in  FIG. 4A ; 
           [0017]      FIG. 5 , is a partial sectional view of a second embodiment used as a retrofit to an existing lint cleaner; 
           [0018]      FIG. 6  is a rear view of the housing of the lint cleaner showing the variable drive for the combing roller; and, 
           [0019]      FIG. 7  is a schematic view of a drive control system for the apparatus. 
       
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT 
       [0020]    In the prior art shown in  FIG. 1 , the bulk of the tufts carried by an airstream flow directly across the top surface of streamer plate  14  and are abruptly whipped over the tip of the plate by the aggressive teeth  13  of cleaning cylinder  12 . This action produces a minimum amount of “opening” of the lint tufts. The smaller number of entering lint tufts that are drawn into the separator cylinder  22  between the brushes move to the perforated screen surrounding cylinder  22  and are swept by the brushes around to plate  14  to also receive a minimum amount of opening. 
         [0021]      FIG. 2  is a cross section drawing of a preferred embodiment of the present invention. As the lint tufts enter the machine at duct  11  at the upper right the bulk of them are thrown against the upper surface of a slowly counter-clockwise rotating combing cylinder  101 . Air duct  11  terminates adjacent an outer surface of revolving combing cylinder  101  and a stationary separator housing and delivers the majority of the tufts to the combing cylinder  101  whose surface is covered with fine, closely spaced teeth  105  that impale some of the fibers against the leftward moving air stream flowing into the large air separator  102 . 
         [0022]    An air separator  102  includes an air separator creel  104  circumscribed by a cylindrical housing formed by a perforated surface or section  16 , and non-porous segment  15  and  15   a  such that the cylindrical housing is open to duct  11  opposite combing cylinder  101 . Perforated section  16  is a stationary separator that is porous to airflow there through but impervious to desirable fiber flow there through. Rotating within the cylindrical housing is revolving air separator creel  104  which is pervious to both fiber and foreign matter. The described air separator creel  104  and cylindrical housing are similar in construction to the air separator taught in commonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 7,779,514 B2 and incorporated herein by reference, however, instead of brushes the air separator of the present invention utilizes a series of axially aligned channels  17  bearing substantially radially extending teeth  18  which pass near the cylindrical housing and combing cylinder  101 . The surface of the high speed air separator creel  104  may be described as having peripherally equally spaced apart, substantially axial rows of sharp teeth completely surrounding it. The details of these teeth should further be described as axial channel saws whose legs project substantially radially outward or slightly forward leaning in the direction of rotation as shown in  FIGS. 4A and 4B . 
         [0023]    Cleaning cylinder  103  generally rotates in a clockwise direction such that the surface of cleaning cylinder  103  and combing cylinder  101  travel in the same direction at their closest point of approach. All of the fiber passing through the machine must pass between cylinders  101  and  103  in this region. Referring to  FIG. 3 , note that the size of the teeth  105  are exaggerated to show their profile. The fine teeth  105  on the combing cylinder are aggressive when converging towards the cleaning cylinder  103  but are not aggressive when diverging therefrom. That is to say, the narrow, sharp pointed, closely or densely spaced, uniquely shaped teeth on the combing cylinder  101  comb against the aggressive teeth of the cleaning cylinder  103  as their surfaces converge, but yield substantially all the fibers to the aggressive cleaning cylinder  103  as their surfaces diverge. In normal combing operation the slowly turning combing cylinder  101  only holds a small percentage of the incoming tufts, letting the bulk of the tufts to be impaled on the outward facing fine teeth  18  on the axial channel  17  on the air separator cylinder  102  or pass between the channel strips and accumulate on the perforated section  16  surrounding the air separator cylinder  102  where the channel teeth  18  impale the tufts and sweep them back across the aggressive facing, slow turning combing cylinder  101  for the first combing action. Some of the fibers are impaled on the channel teeth  18  where they are carried around to the cleaning cylinder  103  surface where they receive a combing action against the cleaning cylinder, but the very aggressive cleaning cylinder  103  saw handily carries them around to join the fibers that were impaled on the combing cylinder for the major combing action between the combing cylinder  101  and cleaning cylinder  103 . The teeth on the combing cylinder  101 , as stated earlier, are aggressive against converging to tangential greater surface movement, but the combing cylinder tooth faces are near radial to become non aggressive as they pass tangential with another aggressive faster rotating surface. Thus, as the combed fibers pass the tangent point between the combing cylinder  101  and the cleaning cylinder  103 , the combing cylinder teeth become non-aggressive and the very aggressive teeth on the cleaning cylinder  103  pull the fibers away from the combing cylinder. As with prior art lint cleaners, adjustable “lint savers” are furnished to reapply the looser fibers to the cleaner cylinder teeth before each grid bar  109 . 
         [0024]    An object of this invention is to make the degree of combing variable in response to manual or automatic control means. The degree of combing is a function of the surface speed of the combing cylinder  101  and that of the cleaning cylinder  103  and air separator cylinder  102 , both of which may have fixed speeds. The surface of the combing cylinder  101  moves in the same direction as both the air separator cylinder  102  and cleaning cylinder  103  at convergence, thus the slower the combing cylinder surface moves relative to the other cylinders, the greater the degree of combing. Conversely, the relatively faster the combing cylinder surface moves, the less the degree of combing until, at the same surface speeds, the combing cylinder becomes only a transfer cylinder. This condition is an option that may be desirable under some conditions. 
         [0025]    This variable combing cylinder surface speed can be accomplished by the use of various well known mechanical or electrical drives. As shown in  FIG. 7 , the automatic function can be accomplished by combining an electric motor  111  employing a variable speed drive input with the output signal from any of various well known electrical, in process, lint cotton condition sensors  112  on the market such as moisture sensors or sample color, trash or grade sensors located inside or outside the gin plant sensing these and other parameters affecting the optimum level of combing. This is also accomplished by driving the combing cylinder  101  by other means that vary the comber cylinder speed without changing the speeds of the other cylinders. This can be as simple as a separate V-belt drive to the combing cylinder incorporating a mechanical variable pitch diameter sheave. It should also be understood that the effectiveness of the combing action is not only determined by the relative surface speeds of the combing cylinder and the adjacent toothed cylinder, but also the density of the fibers passing between the adjacent cylinders. Therefore, the major combing action takes place between the combing cylinder and the cleaning cylinder where all the fibers simultaneously must pass. Furthermore, this major combing action is influenced by the processing rate; the faster the processing rate at a given combing cylinder speed, the more effective the combing. There are various conditions causing the ginning rate to change, but a catch all rate detector, such as a gin feeder feed roll speed detector  113  used to modulate the speed of the combing cylinder  101  is another combing cylinder speed control option that can be employed. These features open the way for an important development in the cotton ginning industry—variable combing of the raw cotton without delaying the ginning process. 
         [0026]    Another embodiment of the invention, shown in  FIG. 5 , provides the benefits of a variable speed combing cylinder to a different style lint cleaner, wherein the lint and commingled trash are delivered in an air stream to slow turning perforated condenser drum  118 . The relatively slowly turning condenser drum  118  causes the cotton lint and commingled trash to build up on the surface of the drum sufficiently thick to form a cohesive batt that is pressed together and doffed from the drum by a pair of doffing rollers  119 . The batt is then fed down to the low speed combing cylinder  101 ′ with its negative draft teeth which comb the lint batt as it is carried forward by the cleaning cylinder and releases the lint to the aggressive teeth of the cleaning cylinder  103 ′ as the cylinders diverge. The lint fibers are impaled on the surface of the toothed cleaning cylinder which carries fibers and trash over a series of grid bars  120  that have acute angle leading edges over which the lint is whipped, thus causing much of the trash and entangled fiber to be slung off by centrifugal force where it drops down into trash conveyor system  130 , as is well known. As cleaning cylinder  103  continues to turn past the grid bars  120 , it moves in close proximity to doffing brush  104 ′ whose surface at the point of close proximity moves faster than the surface of the cleaning cylinder. It should be understood that the combing action in this embodiment is a function of the surface speed of the combing cylinder  101 ′ and that of the cleaning cylinder  103 ′, thus the above described control of the speed of the combing cylinder  101  is applicable to combing cylinder  101 ′. 
         [0027]    It is to be understood that the forms of the invention shown are preferred embodiments thereof and that various changes and modifications may be made therein without departing from the spirit of the invention or scope as defined in the following claims.