Patent ID: 7921529

Claim:
A method of smoothing a container, comprising: rotating the container about a longitudinal axis of the container; bringing together the container and a burnishing tool, comprising a tapered cam shaft, wherein the tapered cam shaft includes camming surfaces having a planar spatial orientation substantially the same as the planar spatial orientation of sides of a pyramid, wherein respective keys respectively extend along respective camming surfaces of the tapered cam shaft, the keys having respective longitudinal axis of extension parallel to the respective camming surfaces, and wherein the camming surfaces are arrayed about a cam shaft axis that is normal to a plane that is parallel to a base of the pyramid; a burnishing assembly, the burnishing assembly including: segmented burnishing components including respective cammed surfaces positioned on the tapered cam shaft adjacent respective camming surfaces, wherein the segmented burnishing components include respective keyways substantially extending along the respective cammed surfaces to accept the respective keys of the tapered cam shaft, the respective keyways having a longitudinal axis of extension substantially parallel to the longitudinal axis of extension of the respective keys, and wherein the segmented burnishing components have burnishing surfaces; and a carrier assembly, the carrier assembly applying force on the segmented machine components to hold the segmented machine components against the tapered cam shaft; wherein the burnishing tool is configured to permit adjustment of the position of the burnishing assembly with respect to the tapered cam shaft in the direction of the cam shaft axis to advance and retract the segmented burnishing components in a radial direction with respect to the cam shaft axis due to movement of the cammed surfaces of the segmented burnishing components along the respective camming surfaces of the cam shaft, such that a portion of the container contacts at least one of the burnishing surfaces of the respective segmented burnishing components; and burnishing the container via contact between the at least one of the burnishing surfaces and the container while the container is rotating.