Patent ID: 7047790

Claim:
A workpiece carrier apparatus for transfer press machine comprising: guide beams which are arranged on a left and right side of a press line; a plurality of carriers which are supported by the guide beams such as to allow movement in a direction of the press line; cross bars which are provided with workpiece holders and are attached to the carriers such as to be capable of being raised and lowered; a first carrier mechanism which feeds a carrier located on a most upstream side in the direction of the press line, in the press line direction; and a second carrier mechanism which feeds a plurality of carriers located downstream, in the press line direction, wherein the second carrier mechanism performs a feed operation for the plurality of the carriers located downstream which is different from a feed operation for the carrier located on the most upstream side performed by the first carrier mechanism, the plurality of the carriers located downstream are connected together and are moved together in the direction of the press line by the second carrier mechanism, each of the carriers comprises a vertically moving body capable of being raised and lowered, and the workpiece carrier apparatus further comprises: drive devices to raise and lower vertically moving bodies of a plurality of groups of adjacent carriers; and a power transmission mechanism connecting the drive devices, and the vertically moving bodies are raised or lowered simultaneously by any of the drive devices corresponding to the respective groups, and the cross bars are fitted between vertically moving bodies of mutually opposed carriers on the left and right guide beams.