Patent ID: 7871258

Claim:
A system for making reinforcing products by agglomerating segments of wet fiber strand comprising an agglomerator and a dryer for drying agglomerates of wet chopped strand segments, the agglomerator having a generally horizontal, non-rotating, elongated, vibrating curved member for supporting a working surface for contacting the wet chopped strand segments, the working surface being concave in cross section in a plane perpendicular with a length of the working surface, the working surface being a dimpled liner or a liner having raised portions on the working surface and lower portions between the raised portions, and a layer of a substantially non-compressible material backing up the liner between a back surface of the liner and a concave surface of the vibrating curved member, the substantially non-compressible material comprised of a particulate material, including fibers, of at least minus 10 mesh particle size and of a particle size distribution that packs with vibration to at least 50 percent of the maximum bulk density possible for the particulate material.