Patent ID: 8701678

Claim:
A method for the continuous manufacture of smoking articles comprising: a rod of smokable material, a filter, and a wrapper of tobacco leaf material circumscribing the rod and filter, the method comprising: cutting a plurality of tobacco leaf portions and tessellating the cut leaf portions to overlap each other and form an elongate web of tobacco leaf material; conveying the elongate web of tobacco leaf material along a pre-determined path; repeatedly severing the elongate web to form a succession of discrete wrappers; contacting each of the discrete wrappers with a respective one of a succession of rods of smokable material and axially aligned abutting filters; and convoluting the discrete wrappers around the rods of smokable material and filters to the form the smoking articles so that longitudinal edges of the wrappers are substantially parallel to a longitudinal axes of the rods of smokable material and axially aligned abutting filters.