Claims
- 1. Apparatus for forming a fluent material into any of a variety of predetermined shapes, comprising:
- a flexible fluent-material dispenser which is relatively positionable to assume a variety of desired curvilinear configurations;
- a positioner array for controlling the configuration of said fluent-material dispenser in accordance with a desired predetermined shape;
- a mechanism that delivers fluent material to said fluent-material dispenser;
- a mechanism that controls rates and differential rates of exiting flow from said fluent-material dispenser;
- cooling elements for causing the fluent material to abruptly enter a non-formable state as it exits the fluent material dispenser, said cooling elements guiding the material so that it becomes an addition to a stabilized portion of the formed shape; and
- a mechanism that effects relative motion between the formed shape and the fluent-material dispenser.
- 2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the mechanism that effects relative motion transports the formed portion of the shape away from the fluent-material dispenser so as to match the rate and angle of movement of the stabilized portion to the rate and angle of movement of the material being formed at the moment of stabilization.
- 3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the mechanism that effects relative motion moves the fluent-material dispenser away from the formed portion of the shape so as to opposedly match the rate and angle of movement of the formed material at the moment of stabilization.
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This is a division of U.S. application Ser. No. 08/159,337, filed Nov. 30, 1993, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,573,716, which is itself a continuation-in-part of PCT application Ser. No. PCT/US92/08505, filed Oct. 6, 1992, which is a continuation-in-part of U.S. application Ser. No. 07/775,642, filed Oct. 10, 1991, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,266,021, issued Nov. 30, 1993.
US Referenced Citations (15)
Foreign Referenced Citations (1)
Number |
Date |
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2123739 |
Feb 1984 |
GBX |
Divisions (1)
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Number |
Date |
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Parent |
159337 |
Nov 1993 |
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Continuation in Parts (2)
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PCTUS9208505 |
Oct 1992 |
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Parent |
775642 |
Oct 1991 |
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