Claims
- 1. A portable and wheelable clipping and shearing machine for finishing lace sheet produced by a lace machine, said portable machine comprising:
- a housing and a plurality of wheel means mounted to the housing for supporting the housing and enabling the housing to be wheeled to a location adjacent a lace machine;
- a take up roller, supported by the housing, for taking up lace sheet as it emerges from said lace machine and a conveying means for conveying lace sheet through said clipping and shearing machine along a predetermined path;
- clipping means, supported by the housing, for clipping floats disposed on said lace sheet to cut said floats into strands, each one of said strands being connected at one end thereof to a respective motif located on said lace sheet;
- shearing means, supported by the housing, for shearing said strands from said lace sheet close to said respective motives; and
- coupling and synchronizing means for detachably coupling said portable machine to the lace machine in a manner enabling said portable machine to be driven from said lace machine and in a manner wherein the speed of movement of said lace sheet through said portable machine is synchronized to the speed at which said lace sheet emerges from said lace machine, said coupling and synchronizing means comprising the sole mechanical linkage between said portable machine and said lace machine whereby said machines may be easily and rapidly disattached and attached from and to one another.
- 2. A portable clipping and shearing machine as in claim 1, further comprising a tensioning mechanism for adjusting the tension of the lace sheet.
- 3. A portable clipping and shearing machine as in claim 2, wherein said clipping means comprises a plurality of cutting blades arranged in a row extending transversely to the predetermined path of said lace sheet, each one of said cutting blades being adapted to oscillate back and forth transversely to said path of said lace sheet and having a front edge which is shaped to snag said floats disposed on said lace sheet as said cutting blades oscillate in a forward direction.
- 4. A portable clipping and shearing apparatus as in claim 3, wherein said clipping means comprises a tension rod juxtaposed to said cutting blades and disposed on an opposite side of said lace sheet relative to said cutting blades, said tension rod being adapted to control the proximity of said cutting blades to said lace sheet.
- 5. A portable clipping and shearing machine as in claim 4, wherein the front edge is spoon-tip shaped.
- 6. A portable clipping and shearing apparatus as in claim 1, wherein said shearing means comprises a cylindrical roller and a plurality of shearing blades projecting radially from said cylindrical roller, each one of said shearing blades spiraling about an axis of said roller, said axis of said roller being disposed transversely to said path of said lace sheet.
- 7. A portable clipping and shearing apparatus as in claim 6, further comprising an adjustable ledge located below said lace sheet relative to said shearing blades for adjusting the distance between a side of said lace sheet containing said strands and said shearing blades of said shearing means.
- 8. A portable clipping and shearing apparatus as in claim 7, further comprising a waste bin for collecting said strands as said strands are sheared by said shearing means.
- 9. A portable clipping and shearing apparatus as in claim 8, wherein said lace sheet travels through said apparatus at a rate of about 4-7 inches per minute.
- 10. A portable clipping and shearing apparatus as in claim 2, wherein said lace sheet travels through said apparatus at a rate of about 3-6 inches per minute.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is a continuation-in-part of application Ser. No. 07/173,079, filed March 25, 1988, now abandoned.
The present invention is related to a clipping and shearing machine for removing from bobbinet and similar fabric such as lace, the loose threads, called "clips" or "floats", which bridge the lace's motives (designs) to one another.
In the lace making art, warp knitting machines are employed to form repeating patterns of lace designs in a web-like fabric which is knitted simultaneously as motif. The knitted fabric which features the lace thereon emerges from the machine in certain standard widths and is rolled up on a roll. The final lace pattern consists of discreet, unconnected motives (flowers or other adornments). However, because it is most practical to use continuous thread in the lace knitting process, the lace emerges with the discreet motives connected by loose bobbin threads which connect the motives to one another and which must be removed from the fabric.
Conventional wisdom in the art of lace making has been to process the clip lace, after it emerges from the lace making machine, in special, very high speed and expensive clipping and shearing machines which first cut each connecting thread into two strands which are thereafter sheared from the material close to the motives.
The lace making process is relatively slow and the myriad of possible patterns and applications has spawned numerous specialty lace making shops. An average lace mill may have 20 to 30 lace making machines and typically may run one third to one half of the machines on clip lace patterns, depending on market demand, as well as the type of machines in the shop. Accordingly, it has been customary for small lace making shop owners to subcontract the clipping and shearing aspect of their work to specialty houses which can justify the large investment in the high-speed shearing and clipping machines.
The present industry practice has resulted in a bottleneck wherein the small operators must postpone final delivery of their product pending the routing of their work product through the clipping and shearing processors. These small specialty shops cannot justify the large investment in the high-speed shearing and clipping machines.
Clipping and shearing machines for handling lace are old. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 361,563 dating back to 1887 discloses a machine for clipping lace, i.e. cutting each float into two strands. Machines for shearing the loose threads or strands created by the clipping operation are described for example in U.S. Pat. No. 2,747,534 to Piper et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 3,327,366 to Holm.
Other machines have attempted to deal with clipping lace patterns by attaching clipping and shearing apparatus to lace machines but all the prior art dealing with apparatus attached to the lace machine share one major fault, namely, complexity of design, installation and operation which severely limits the practical application of such machinery. Because of their complex design these apparatus must be assembled and permanently or semipermanently mounted to a lace machine to create an operable relationship between themselves, the lace sheet and the lace machine. These fixed machines are also cumbersome and make repairs of damages on the lace sheet awkward, as well as repairs to lace machines. Furthermore, the previous art, because of its fixed attached nature, does not allow for flexibility in moving of a clipping and shearing apparatus from one lace machine to another. The importance of this flexibility is paramount to the novelty of this invention.
Because frequent pattern changes are made on lace machines according to market demand, a mill operator cannot always pick which machine a clip lace pattern will go on. Under the present scope of the prior art this leaves the mill operator with two poor choices. Firstly, he can disassemble and reassemble an apparatus on a lace machine each time a new clip pattern needs it. This would result in 24 to 72 hours downtime and extensive labor costs. Secondly, he can outfit his entire mill of lace machines with the fixed apparatus resulting in excessively impractical outlay of capital.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a simpler clipping and shearing machine having the attribute of being more commonly affordable.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a portable, self contained clipping and shearing apparatus allowing flexibility of movement from one machine to another.
It is a third object of the present invention to provide a clipping and shearing apparatus which can be quickly and easily attached and synchronized with a lace machine.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a self contained clipping and shearing apparatus which will provide easier access when repairing damages on the lace cloth while it is still on the lace machine.
It is another object of the clipping and shearing machine to be powered by the lace machine through two chains connecting the take up mechanism and the clipping and shearing mechanisms to the take up roller and the main shaft of the lace machine.
In realization of the foregoing and other objects, the present invention provides a portable clipping and shearing machine for finishing lace sheets produced by a lace machine. A take up roller, in the portable machine, receives the lace sheet as it emerges from the lace machine and directs it to a clipping mechanism at which time each float on the lace sheet is cut into two dangling strands.
The lace sheet then travels to a shearing mechanism which shears the strands off the lace sheet, close to the surface of the motives from which the strands dangle. To enable the portable clipping and shearing machine to operate in tandem with the lace knitting machine, the lace sheet processing speed of the clipping and shearing machine is synchronized to the speed at which the lace sheet emerges from the lace machine.
Other features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description of preferred embodiments thereof which are presented below in relation to the appended drawings.
US Referenced Citations (6)
Foreign Referenced Citations (3)
| Number |
Date |
Country |
| 226351 |
Mar 1963 |
ATX |
| 63121 |
Jan 1941 |
NOX |
| 2019162 |
Oct 1979 |
GBX |
Continuation in Parts (1)
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Number |
Date |
Country |
| Parent |
173079 |
Mar 1988 |
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Patent Grant
5007253
