Mold opening and closing mechanism including independently driven mold support mechanisms

摘要

A mold opening and closing mechanism for an I.S. machine has a pair of mold support mechanisms supported for horizontal displacement between a retracted position and an advanced position. Each of these support mechanisms are linearly displaced by a drive assembly which includes a lead screw (70), a housing (90) secured to the section frame (94) for supporting the lead screw, a motor (66) coupled to the lead screw, nuts (72, 74) operatively associated with the lead screw, and links (76, 78) interconnecting the nuts with their associated mold support mechanism. The housing has a rear wall (88) defining a flat surface (86), and the nuts (72, 74) have flat rear bearing surfaces (84) with a spacing between them when the mold support mechanism is fully retracted. The lead screw has a rigidity chosen so that when the mold mechanism is displaced to the advanced position into engagement with the other mold support mechanism with a predetermined force, the lead screw (70) will deflect to establish engagement between the flat bearing surfaces (84) and the rear flat wall surface (86) of the housing which is secured to the frame. The mold support mechanism will then be part of a continuous solid structure extending from the section frame, up the housing of each of the drive assemblies, across the nuts and the links of each drive assemblies, and across mold support mechanisms and hence will positively prevent the vertical or horizontal displacement of the engaged mold support mechanisms from the applied forces.