CIGARETTE MANUFACTURE

摘要

A cigarette making machine includes an elongate tobacco reservoir (10; 110) arranged to receive pneumatically delivered tobacco at one end (10A), and to feed tobacco as a thick carpet towards the other end (10B) at which there is located one or more metering rollers (26, 28, 30) for feeding a thinner metered carpet (34) of tobacco towards a cigarette rod forming part of the machine, the reservoir having a width approximately equal to the width of the metered carpet fed towards the rod-forming device and having at its tobacco inlet an oscillating device (22; 122) for spreading the pneumatically delivered tobacco across the width of the hopper, and having means (36; 136) at each end for substantially sealing the space within the reservoir from the atmosphere, so that tobacco can be stored in the reservoir, while the machine is not operating, without drying to any significant extent.