摘要 |
The device for feeding filter plugs to a demand drum comprises, in combination, a gravity-feed hopper containing a supply of multiple length filter rods, the hopper being closed, in correspondence of its bottom end, by a rotating fluted drum wherein each flute of the drum is capable of housing a filter rod. The filter rods, thus removed from the hopper, are cut into three filter plugs, which are delivered, axially aligned, onto a horizontal conveyor belt subdivided into three tracks. As a continuation of the conveyor belt there is provided a horizontal fixed sliding surface onto which the articles slide in three rows, each leading article of the three rows being pushed by the subsequent ones, until the leading article reaches an abutment member, where it is firmly positioned. Also the sliding surface is subdivided into three tracks. In correspondence of the abutment member there is arranged a collecting and offsetting drum, which presents angularly spaced pick-up elements, and is subdivided into three sections (one for each track of the sliding surface), each section being angularly offset with respect to the adjacent one. In this manner, the filter plugs are individually and sequentially collected by the collecting drum and are transferred, the one after the other, onto a demand drum.
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