Method and apparatus for coiling and packaging electrical cable
First Claim
1. A method of coiling and packaging an electrical cable comprising the steps of:
- feeding said cable to a coiling apparatus;
continuously monitoring a selected parameter of said cable during feeding of said cable to said coiling apparatus;
generating a fault signal indicative of a predetermined deviation from a standard value of the selected parameter of said cable;
continually measuring predetermined lengths of said cable;
coiling successive ones of a plurality of individual coils of said predetermined length;
positioning a package receptacle for receiving an individual cable coil;
continually severing said individual coils from said cable after coiling thereof;
transferring the individual cable coil to said package receptacle;
transferring said package receptacle containing the cable coil to a sealer unit for sealing said package receptacle;
automatically discriminating between a fault signal generated by reason of a fault in an individual coil transferred to said package receptacle and a fault signal generated by reason of a fault in a next successive coil to be wound;
transmitting said discriminated fault signal to said sealer unit; and
disabling the sealer unit in response to said transmitted fault signal to prevent sealing of said package receptacle only when a fault exists in the cable coil contained in said receptacle.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A method of and apparatus for automatically coiling predetermined lengths of multi-conductor electrical cable and packaging individually wound coils of cable are disclosed. A plurality of monitoring devices are arranged along the cable feed path to a coiling machine for continuously monitoring a number of selected parameters of the cable for defects and for generating fault signal outputs indicative of a predetermined variation from a standard value of the selected parameters. Successively wound coils are transferred from the coiling machine to a packaging machine where they are individually packaged, sealed and discharged. The fault signal outputs generated by the monitoring devices are transmitted to the packaging machine to automatically and positively identify a package containing a defective coil by disabling the package sealing mechanism. An electrical circuit is provided for discriminating between faults occurring in a coil being wound and faults occurring in a next successive coil to be wound.
17 Citations
11 Claims
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1. A method of coiling and packaging an electrical cable comprising the steps of:
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feeding said cable to a coiling apparatus; continuously monitoring a selected parameter of said cable during feeding of said cable to said coiling apparatus; generating a fault signal indicative of a predetermined deviation from a standard value of the selected parameter of said cable; continually measuring predetermined lengths of said cable; coiling successive ones of a plurality of individual coils of said predetermined length; positioning a package receptacle for receiving an individual cable coil; continually severing said individual coils from said cable after coiling thereof; transferring the individual cable coil to said package receptacle; transferring said package receptacle containing the cable coil to a sealer unit for sealing said package receptacle; automatically discriminating between a fault signal generated by reason of a fault in an individual coil transferred to said package receptacle and a fault signal generated by reason of a fault in a next successive coil to be wound; transmitting said discriminated fault signal to said sealer unit; and disabling the sealer unit in response to said transmitted fault signal to prevent sealing of said package receptacle only when a fault exists in the cable coil contained in said receptacle. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3)
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4. Apparatus for coiling and packaging a predetermined length of electrical cable from a running indeterminate length of said cable comprising:
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means for continuously feeding a running length of electrical cable along a cable feed path; means for continuously monitoring a selected parameter of said running length of cable and for generating a fault signal indicative of a predetermined deviation from a standard value of said parameter; means for measuring predetermined lengths of said cable; means for continually coiling successive ones of a plurality of individual coils of said predetermined length; means arranged downstream of and spaced from said monitoring means for continually severing said individual coils from said running length of cable; means for ejecting said individual coils from said coiling means; means for packaging the individual coil ejected from said coiling means, said packaging means including means for positioning a package receptacle for receiving the ejected coil therein and means for sealing said package receptacle; and means transmitting said fault signal to said sealing means, said transmitting means including means for discriminating between a fault signal generated by reason of a fault in an individual coil severed from said cable and a fault signal generated by reason of a fault in said cable upstream of said severing means said transmitting means disabling the sealing cycle of said sealing means to prevent sealing of said package receptacle only when the fault exists in the individual coil contained in said receptacle. - View Dependent Claims (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
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Specification