US 12,264,433 B2
Cloth spreading apparatus
Masanori Kondo, Takamatsu (JP); Tomoyuki Tanii, Takamatsu (JP); Masashi Ido, Takamatsu (JP); and Shinji Kato, Takamatsu (JP)
Assigned to PUREX CO., LTD., Takamatsu (JP)
Appl. No. 18/009,183
Filed by PUREX CO., LTD., Takamatsu (JP)
PCT Filed Jun. 17, 2021, PCT No. PCT/JP2021/023060
§ 371(c)(1), (2) Date Dec. 8, 2022,
PCT Pub. No. WO2021/256541, PCT Pub. Date Dec. 23, 2021.
Claims priority of application No. 2020-106438 (JP), filed on Jun. 19, 2020.
Prior Publication US 2023/0257927 A1, Aug. 17, 2023
Int. Cl. D06F 67/04 (2006.01); D06C 3/08 (2006.01)
CPC D06F 67/04 (2013.01) [D06C 3/08 (2013.01)] 16 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A cloth spreading apparatus comprising:
a spreading unit having a pair of spreading clamps that grasps adjacent corners of a fed cloth and spreads at least an upper-side part of the cloth between the corners in a right-left direction; and
an ejection unit having:
an intermediate movable body that, while moving backward from a forward position, releases the upper-side part of the cloth that the intermediate movable body has received from the pair of spreading clamps in the forward position and held onto an upper surface by sucking; and
a belt conveyor that receives the upper-side part of the cloth having been released by the intermediate movable body, and pulls in the upper-side part and also sequentially pulls up the rest of the cloth under the upper-side part to eject the entire cloth backward,
the cloth spreading apparatus being characterized in that the ejection unit has:
a large number of suction holes that are dispersedly disposed in the upper surface of the intermediate movable body, at least over a lateral range corresponding to a set maximum lateral width of the upper-side part of the cloth, and allow communication between an inside and an outside of the intermediate movable body;
a negative pressure source that sucks out air inside the intermediate movable body to form a negative pressure region inside the intermediate movable body; and
sucking force maintaining means that maintains a sucking force with which the suction holes suck the upper-side part of the cloth, regardless of whether the lateral width of the upper-side part of the cloth is large or small.