Western Electric Company, Inc.

Eugene Raymond Cocco

Byron Lee Small

Edwin C Hardesty

Gordon Foreman Bloxham

Daniel Marion Steinert

Claude Paren Brezeale

Charles McGonigal

William G Pflugrad

A retractile telephone cord of this invention has a retractility which decreases substantially linearly from each end to a center of its length and an extensibility which increases substantially linearly from each end to a center of its length. The cordage includes a plurality of conductors which are individually insulated with a first plastic material and which are disposed in a planar array, and a jacket of a second plastic material which encloses the array. The jacket is formed about the array to provide a cross-section transversely of the cordage which includes at least one side that is parallel to the array. In making the retractile cord, a length of the cordage is wound helically about a mandrel with the one side of the cross-section of the cord being in engagement with the mandrel. This prevents any axial twisting of the cordage as it is wound on the mandrel and subsequent to the heating of the cord and the reversing of the direction of the helical wind, results in a cord having the above-mentioned retractility and extensibility properties.

Tapered retractile cords

A telephone cord which is particularly suited for use with some models of decorative telephones includes a plurality of individually insulated conductors, a plastic jacket which encloses the plurality of individually insulated conductors, and a braid which encloses the plastic jacket. While the braid is comprised of a woven band of cloth of a natural material or a synthetic material, in a preferred embodiment it is made of cotton which is dyed to a color which is compatible with that of portions of the decorative telephone. An end portion of the cord which is terminated with a modular plug that is capable of being inserted into a jack in the telephone is treated to cause the braid to be bonded to the plastic jacket so that when the jacket is removed to expose the conductors for purposes of plug termination, the braid will not fray.

Telephone cord having braided outer jacket

A plurality of groups of mandrels are arranged for movement successively through a plurality of workstations with each group being worked on at a station while other groups are being worked on simultaneously at other stations to produce continuously automatically groups of retractile cords. Cordage is fed from a supply into clamping engagement with each of the mandrels in the group in a cord-loading position and then wound helically in a plurality of spaced-apart convolutions on each of the mandrels of that group after which the wound cords are severed from the cordage supplies. The wound cords are advanced incrementally through a heating zone, wherein the cords are exposed to radiant heating supplemented by preheating of the mandrels, while cordage is being wound on the next successive groups of mandrels. The wound cords in each group are advanced through a cooling zone and then to an unloading station where they are removed from the mandrels while the pitch of the helices of the convolutions is reversed and the tendency of the convolutions to enlarge is minimized.

Method of making retractile cords

A plurality of groups of mandrels are arranged for movement successively through a plurality of workstations with each group being worked on at a station while other groups are being worked on simultaneously at other stations to produce continuously automatically groups of retractile cords. Cordage is fed from a supply into clamping engagement with each of the mandrels in the group in a cord-loading position and then wound in a plurality of spaced-apart convolutions on each of the mandrels of that group after which the wound cords are severed from the cordage supplies. The wound cords are advanced incrementally through a heating zone, wherein the cords are exposed to radiant heating supplemented by preheating of the mandrels while cordage is being wound on the next successive groups of mandrels. The wound heated cords in each group are advanced through a cooling zone and then to an unloading station whereat the wound cords are removed from each mandrel to reverse the pitch of the helices of the convolutions and in a manner that the pulling forces imparted thereto are such that the tendency of the convolutions to enlarge is minimized.

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Baltimore, MD, United States of America

Eugene Raymond Cocco