Spencer Wright Industries, Inc.

Ian Beverly

Harold B Bardsley

Ian Slattery

A tufting machine for producing pile fabric having a pile height of approximately at least 50 mm has divider plates between adjacent needles to prevent yarn loops and especially the legs of cut loops from becoming trapped between an adjacent needle and its associated yarn feed. The divider plates may take the form of plates forming an extension of the fingers of the needle plate between each pair of which a needle reciprocates and may be mounted on a block on the bed plate beneath the needle plate, or may be plates upstanding from the hook bar.

Tufting machine

A tufting needle which has a transverse eye between the blade of the needle an the point and has a clearance above the eye in the blade on one side and has no yarn guide and protection groove on the opposite side. Also, disclosed is a conventional tufting needle which has the conventional yarn guide and protection groove.

Tufting machine needle

A needle module contains a plurality of needles having a shank and an eye at a first end and a mounting portion at the second end mounted in a module body. A rod is mounted on and spaced apart from the module body transversely to the needles. Yarn stands pass over the rod and are directed through the eyes of the needles.

Needle module for a tufting machine

A needle, which may be one of a plurality of needles in a needle module, has a rod attached to the shank adjacent the yarn guide groove or to the blade in the guide groove and extending laterally or transverse to the axis of the needle committing yarn to be directed readily into the yarn groove with a minimum angular deviation in its path. When the needle is one of several in a needle module the rod may be common to all of the needles and passed through an aligned hole in each of the needles and secured therein by bending of the rod. A yarn entrance guide is formed by each respective needle, the adjacent needle, the rod and the module body and this entrance permits ready threading of each needle.

Needle for a tufting machine

The hooks of a cut pile tufting machine have a cam or chamfer surface in the form of an inclined ramp in the shank of the hook adjacent the throat extending to the cutting edge, the hooks being positioned in a hook module with a dual or compound angle relatively to the body of the module. The knife which cooperates with the hook to cut loops of yarn seized by the hook is positioned vertically relatively to the hook but is tilted relatively to the hook. The hook is inclined horizontally toward the knife and is tilted vertically away from the knife. The result is that initial knife tension against the hook is substantially eliminated while additional knife tension is created during the cutting stroke. The vertical positioning of the knife and the angular positioning of the hook away from the knife results in substantially eliminating J-cutting. The hook is preferably inclined horizontally approximately 2&deg; toward the knife, inclined vertically approximately 2&deg; from the knife and the knife is tilted approximately 2&deg; horizontally toward the hook.

Cut pile tufting machine cutting elements

A tufting needle construction in which the mounting shank is offset from the axis of the blade and the yarn guide groove which extends to the eye and point portion of the needle. The yarn guide groove extends from a yarn entry mouth spaced from the shank so that yarn entering the groove from the mouth lies entirely within the groove and does not feed into the groove at an angle. Accordingly, when the needle pierces a backing material during the tufting process, the yarn is not crushed between the blade and the backing material. In one embodiment the shank is perpendicular to the blade. In another embodiment the shank has a first portion perpendicular to the blade and another portion parallel to the blade.

Knife holder for tufting machines

A tufting machine has a broken yarn detector mounted intermediate the yarn feed mechanism and the needles, the detector having a multiplicity of yarn engaging fingers pivotably mounted in a support housing secured to a frame carried by the tufting machine. Each finger has an eyelet for receiving a strand of yarn which during normal operation of the tufting machine supports the finger in a raised position, but which drops when the yarn is broken. A signal generator and a signal receiver in the form of a light source and a photo-conductive receiver respectively are carried by the frame of the broken yarn detector at a disposition such that when a finger drops it interrupts the transmission of the light beam from the transmitter to the receiver to provide a signal which may be used to stop the tufting machine. The housing of the broken yarn detector supports a lifting member which may be raised to lock all the fingers in a raised position for threading of yarn therethrough and may be lowered during normal operation of the tufting machine and yarn detector. The frame also carries a support member for supporting selective non-threaded fingers in a remote position when such fingers are not being utilized.

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Blackburn, United Kingdom

Ian Beverly