Apparatus for arranging and piling cigarettes

Abstract

An apparatus for arranging, side by side, cigarettes to form three cigarette layers, seven, six and seven cigarettes in the corresponding layers, the total number being twenty cigarettes and piling the cigarette layers on one after another in a staggered way to form a three-layered cigarette package. Twenty cigarette supplying passages are provided so as to communicate with the bottom portion of a hopper. Cigarettes are supplied to the cigarette supplying passages in an aligned state. Cigarettes are taken out one by one from the bottom end of each cigarette supplying passage and supplied to three cigarette arranging drums on which three cigarette layers are formed. The cigarette layers on these cigarette arranging drums are transferred to a cigarette piling drum through transfer drums disposed between the cigarette arranging drums and the cigarette piling drum and piled on each cigarette piling head of the cigarette piling drum to form a three-layered cigarette stack. The arrangement of the transfer drums between the cigarette transfer drums and the cigarette piling drum widens the distance between the adjacent cigarette arranging drums, allows the cigarette supplying passages to extend substantially vertically and linearly, thereby facilitating smooth transfer of cigarette in the apparatus and reducing the diameter of the cigarette piling drum so as to speed up the operation of the apparatus.