Method and apparatus for high speed decoration of bottles

Abstract

Bottles are decorated while advanced by intermittent motion to each of a plurality of decorating stations where a squeegee presses a decorating screen into line contact with a surface of the bottle which has a speed the same as the speed of which the decorating screen is advanced along the printing station. The bottles are decorated at a higher through put rate by initiating linear movement of the screen before the bottle arrives at the decorating station and continuing linear movement of the screen after the bottle moves from the decorating station. The degree of overlap allows the printing cycle to consume a major part of a machine cycle while the bottle indexing cycle consumes a minor part of the machine cycle. The bottles are received in a vertical orientation and intermittently re-orientated horizontally for entrance to the decorating machine. The intermittent handling and reorientation of each bottle is carried out by drive systems by using closed cams to always maintain control of the workpiece position during the handling of operations. After decoration, the bottles are intermittently received with a horizontal orientation by delivery equipment. The delivery equipment intermittently orientates the bottles to a vertical orientation and then transfers the bottles in an intermittent fashion to a delivery conveyor.