Cam system for double cylinder knitting machine

Claim 1

A two cylinder multi-feed knitting machine including upper and lower needle cylinders and having a multi-component cam system for controlling the longitudinal movement of pivotal selectors and their directly associated needle jacks and needles, said machine being provided with a patterning device adapted to act upon said selectors to cause them to selectively engage components of said cam system and thus select needles for transfer into operative position; said cam system comprising first lifters positioned in advance of the point at which said needles are transferred from the lower to the upper of said cylinders, said first lifters being adapted to act upon the control butts of selectors which were selected in the preceding patterning system by said patterning device and upon the needle jacks associated therewith, stitch cam means being located in juxtaposed relation to the first lifter for said selected selectors, a second lifter for the non-selected needle jacks being provided in the direction of rotation of the needle cylinder supporting said non-selected needle jacks, a path being established for passage of the control butts of the non-selected needle jacks behind the lifting edge of said second lifter below the path of the control butts of the selected jacks, said patterning device being positioned below said path adapted to select the control butts of selectors, a third lifter being mounted behind said patterning device adapted to act upon the control butts of selected selectors, the clearing edge of a stitch cam for said non-selected needle jacks being positioned in the needle jack cam system behind the lifting edge of said third lifter, a space being provided below said clearing edge adapted to permit mutual contact of the said non-selected needle jacks and selected selectors, a fourth lifter for the selected selectors being positioned in the direction of rotation of said needle cylinders, said fourth lifter being adapted to receive the selectors lifted by said third lifter and thus permit movement of the associated needle jacks on to a distributing lifter adapted to effect a transfer of the needles associated with said selected needle jacks to the said upper cylinder, a cam system being provided for said upper needle cylinder including a further lifter for said needle jacks having a slope opposed to that of said distributing lifter whereby needles are transferred from said upper needle cylinder to said lower needle cylinder.