Bottle operated label feed switch mechanism

Claim 1

In a bottle labelling machine having a rotary turret and a plurality of sleeve forming mandrels thereon, pocketed wheel means on the turret beneath the mandrels, the pockets thereof adapted to receive upright bottle and carry them on the turret means connected for driving the turret and its said pocketed means in continuous rotation, in axial alignment with the mandrels, a first power-operated continuously operable, moving horizontal infeed conveyor for advancing bottles thereon in upright position to the turret, a web supply of label material, a feed drum adjacent the turret adapted to feed a length of label material to each of the mandrels moving past the feed drum adjacent the turret adapted to feed a length of label material to each of the mandrels moving past the feed drum at a label loading station, web advancing means engaging said web for moving it to the feed drum, knife means operatively connected to the feed drum for cutting label lengths from said web thereon, the mandrels being operated to wrap said length thereon and form a label sleeve during turret rotation from the sleeve loading station a predetermined advanced distance to a bottle labelling station, the improvement therein comprising: a timing means along the infeed conveyor for engaging upright bottles moving thereon and equally spacing and timing them to correspond with the turret pockets, means advancing the upright bottles seriatim from said timing means into the pockets on the turret ahead of the bottle labelling station, a second power-operated drive means engageable for actuating the feed drum, knife means and web advancing means in unison, a means for operatively engaging and for disengaging said second drive means including an electrically-operated controller therefor, a horizontal switch-actuating arm pivotally mounted and biased for movement into the path of the timed upright bottles passing the timing means and pivoted by contact with said timed bottles, said arm being positioned for contacting said bottles a distance along the path therefor to the bottle labelling station that equals the distance in the mandrel path between the mandrel loading station and the bottle labelling station, and an energizing circuit connected to said controller and including a switch operated by said arm in response to said bottle contact therewith for operatively engaging said second drive means, whereby labels are fed to the mandrels at the mandrel loading station only in response to said bottles contacting said arm.