Bottle labeling machine with turntable having resiliently urged clamping jaws

Claim 1

In an apparatus for bottles to be provided with labels and comprising a turntable, at least one rotary head arranged on the turntable eccentrically to its axis of rotation, wherein the improvement comprises a clamp on each rotary head for picking up a bottle as the clamp moves past a rotating pickup element and for delivering the bottle when moving past a delivery element wherein both the pickup and delivery portions of the turntable cycle for each clamp is less than the complete turntable cycle, a pair of jaws on the clamp spacable against an elastic force to embrace a bottle therein and means for rotating the rotary head at least one complete revolution about its own axis for each revolution of the turntable to align the plane of symmetry of the jaws so that the axis of the bottle lies in such plane of symmetry when the bottle is picked up and delivered by the clamp, said means comprising a single stationary cam track, a cam follower operatively connected to each rotary head and engageable with the cam track only during the pick up and delivery portion of the turntable cycle for the corresponding clamp, to impart asymmetrical rotation to the rotary head, stationary gear means and cooperating gear means connected to each rotary head and engageable with the stationary gear means only when the associated clamp is outside of the pick up and delivery portions of the turntable cycle to impart symmetrical rotation to the rotary head.