Wheel assembly for use in an apparatus for multipackaging containers

Claim 1

In an applicating machine for applying a carrier stock to containers in which the carrier stock is made of a resilient plastic material and comprises a longitudinally extending series of transversely arranged ranks of container encircling bands which are to be transversely stretched for application to successive ranks of a plurality of rows of containers passing through a work station in the machine, the improvement of a rotating wheel assembly for receiving said carrier stock and laterally stretching said carrier stock, said wheel assembly comprising a pair of spider wheels mounted in a parallel spaced apart relationship for rotation about a horizontal axis extending transversely to and above said series of containers, a series of pairs of opposed stretching members radially spaced about said horizontal axis carried on the periphery of each spider wheel and adapted to transversely stretch the carrier stock through application of forces only at the inner periphery of the outer band region of each rank of container encircling bands, a first member in each of said parts of stretching members being fixedly mounted to a first of said spider wheels and relative to the plane of rotation of said spider wheel, means for mounting the second member in each pair on a second of said spider wheels for reciprocating, linear, movement relative to its associated fixed first member in directions generally parallel to said horizontal axis.