Abstract: A small, accurate, reliable and economical pump which is particularly useful in intravenous (IV) feeding includes a disposable pump chamber and a pump housing. The disposable pump chamber has an inlet, an outlet, and first and second flexible rolling diaphragm pumping chambers. First and second cylinders in the pump housing are positioned to receive the first and second flexible rolling diaphragms of the disposable pump chamber. First and second pistons are movable in the first and second cylinders, respectively. In addition, first and second valves are provided in the pump housing. The first valve controls fluid flow between the inlet and the first flexible rolling diaphragm pump chamber, while the second valve controls fluid flow between the first flexible rolling diaphragm pumping chamber and the second flexible rolling diaphragm pumping chamber. A motor and cam shaft drive the first and second pistons and the first and second valves.

Abstract: An improvement to the hydraulic power apparatus for hydraulic presses is provided, wherein the seals and various gaskets for containing the hydraulic fluid in the press has an enclosed container substituted therefor. This enclosed container, in communication with hydraulic fluid reservoirs, provides the pressure for the ram in the hydraulic press. The container is inflatable with the pressure on the hydraulic fluid, but which fluid is never in direct contact with any of the structural mechanisms comprising the hydraulic power apparatus. The hydraulic power apparatus, hence, can be modified to increase the dimension of the ram to remove the gasket mechanisms and to provide an installation hatch which facilitates serviceability to the inflatable container.

Abstract: A device for controlling flow of fluid to and from a resilient inflatable cuff implanted about the urethra to control flow of urine therethrough. The device comprises a housing of rigid material that provides an expansible sealed chamber, a piston forming one wall of the chamber and spring pressed to a position for decreasing the volume of the chamber to thereby force fluid from the chamber to the cuff, manually operable means for moving the piston to another position for enlarging the chamber to permit deflation of the cuff by return of fluid to the chamber, and a flexible cover or envelope encapsulating the housing, piston and manually operated means.

Abstract: A fluid expandable drum for building portions of tires in a tire building machine includes an annular supporting drum and an expandable annular tube element having an inner peripheral surface supported on the annular drum. The tube element includes an outer peripheral surface upon which support means is secured for movement therewith. A plurality of shoe members are connected to the support means for movement therewith with the shoe members defining an annular building surface thereon which is movable in a radial direction toward and away from the annular support drum upon contraction and expansion, respectively, of the tube element. The tube element is expanded to expand the diameter of the building surface to enable a tire portion to be built thereon and retracted to decrease the diameter of the building surface to enable a build tire portion to be removed therefrom.

Abstract: A fluid expandable drum for building portions of tires in a tire building machine includes an annular supporting drum and an expandable annular tube element having an inner peripheral surface supported on the annular drum. The tube element includes an outer peripheral surface upon which building means is secured for movement therewith. The building means define an annular building surface thereon which is movable in a radial direction toward and away from the annular support drum upon contraction and expansion, respectively, of the tube element. The tube element is expanded to expand the diameter of the building surface to enable a tire portion to be built thereon and retracted to decrease the diameter of the building surface to enable a built tire portion to be removed therefrom.

Abstract: An expandable carrier apparatus for transferring a tread and a radial tread ply band from a first work station to a further work station in a tire building machine includes an annular support member and a fluid expandable annular tube element having an upper wall portion and a lower wall portion. The lower wall portion of the tube element is movable radially away from the upper wall portion upon expansion of the tube element and is movable radially toward the upper wall portion upon contraction of the tube element. The upper wall portion includes an annular peripheral surface which is bonded along a portion of the width thereof to the support member and the lower wall portion includes an annular outer peripheral surface having a plurality of gripper means disposed in an annular array supported thereon which are operable to engage and grip tread and a radial tread ply band upon expansion of the tube element.

Abstract: Fluid-driven torsional operators for turning rotary valves such as ball valves, butterfly valves and the like and for turning similar devices which swing about a pivot axis, said torsional operators including an inflatable fluid-driven torsional actuator having an axially elongated, flexible, hollow, thin-walled elastic shell defining a fluid chamber with a plurality of inextensible flexible strands bonded to this thin-walled shell. These strands extend between the shell ends and are anchored to axially opposed coupling members which are fixed to and in fluid-tight sealing engagement with the opposite ends of the shell.

Abstract: An improved inflatable bladder for use in force transmission apparatus comprises a pair of flexible sheets peripherally joined together, one of such sheets having therein an opening for admission to and discharge from between the sheets of an inflating fluid, the periphery of the sheets having a contour which is at least in part concave toward the bladder center.

Abstract: An annular bladder providing both circumferential expansion and rolling movement normal to its circumference in response to inflation thereof, said bladder having a cylindrical outer wall extending between a forward edge and a rearward edge and being turned radially and axially inward at the respective edges, the bladder comprising a first and a second circumferential zone and in said outer wall a transition zone, said first zone extending in a forward direction from said transition zone, said second zone extending in a rearward direction from said transition zone, said first zone having greater resistance to circumferential elongation relative to the second zone and said second zone having lesser resistance to circumferential elongation relative to the first zone, said transition zone being located a predetermined distance forward of the rearward edge of said bladder when the same is uninflated.

Abstract: An inflatable bladder for a tire building drum is adapted for mounting snugly on a cylindrical drum extension which has a circumferential groove accommodating a non-inflatable elastic ring secured integrally to the bladder. The bladder inner wall has a flangeless port between two circumferential sealing ribs integral with the bladder wall. The port is in air-flow communication with a channel in the outer surface of the extension.

Abstract: A driving assembly for moving one unit with respect to another, for instance, a working unit with respect to a frame unit. Preferred practical applications for the driving assembly are lifting platforms or presses. The driving assembly includes a flat, enclosed, flexible container or bladder disposed between the two units. End wall portions of the container comprise the major surface area thereof. When pressure is introduced into the container, the walls thereof bear entirely against opposed bearing portions of the respective units and against a limiting wall. The invention allows for use of a very thin walled container for lifting large loads.

Abstract: The invention provides a pump adapted inter alia for the intake and delivery of liquid such as water in wells or relatively deep bodies of water. The pump comprises a rigid-walled chamber, adapted to be immersed in the liquid to be sucked in. The rigid-walled chamber has an intake valve and a delivery valve interposed between the rigid-walled chamber and a delivery tube. The pump is characterized in that it comprises, accommodated in the rigid-walled chamber, a resiliently deformable chamber associated with means for controlling, at least in one direction, alternate deformations of the chamber by expansion and retraction.

Abstract: This invention relates to means for imparting angular movement to a first member connected to a second member by a hinge in one sense about said hinge pivot axis. The actuator is formed from a flexible substantially inelastic retaining means connected between two anchorage positions on the members and subtending that angle between the two members which is reduced on the first member moving relative to the second member and includes an elongated inflatable conduit of substantially constant surface area which is mounted between the members and the retaining means. The conduit is inflated to press outwards against the retaining means to cause the retaining means to exert a pulling force between the members to impart angular movement to one of said members relative to the other member in this one sense.

Abstract: Caliper type bicycle brakes for the front and rear wheel are actuated simultaneously by a single actuator assembly mounted adjacent the handlebar. Hydraulic fluid under pressure is delivered to the brakes through two self-contained hydraulic circuits, one for the front brake and one for the rear brake. The brake system includes a device for applying a greater braking force at the front wheel than at the rear wheel. In an alternate embodiment the brake system is actuated by the chain drive system of the bicycle. Improved brake shoe elements and a device for wiping water from the wheel rim for enhanced wet weather braking are also disclosed.

Abstract: A device for displaceably supporting a body in relation to a support surface comprising at least two elastic elements positionable between the support surface and a surface of the body and separately expansible and contractible in a direction towards and from the support surface and the body surface and means for alternately expansing and contracting the elastic elements, the elastic elements thereby being alternately loaded by and unloaded from the weight of the body, the body being displaceable substantially parallel with the support surface by means of elastic shearing in the elastic element at the moment loaded by and supporting the body, and the means for expansing and contracting the elements being adapted to contract and unload the loaded element after a predetermined deformation thereof and to expanse the other element to a loaded position, the unloaded element thereby elastically resuming its non-deformed position.

Abstract: Hydraulic and pneumatic motors having expansion chambers arranged between two supporting means, at least one of which is rotatable, said chambers formed at least in part of material that is elastically deformable by the pressure medium used, are provided. The invention also provides a control system for introducing the pressure medium into the chambers sequentially and expelling it sequentially after each chamber has attained maximum volume.

Abstract: The specification describes a linear fluidic actuator comprising a plurality of expansible tubes or tubular envelopes closed at opposite ends and coupled in a chain and arranged to have one end of the chain anchored while the other end is adapted to move and exert a tensile force upon inflation of one or more of the tubes, as by compressed air, into a circular diameter, in accordance with the degree of contraction of the chain of tubes. A variation of the actuator utilizes the contracting force of the chain of tubes to effect compression of one or more caged springs, the compressive force of which is illustratively shown and described as actuating a floating member to operate a valve device of the gate or plug type. Also disclosed are modifications utilizing a plurality of parallel-related chains of tubes and tubes expansible to different diameters for utilizing different inflating pressures.

Abstract: A fluid pressure motor having a plurality of independent, freely distortable pressure chambers connected together in the form of a multi-lobed rosette shaped structure arranged between two rotatable supporting plates inclined at an angle to each other. The chambers are elastically deformable by the fluid pressure and there are at least two rosette shaped structures superimposed between the rotating support plates with adjacent chambers in each of the rosettes being in fluid communication with each other and with a control system for introducing a fluid pressure medium into the chambers sequentially and expelling it after the chambers have attained maximum volume.

Abstract: A drive arrangement for producing a rotary motion by means of a fluid or eous pressure medium in which a working shaft and an eccentric part within a housing are acted upon by at least one freely deformable expansion cell mounted between the housing and the eccentric part in such a manner that expansion of the collapsible cell exerts a rotational moment on the eccentric part, a force that is directed along the central axis and therefore along the working shaft. The expansion cells are connected with the working medium by suitable control means.

Abstract: This invention relates to a pressure vessel and more particularly to a pressure accumulator of the type including a rigid container having a pair of ports at its respective ends with a deformable partition or bladder therein having a mouth at one end affixed to one of said ports, said bladder separating two fluids such as gas or liquid under pressure in said container.The bladder is of the type formed from two separate sections, each substantially cup-shaped, so that when the rims of the sections are joined, a closed container will be formed.As the bladder expands t o force liquid from the other port of the container, stress will be imparted to the wall of the bladder as a result of the stretching thereof, and such bladder wall is conformed to minimize the stress that would otherwise be imparted to the junction between the two sections of the bladder.