Abstract: A mobile street sweeper of the air recirculation pickup hood type has a hopper and a dust filter chamber. A main blower exhausts air from the hopper and introduces it into one end of the hood and air is returned to the hopper from the other end of the hood. An auxiliary blower withdraws air from the filter chamber and exhausts it to atmosphere. The hood is provided with an unobstructed front window and angled deflectors which windrow large objects into the window. The upstream end of the window is disposed at a zone wherein the static pressure of the air stream circulating along the hood is at atmospheric pressure and the downstream end of the window is disposed at a zone wherein the static pressure is only slightly less than atmospheric pressure.

Abstract: A filling machine for filling open top containers with pressurized liquid, especially carbonated liquid, or liquid which readily foams, having rotary turret mounting filling valve assemblies, each of which includes a cylinder with its foot valve and a piston with its plug valve, as generally known in the art. Before filling starts, a measured charge is trapped in a measuring chamber. Each foot valve is provided with a perforate wall exposed to atmosphere on its underside, and a flexible diaphragm overlies the perforated all and is exposed to the filling charge. At the start of the container filling operation, the foot valve is moved downward, while in sealed relation with the cylinder, to first deblock the plug valve and then decompress the measured charge.

Abstract: A resiliently supported filter support plate, with tubular filters depending therefrom, is provided with an overlying rock shaft carrying rocker arms having depending hammer heads arranged to strike and jar the filter mounting plate to shake off the filter cake. A resilient crank arm is connected to the rock shaft and is provided with parallel, cantilever mounted leaf springs that receive an eccentric drive roller which oscillates the rock shaft through one or the other of the leaf springs and causes the hammer heads to strike the filter support plate before the striking stroke of the roller has been completed. The driven leaf spring is then deflected by the roller as it completes its striking stroke, further motion of the hammer heads having been interrupted by the filter support plate. On the hammer lift stroke the eccentric roller retracts the hammer via the other leaf spring.

Abstract: A mobile scaffold has a carriage for traversing longitudinally a first track and a second track. The carriage is suspended from the first track. Lateral support for one side of the carriage is provided by the second track, and this track is spaced vertically from the first track. A parallel arm type crane has one end mounted to the carriage on a side that is opposite from the side adjacent the second track. Attached to the end of the crane extended outwardly from the carriage is an operator's platform. The crane can swing to position the platform both in elevation and in a direction lateral of the carriage. The carriage has a vertical drive shaft with a horizontal wheel mounted thereon for contacting the second track. Bearings fit about the vertical drive shaft and the end of the crane is attached to the bearings so as to swing about the drive shaft.

Abstract: A drum rotation indicator enables a crane operator to sense rotation of a drum, and thereby determine linear movement of a cable, that has one end wound about the drum. This indicator has a cam, that rotates with the drum, and a cam follower, that translates rotation of the cam into linear movement. A readout plunger is located conveniently for the operator's hand, and linear motion that is induced by the cam follower is transferred to the readout plunger by a medium that can be a mechanical linkage, a push-pull cable, or a hydraulic system. In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the cam follower disengages automatically from the cam after linear motion has been transferred to the readout plunger. The linear motion transferring medium also transfers motion from the readout plunger to the cam follower, which pivots into engagement with the cam. The cam has a serrated periphery, to give an instantaneous response, upon rotation of the drum, to engagement of the cam follower with the cam.

Abstract: An extensible boom has a base section that is pivotally connected to a machinery platform and at least one section that is movable axially relative to the base section. A cable system is provided for extending and for retracting the movable sections. The boom sections can be jammed together in either an extended position or a retracted position to resist compression axially of the boom, and to resist bending transversely of the longitudinal axis of the boom in a generally vertical plane. A live mast is offset from the base end of the boom in a vertical plane. Boom carrying ropes extend between the distal end of the base section and the live mast, while a boom pendant extends between the live mast and the distal end of the tip section of the boom. Support of the boom can be transferred by alternately tensioning and slackening the boom carrying ropes and the boom pendant.

Abstract: A transmission, in which power is transmitted from one variable diameter pulley to another through an endless band, has an automatic band tensioning mechanism. The band tensioning mechanism includes a tensioning shaft, an adjusting wheel rotatably mounted on the shaft, and a spring connected between the shaft and the wheel. A worm engaged with the wheel is mounted on a shaft slidably received in a locking member. The worm has a locking shoulder at one end which is normally urged, by the spring acting through the wheel, into engagement with a locking shoulder on one end of the locking member. The worm is moved out of locking engagement against the bias of the spring for rotation of the worm and wheel, and tightening of the spring.

Abstract: A railroad car dumper, suitable for dumping cars of a unit train, is disclosed. The dumper has a frame and a carriage, with tracks on the carriage to receive a car from adjacent tracks. The frame has a sidewall to support a car on the tracks during dumping with the car couplers on the axis of rotation of the dumper. The dumper frame is shiftable laterally, while the carriage remains fixed to maintain alignment of the carriage tracks with the adjacent tracks. Lateral shifting of the dumper frame while the carriage and tracks remain fixed permits a locomotive, larger than the cars to be dumped, to pass through the shifted frame.

Abstract: A two mass vibratory material handling apparatus has a first mass that includes a vibration exciter of the rotary eccentric weight type and a second mass that includes an object to be vibrated. The two masses are interconnected by resilient elements designed to permit a desired vibration amplification from the vibration exciter to the object to be vibrated. The vibration exciter has a drive with an adjustable drive ratio located between a fixed r.p.m. at full voltage motor drive shaft and a shaft that rotatably supports eccentric weights. Variable pitch pulleys or a set of pulleys having various pitch diameters and provided so that pitch diameters can be selected therefrom for mounting one pulley on each shaft with a drive belt trained about the pulleys and thus, provide a drive ratio enabling the fixed frequency motor to drive the eccentric weights at a selected operating frequency.

Abstract: A roller chain that includes a series of alternately arranged roller links and pin links is manufactured by welding side bars to separately formed bushings and pins. Each roller link has a pair of laterally spaced side bars extending in a direction longitudinally of the chain. A pair of bushings extend transversely of the chain between the side bars and a pair of rollers are rotatably mounted on the bushings. Welds fuse each end portion of each bushing to an adjacent side bar end portion. Each pin link has a pair of laterally spaced side bars extending in a direction longitudinally of the chain, with one side bar being located on one side of an adjacent pair of roller links and the other side bar being located on the opposite side of the roller links. A pair of pins extend transversely between the side bars, through bore openings in the bushings of each roller link. Welds fuse each end portion of each pin to an adjacent side bar end portion.

Abstract: An auxiliary speed reducer unit can be detachably mounted upon a main speed reducer unit to form a compound speed reducer. The main unit includes a housing and a worm shaft rotatably journalled therein with an end portion of the worm shaft extending from the housing. The auxiliary unit has a housing with an opening therein for receiving the end portion of the main unit worm shaft. An input worm shaft is rotatably journalled within the auxiliary housing and has a worm thereon that meshes with a worm gear. Within the worm gear is a central bore of a size to receive and key with the end portion of the main unit worm shaft. Annular grooves on opposite faces of the worm gear receive annular projections having a radial width less than said grooves. The projections extend from opposite sides of the auxiliary unit housing to support the worm gear in a loosely rotatable manner for limited play in the plane of the gear while the gear is in mesh with the input worm.

Abstract: A blank, having a pair of parallel bushing forming strips that are intermediately connected by a web, is formed from stock. The blank is bent and curled in a progressive die to form a bushing link that includes a pair of cylindrical bushings integral with the web. Rollers can be slipped longitudinally over the bushing ends opposite from the web and an inside plate is welded to the bushing ends to form a roller link. Such roller links are alternately arranged with pin-links to form a roller chain. A bushing chain can be formed in essentially the same manner as the roller chain by omitting the rollers from the bushing links.

Abstract: A diesel pile hammer housing is seated upon a pile and a ram moves alternately up and down within the housing, striking an anvil and driving the pile. The ram and the housing cooperate to define a power chamber and a separate scavenging chamber that are interconnected for gases to flow from the power chamber to the scavenging chamber. During the diesel operating cycle, upward movement of the ram creates a sub-atmospheric pressure in the scavenging chamber and gases are drawn from the power chamber into the scavenging chamber. During starting operation, the ram is elevated by a generally cylindrical push rod that fits through a circular guide bushing in the housing to contact the ram within the scavenging chamber. An intermediate portion of the push rod is deformed from its generally cylindrical shape by removal of a segment thereof to form a flat surface along one side of the rod.

Abstract: A heavy duty truck carrier has a machinery platform mounted thereon for rotation in a generally horizontal plane about a substantially vertical axis. Material handling equipment, such as a crane or an excavator, is mounted upon the machinery platform in a position over the vertical axis of rotation. An operator's cab is offset from the axis of rotation and mounted upon an elevating mechanism attached to the machinery platform. The elevating mechanism has a pair of hydraulic cylinders mounted within a support frame and actuating arms extending upward from the cylinders and frame to support a bracket attached to the upper portion of the operator's cab. A pair of guide brackets project from the lower portion of the operator's cab and are slidably mounted for vertical movement about the outside surfaces of the hydraulic cylinders.

Abstract: An extensible cantilever boom assembly, for a mobile crane, has telescopically interfitting box-like boom sections, that include web or side plates of uniform thickness. These plates are shaped to provide increased stiffness, and openings are provided within some of the plates to reduce the plate weight, so that the load carrying capacity of the boom is increased. A plurality of shaped portions are formed within the plates, at locations intermediate the top edges and the bottom edges of the plates. These plate portions are spaced laterally from the parallel planes that define the side surfaces of the plates, at the junctures of the side surfaces with the top and bottom edges. The shaped portions, located at longitudinally spaced intervals, are aligned in a row that extends longitudinally of the plate. Each shaped portion has a regular geometrical pattern that forms a laterally projecting protuberance on one side of the plate and a corresponding depression on the opposite side of the plate.

Abstract: A hydraulic jack, suitable for use as an outrigger support for a mobile crane, has a cylinder with a piston slidably received therein. Projecting from the piston is a rod that extends axially outward of the cylinder for supporting a load. The rod is externally threaded and a worm wheel nut is internally threaded to fit upon the rod. The nut is held in a fixed, axial position relative to the cylinder, and this nut must rotate on the rod to enable the rod to travel inwardly or outwardly of the cylinder. A rotatable worm is threaded to mesh with worm engaging gear teeth on the periphery of the worm wheel nut. Preferably, the thread on the worm has a helix angle with a self-locking characteristic, but the helix angle of the threads between the worm wheel nut and the piston rod is greater than the angle of friction so that there are no self-locking characteristics.

Abstract: There is disclosed a telescoping boom with first and second motors, each connected between adjacent boom sections to extend and retract one boom section with respect to the other. Each motor has a piston slidably received in a cylinder to define an extend chamber on one side of the piston and a retract chamber on the other side thereof. Each piston has a rod extending from the cylinder which has two passages therein, one communicating with the extend chamber and the other communicating with the retract chamber. A control valve has a first portion for control of the first motor and a second portion for control of the second motor. The hydraulic passage between the retract chamber of the second motor and the second valve portion includes the retract chamber of the first motor. The hydraulic passage between the extend chamber of the second motor and the second valve portion, and only that passage, passes over a reel between said members.

Abstract: A vibratory parts feeder has a feeder bowl with a helical track originating at the bottom of the bowl and extending upwardly along the inner periphery of the bowl wall to an exit station at the top of the bowl. Articles can be progressively fed from the lower portion of the bowl along the helical track to the exit station at a given feed rate by vibratory energy. The feeder bowl and its mounting frame form a feeder bowl mass that is supported above a base mass by a plurality of inclined leaf springs. One end of each spring is connected to the feeder bowl mass and an opposite end of the spring is connected to the base mass. The leaf springs are arranged to move one of the masses vertically in response to rotational twisting of one of the masses relative to the other mass about a central vertical axis of the feeder.

Abstract: Combination barge positioning and propelling apparatus utilizing a plurality of powered, reversible traction devices in frictional contact with the vertical sides of the barge is disclosed. Several embodiments of the apparatus are shown to accommodate various widths of barges and variations in the water level and/or draft of the barges.

Abstract: A lifting crane has a boom of box lattice type construction, and a steel wire rope hoist line extending adjacent to the boom is alternately slackened and tensioned during a cyclical work period as to slap, pound or rub against some of the lattice members. This makes such lattice members vulnerable to damage by contact with the hoist line and subjects the hoist line to abrasive wear by contact with the lattice members. An elongate, rigid connector extends longitudinally of a lattice member vulnerable to damage by hoist line contact and defines a mounting base receiving slot therein. A strip of expendable material softer than the hoist line has a mounting base portion shaped to fit within the slot in the connector for securing the strip thereto and has an enlarged head portion that is positioned between the connector and the hoist line when the strip is secured to the connector to form a shock absorbing cushion that is non-abrasive to the hoist line.