Abstract: A gradation thermal printhead having a plurality of heat generating elements each having a heat generating body connected between a pair of electrodes, the electric resistance value of the heat generating body being locally increased in one or more portions thereof. Disclosed also is a gradation heat transfer printing apparatus making use of the gradation thermal printhead mentioned above and employing an energy controlling means for varying the voltage or pulse width of the signal pulse voltage applied to the thermal printhead, thereby allowing a control of the area of the printed dot corresponding to one heat generating element, i.e., the density of printing, thus attaining a gradation control of the printed image.

Abstract: Harmonic vibrations in a signature machine due to the inertial influence of a reciprocating mass comprising grippers and associated parts are reduced by using a planetary gear drive and a weight secured thereto; momentum of the gripper mass is countered by another rotating weight. The planetary gear drive may be either epicyclic or hypocyclic, depending principally upon the length of the reciprocal stroke.

Abstract: In a machine for successively processing cardboard sheets running through a printing machine having more than one printing station, the active parts of each of the printing stations being mounted on a vertical slide in the machine frame with an arrangement for lifting the parts from a working position to either a standby or a preparatory position with the printing cylinder of each station being out of engagement with the sheet being carried by a conveyor arrangement through the machine. This will allow easy access to the printing cylinder. The machine includes a shiftable guide or shutter, which can be moved to a position beneath the printing cylinder when the cylinder is raised from the working position to guide the sheet passing through the station which is not in a working mode.

Abstract: A device for back scraping snow, earth, or other like substances which generally includes a truck having a concave snowplow blade mounted on its front. The blade has shoes provided on its backside, wedge shaped hinged connections mounted on the shoes, and a flat blade mounted pivotably on said wedge brackets. When the flat blade is brought in contact with snow to be scraped and the snowplow blade is moved in a backwardly direction, the snow to be scraped is moved by the flat blade.

Abstract: In the substantially radially extending compartments of a cell wheel or drum of a processing apparatus for processing printed products, there are inserted removable divider or partition walls. The removable divider or partition walls divide each of the compartments into two feed channels. These divider or partition walls terminate at a predetermined distance or spacing from the floor of the compartments. Feed structure, such as grippers for advancing the printed products are arranged in the region of the floor of each compartment and such feed structure commonly coacts with both feed channels. A printed product is inserted into each feed channel. Both printed products are conjointly advanced in the longitudinal direction of the compartments by the related product feed structure and these products are simultaneously opened and furnished with inserts. The opening of the printed products and the stuffing of inserts is done separately.

Abstract: A platen for use with a conventional screen printing machine for printing designs or patterns onto garments includes a window or windows formed in the body of the platen. The windows permit backlighting therethrough and through the garment material to enable the positioning and registration of a pattern on one side of a garment (the front side, for instance) to be registered with a pattern to be printed on the opposite side of the garment. The platen windows may be formed of a plexiglass material, either transparent or translucent, sufficient to permit light to pass therethrough. Light sources are positioned directly below the windows of the platen to enhance the backlighting effect for more accurate registration of patterns to be printed on the garment. A closed loop frame is adapted to fit around the periphery of the platen to hold a garment in position on the platen during the screen printing process.

Abstract: A continuous web of paper with a series of transversely extending rows of perforations between successive panels is folded in zig-zag fashion by reducing the speed of each oddly numbered panel and simultaneously diverting the oddly numbered panel from the path of the web while the evenly numbered panels immediately following the diverted oddly numbered panels continue to advance at a higher speed so that the neighboring panels define loops while the next-following evenly numbered panels catch up with the immediately preceding oddly numbered panels. The loops are stabilized by suction-operated conveyors and by admission of compressed air thereinto, and the resulting stack of overlapping panels is severed at intervals across selected rows of perforations to form a series of smaller stacks each of which contains a desired number of panels.

Abstract: A method of separating and feeding sheets from a stack comprises the steps of bringing a pick-up head into engagement with an intermediate portion of the top sheet of the stack while leaving the opposite ends of the sheet free, applying an air stream from each of the opposite sides of the stack and directed inwardly to impinge against the stack and to cause the free ends of the top sheets of the stack to separate from the underlying sheets, and moving the pick-up head with the picked-up top sheet away from the stack.

Abstract: The invention related to a device for layer-stacking web-like materials, comprising a fixed table on which a carriage is mounted for sliding, said carriage supporting a roll of material mounted for free rotation on a support and being held by pressure against at least one endless driving elastic belt mounted on two rollers placed in parallel relationship inside a vertical plane, said rollers being driven in rotation by a position- and speed-controllable driving member, the material being unrolled and going down freely vertically in order to be laid on the laying table.

Abstract: A carrier for work to be printed comprises a web made up of a series of panels, connected edge-to-edge, and providing means, such as slits, tabs and flaps for coupling the work to the web. The slits, tabs and flaps are preferably arranged to accommodate standard sizes of stationery, so that cut sheets of stationery, coupled to the web, may be printed automatically.

Abstract: Detecting the inoperability of a plurality of printing element drivers without printing involving sequentially energizing each of the drivers with a shortened time duration pulse sufficient to produce a signal in indicating operability and/or inoperability but not sufficient to cause printing.

Abstract: A plurality of hoppers or bins which are product-loadable from above are uniformly spaced from each other and are transported along a path of conveyance. The hoppers or bins, each of which is bounded by two walls or faces which are substantially transverse to the direction of conveyance, pass by a plurality of individual infeed conveyors which are staggerdly arranged in the direction of conveyance. These individual infeed conveyors possess controllable grippers or clamps which are spaced from one another. These mutually spaced clamps or grippers are used to load or fill each hopper or bin with a printed product. The mutual spacing of successive clamps or grippers and their circulating speed substantially correspond to the mutual separation distance or spacing and the circulating speed of the hoppers or bins.

Abstract: A method of makeready for a web printing press of the type wherein a web of paper or the like is fed through a print station and a perforating or like processing station driven by first and second drive shaft sections, respectively, which are normally held interconnected via a clutch for joint rotation and which are declutched to allow the print station to operate independently of the processing station. For reconnecting the two drive shaft sections in phase, the method comprises counting the number of revolutions of the first drive shaft section after the same has been declutched from the second drive shaft section, as by a CPU connected to receive electric pulses representative of the revolutions of the first drive shaft section. Upon reception of a clutch engage command from a manually actuable control panel, the CPU computes the additional number of revolutions required for the first drive shaft section before being reconnected in phase to the second drive shaft section.

Abstract: An apparatus for gathering signatures including a hopper for holding a supply of signatures and a rotatable transfer drum positioned horizontally adjacent thereto for extracting a signature from the supply and carrying the signature in a first path about the periphery of the transfer drum. An adjustable stop is provided for limiting the movement of the signature along the first path to cause the signature to be stopped with its front edge portions at a predetermined location. A first spreader drum is mounted beneath the transfer drum assembly with its outer peripheral surface nearly tangential to the outer peripheral surface of the transfer drum at the predetermined location. Grippers are carried by the spreader drum for engaging the front edge portions of the signature engaged with the stop and conveying the signature away from the transfer drum along a second path.

Abstract: A card printer comprises a type group consisting of a number of types being worked in a desired printing pitch. The types are in a lined-up arrangement in a horizontal direction and are received in a type receiving case so as to carry out an impact printing at their front. A correspondingly solenoid and a corresponding armature group electromagnetically drives each type in response to a control system. A feed system controlled by a control system feed successive cards and a ribbon in a horizontal direction facing the type group. At every place feed of the card by the feed system, a position on the card for a letter or a code to be printed and a lined-up position of a corresponding type are electronically checked and selected by a control system, and, only when the two card and type positions agree each other, a type or types in or are successively or at the same time driven electromagnetically by the corresponding solenoid and the corresponding armature so as to automatically print on the card.

Abstract: A screen printing assembly attachable to a screen frame supporting a screen having a pattern. A support frame, which comprises a flat aluminum extrusion, is positionable adjacent and attachable to the screen frame. A squeegee assembly is movable relative to the support frame and positionable generally on the screen to press ink through the screen. A sealed chamber is connected to the bottom of the support frame and positionable generally adjacent the screen. The squeegee assembly presses the ink through the screen within this sealed chamber. The sealed chamber safety contains the printing ink solvents which are deposited in it. A flexible plastic sheet forms the upper surface of the sealed chamber. This sheet, which can have ultra-violet properties, rolls at its opposite ends about rod assemblies. The sheet is attached to the squeegee assembly and moves with it between these rod assemblies. Tension springs mounted in the rod assemblies keep the sheet taut.

Abstract: A mechanically-expandable instrument (bougie), especially useful for treating diseases in the urethra and the neck of the urinary bladder, comprises an adjustable-speed driving unit (20) and a probe (22) composed of two rods (64) and (66) pivotally connected together at one end thereof and attached to output sliders (54, 56) of the driving unit at their other ends. Each of the rods (64) and (66) has a semicircular cross section so that in an assembled state the probe has a complete circular cross section. Reciprocations of the sliders cause expansions and contractions of the probe, thereby to stretch urethral constrictions in the radial direction and to subject the urethra and its surrounding tissue to massaging and vibrational actions which are extremely efficient for treating diseases of the urethra and the neck of the urinary bladder. Other embodiments of the rod employ cams, wedges, and threaded means for creating radial expansions and contractions of the probe.

Abstract: A blade assembly for the cutting edge of a scraper pan type earth mover includes a fixed blade having forward and downwardly projecting cutting teeth and a moveable blade also having cutting teeth, the moveable blade overlying the fixed blade, and power means for reciprocating the moveable blade in a transverse direction.

Abstract: This print assembly comprises a carousel element having circumferentially a plurality of support elements supporting each a stack of magnetic cards to be printed magnetically and in clear, actuators drivingly connected to and rotating the carousel element for positioning one of the support elements at a magnetizing device for the cards, a clear printing device for the cards arranged downstream of the magnetizing device, transport members transporting the picked up cards from the support elements to the magnetizing and the clear printing device, and a selector arranged downstream of the printing device for separating the validly printed cards from the void ones.

Abstract: A blueprint copy collating apparatus for use with a blueprint copying machine comprising a plurality of blueprint receiving bins which are adapted for vertical movement relative to a support frame. A conveyor means is provided for transporting blueprint copies to the blueprint receiving bins and a drive means provided for raising and lowering the bins relative to the conveyor according to a predetermined sequence which is determined by a control circuit and corresponds to user selection. A vibrator table is secured to the apparatus for aligning sets of blueprint copies which are removed from individual bins subsequent to completion of the sorting or stacking function.