US2909992A - Printing press - Google Patents

Description

1959 J. w. ROCKEFELLER, JR 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS 8 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed Dec. 23, 195"! Oct. 27, 1959 J. w ROCKEFELLER, JR 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS Filed Dec. 23, 1957 8 Sheets-Sheet 2 QMJMV Oct. 27, 1959 J: w. ROCKEFELLER, JR 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS Filed Dec. 23, 1957 8 Sheets-Sheet 3 $1527 WZMkFf/H J5:

Oct. 27, 1959 J. w. ROCKEFELLER, Jl 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS Filed Dec. 25, 1957 a Sheets-Sheet 4 'sMW 011%. 27, 1959 J. w. ROCKEFELLER, JR 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS Filed Dec. 23, 1957 8 Sheets-Sheet 5 Oct. 27, 1959 J. w. ROCKEFELLER, JR 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS a Sheets-Sheet 6 Filed Dec. 23, 1957 Oct. 27, 1959 J. w. ROCKEFELLER, JR 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS Filed Dec. 23, 1957 8 Sheets-Sheet 7 HOV.A.C.

Oct. 27, 1959 J. w. ROCKEFELLER, JR 2,909,992

PRINTING PRESS Filed Dec. 23, 1957 a Sheets-Sheet a niteci States atn 2,909,992 PRINTING PRESS J o'hu W. Rockefeller, Jr., Short Hills, N.J., assignor to *Columbiau Art Works, Milwaukee, Wis., a corporation of Wisconsin 7 Application December 23, 1957, Serial No. 704,693

4 Claims. (Cl. 101-76) This invention relates to the printing art and has as its purpose to provide a printing press especially adapted for the printing of such items as daily calendar pads and dated coupon books, asfor instance, Christmas Club savings books and the like, wherein successive leaves bear printed indicia, including dates, which are not necessarily consecutive on successive leaves.

Heretofore in the printing of such work, it was neces sary to print all of the required number of each of the individual leaves of the complete pad or book before the complete .pad or book could be made up. Although the presses used for this purpose usually were large enough to enable more than one of the individual leaves to be printed with each impression, the full supply of all of the leaves required for the entire job lot had to be completed before the pads or coupon books could be made up, and before the pads or books could be completed the printed sheets had to be cut into separate leaves, and the thus separated leaves had to be collated. The disadvantage of this past practice is obvious. Itrequired predetermining the total number of pads or books to be produced and it entailed many repeated set-ups of the press to print the complete job.

With a view toward overcoming this disadvantage and giving the printer far greater flexibility in the printing of such work as ,here contemplated, thepresent invention has as its object to provide a press with a plurality of changeable printing faces which are automatically changed with each impression or stroke of the press, and wherein the selection and grouping of the printing faces is governed by a programming element or device, so that by operating the press in cycles, complete calendar pads, coupon books, or the like, are delivered by the press with each complete cycle of operation thereof.

More specifically, it is an object of this invention to provide a press of the character described wherein a plurality of movable type carrying units are provided, each of which has a series of printing faces thereon to be individually brought into printing position upon proper indexing thereof, and wherein theindexing of the type carrying units is under the control of and governed by a programming element or device.

Another object of this invention is to provide a press of the character described, which is so designed and constructed that, by operating the same in cycles, each of predetermined duration, complete articles such as dated coupon books and daily calendar pads are delivered by the press at .the completion of each cycle of operation thereof.

With the aboveand other objects in view, which will appear as thetdescription proceeds, this invention resides in the novel construction, combination and arrangement of parts substantially as hereinafter described and more particularly defined by the appended claims, it being understood that such changes in the precise embodiment of the hereindisclosed invention may be made as come within the scope of the claims.

The accompanying drawings illustrate one complete example of the physical embodiment of the invention constructed according to the best mode so far devised for the practical application of the principles thereof, and in which:

Figure 1 is a perspective view of a daily calendar pad, which is one of the items that may be economically and expeditiously printed with the press of this invention;

Figure 2 is a perspective view of a coupon book, the printing of which is also'facilitated by this invention;

Figure 3 diagrammatically illustrates the complete printing press of this invention;

Figure 4 is a perspective view ofthe printing head, or loosely, plate cylinder of this invention, and which as will appear from this View, comprises three separate type carrying units or wheels, namely, a day of the week wheel; a day of the month wheel; and a month of the year wheel; I

Figure 5 is a cross sectional view through the printing head illustrated in Figure 4, showing particularly the manner in which the day of the week wheel is indexed;

Figure 6is a view similar to Figure 5 but illustrating the manner in which the day of the month wheel is indexed;

Figure 7 is, again, a view similar to Figure 5, but illustrating the manner in which the month of the year wheel is indexed;

Figure 8-is a detail cross sectional-view through the main supporting shaft of the printing head and through the hub of the month of theyearwheel to illustrate one form of detent that may be used to releasably hold the individual wheels in their indexed positions;

Figure 9 is-a perspective view illustrating one form of programming element which maybe used to control the operation of the press;

Figure l0 is a view diagrammatically illustrating the manner in which the programming element of Figure 9 controls the indexing mechanism;

Figure 11 is a perspective view of an alternative or modified form of programming element;

Figure 12 is an enlarged fragmentary view with parts broken away and in section, illustrating a detail of the programming element shown in Figure '11 and Figures 13, 14 and-15 are similar detail sectional views through the rim-of the drum shown in Figure 12, at difierent locations, the first of which is at the plane of the line 1313 in Figure 12.

Referring now particularly to the accompanying drawings in which like numerals indicate like parts throughout the several views, the numeral 16 indicates generally a calendar pad of the conventional type wherein each sheet or leaf bears diiferent indicia. As brought out hereinbefore, it was the practice in the past to print the entire number of each of'the individual leaves of the pad, required to fill a given order, before the pad could be made up. By co ntrast, this invention permits all of the successive leaves-of a single pad to be printed dur ing each complete cycle of the press so that each cycle of the press produces a complete pad, and, of course, through the simple expedient of multiplying the number of printing heads with which the press is equipped, several pads can be completely printed and finished with each complete cycle of the press.

Though it is perhaps unnecessary, it should be noted that in calendar pads of the type here under consideration, each-leaf thereof is imprinted with the name of the day of the week, the number of day of the month, the month of the year, and, in addition, a complete monthly calendar.

Although the invention was developed primarily for the printing of calendar pads such as that illustrated in Figure 1, it is equally advantageous in the printing of such other items as coupon books, like the book 17 shown in Figure 2. Such coupon books are used, for instance, in Christmas Club savings accounts and usually have successive leaves thereof. imprinted with indicia including dates which are not'necessarily consecutive on successive leaves.

In general, the printing press of this invention com- 1 inafter described. Thus, by controlling the positions of the masks with respect to the fixed stroke of the pawls, the

angle through which eachr-type carrying unit or wheel prises a printing head designated generally by the nuand, to obviate the need for large indexing increments and still enable all of the wheels to have the same effective diameter, the day of the week wheel has thirtyfive faces representing five weeks. This multiplication of printing faces on the day of the week wheel also has the advantage of equalizing the wear thereon with that of the other wheels.

The day of the month wheel, likewise has separate printing faces, delineated with the number of the days of the month and hence there are thirty-one such faces; and the month of .the year wheel 21 has twelve separate faces, each delineated with the name of one month and the year, and preferably also the complete calendar for its respective month.

A detent 23 such as that shown in Figure 8, is prw vided for each of the three type carrying units or wheels, to releasably hold the same with one of its printing faces facing downward and coplanar with one of each of the other two units so that one printing face of each unit is always in printing position. The detent 23 may be simply a spring urged plunger carried by the shaft 22 to engage in one of a circle of notches 24 in the hub of the wheel, and obviously the number of such notches in each wheel corresponds to the number of printing faces on the wheel.

Each of the three separate type carrying units or wheels has a ratchet wheel fixed to one side thereof, the ratchet wheels for the respective type carrying units being desig nated 19', and 21'; and the number of teeth in each of these ratchet wheels corresponds to the number of printing faces on its respective type carrying unit or wheel. These ratchet wheels 19', 20', and 21' form part of the indexing mechanism by which the type carrying units are periodically advanced as required to effect the desired sequence of combinations of type.

To advance the ratchet wheels and thus index their respective type carrying units, pawls 25, 26, and 27 are provided. These pawls are pivoted to the outer ends of fingers 28, 29, and 30, respectively, all of which are fixed to a shaft 31 which extends lengthwise across the printing head and is, in turn, carried by a pair of arms 32 journalled upon the main supporting shaft 22. Thus, by rocking the arms 32 about the shaft 22 any one or more of the type carrying units or wheels may be indexed to bring another combination of printing faces into printing position, the combination depending upon which of the pawls operatively engages or engage the ratchet wheels.

Engagement of the pawls with their respective ratchet wheels is controlled by masks 33, 34, and 35. These masks are rotatably mounted on the shaft 22 and respectively overlie the ratchet wheels 19, 20 and 21', with the peripheries of the masks in position to hold the pawls from engaging between the teeth of the ratchet wheels for all or part of the arcuate stroke of the pawls, depending upon the positions of the masks;

The arcuate stroke of the pawls has fixed limits and is produced by swinging the arms 32 about the shaft 22 through a predetermined angle, in a manner to be here;

is advanced with each stroke of the press is readily controlled. Any suitable means may be employed to rotate the masks about the main supporting shaft and thus determine their positions. For instance, solenoids 36, 37, 37' and 38 may be provided for this purpose. The solenoid 36 has its armature connected with the mask 33; the solenoids 37 and 37' have their armatures connected with the mask 34; and the solenoid 38 has its armature connected with the mask 35. All of the solenoids are fixedly mounted with respect to the stationary main supporting shaft 22 so that, upon energization, thereof, their armatures swing the masks through predetermined angles.

The energization of the solenoids is under the control of, and is governed by, a programming element, indicated generally by the numeral 39. This programming element may be in the form of a tape 40 (see Figures 3, 9 and 10) movable between a common contact bar 41 and a plurality of contact fingers 42, 43, 44 and 45, to control the closure of circuits by which the solenoids are energized. The tape 40 is incrementally advanced with each stroke of the press and may simply have holes 40 located to permit closure of the contacts whenrneeded to effect the desired printing sequence. The manner in which this is done will no doubt be clear from Figures 9 and 10.

An alternate form of master control or programming element is shown in Figures 11 to 15, inclusive. Here, a large wheel 46 the rim portion of which is of insulating material, has conductor bars 47 embedded in its surface. All of these conductor bars are electrically connected to a ring 41 which may be considered the counterpart of the common contact 41. As the wheel is incrementally advanced, as by a pawl (not shown) engaging in ratchet teeth formed on the ring 41', these conductor bars 47 engage stationary contacts 42', 43', 44', and 45 which are connected into the circuits of the solenoids as in Figure 10, to close these circuits as required to produce the desired results.

Although, in the practical application of the invention, a specially designed press most likely would be employed, for purposes of illustration, the invention has been shown in Figure 3 in conjunction with a conventional check printing press wherein the printing head is constrained to rectilinear up and down motion above a platten 49 to cause the printing faces then in printing position to coact with the platten and produce a printing impression upon the stock on the platten. However, in this case the stock is in the form of a web W instead of a succession of separate sheets.

The web W is intermittently advanced with each stroke of the press, and at the delivery end of its travel the web is cut by a knife or cut-off unit 50, into separate leaves which are gathered in proper succession into a pile P.

Since the general press structure forms no part of this invention, it has not been illustrated, suffice it to say that as in the conventional check printing type press, the printing head 18 is inside an inking mechanism comprising a cylinder C interrupted at the bottom to expose the type faces in printing position, and rollers R mounted to rotate about and roll across the surface of the cylinder and across the exposed type faces to properly ink the same before each impression.

Up and down motion is imparted to the entire printing head assembly by a crank shaft 51 having axially spaced crank pins 51 (only one of which is shown) each of which is connected by a link or rod 52 with one end of the shaft 22, or at least with the frame (not shown) in which the shaft is mounted. Thus, each revolution of the crank shaft brings the printing faces in printing position into printing coaction with the impres- "retracted. This may be 'done'hy-geaiing such-as that tion is reached, one of the interruptions in the gear 53 allows the segment 54 to turn freely and be retracted by a spring 55 to its fullline position, the timing, of course, being such that the indexing of the type carrying units or wheels by the pawls, occurs between impressions.

By the same token, the intermittent advance of the programming element must be properly coordinated with the periodicity of the printing strokes, and this is achieved by having the tape 40 trained over and meshed with a sprocket wheel 56 which is incrementally advanced with each stroke of the press, as by a finger 57 projecting down from the connecting rod or link 52, and arranged to transmit an increment of rotation to the sprocket wheel 56 through a bell crank and pawl and ratchet mecha- Operation The operation of thepress will be described-in conjunction with the printing of a calendar pad such as that illustrated in Figure 1.

Since each cycle of press operation produces at least one complete calendar, it follows that at the start of the cycle, the three type carrying units, or wheels 19, 20, and 21, will bein their positions at which the combination of printing indicia in printing position will correspond to the first day of the year, as for instance, Tuesday, Jan. 1, 1957. will be in its position at which the month of January is in printing position; the day of the'month wheel will be in its position at which its printing face bearing the numeral 1 is in printing position; and the day of the week wheel will be in the position at which the name of the first day of the year (Tuesday) will be in printing position. I

Between the first impression and the next, the day of the week wheel 19 and the day of the month wheel 20 are each advanced one increment. This results from the fact that the mask of each of these two wheels is normally so positioned that it uncovers only one tooth of its respective ratchet wheel lying within the stroke of the associated pawl. This operation is repeated after each impression until the entire month of January is accounted for, and it will be noted that during each of the thirty-one strokes of the press required to complete the month of January, the mask 35 of the month of the year wheel 21 remains in a position at which it prevents engagement of its associated pawl with the ratchet wheel of this unit.

Upon completion of the thirty-first impression, the master control or programming element has moved to its position at which the contact 45 engages the common contact 41 to thus effect energization of solenoid 38 which is operatively connected with the mask 35 for the month of the year wheel. Such energization of the solenoid 38 swings the mask 35 counterclockwise far enough to uncover the last covered tooth of its ratchet wheel in time for the associated pawl 27 to engage this tooth and advance the wheel 21 one step. This brings the February printing face into printing position and, since there are thirty-one faces on the day of the month wheel, this wheel will be in its position at which its number one face will be in printing position. The day of the week wheel 19 will automatically likewise be in its proper position, since the days of the week continue in their regular order regardless of the changing months.

Throughout the printing of the month of February the procedure continues as explained, but, obviously, since Thus, the month of the year wheel the month or February has a change must 'beniade in the day of the month wheel after twenty-eight impressions. For the three normal years, thi'smeans that the day of the month wheel must be advanced four steps to bring the number one face thereoninto printing position during the time that the month of 'the'year wheel is indexed to bring its March face into printing position. This operation is againcontrolled by the programming element and is done by energizing the solenoid 37. The energization of the solenoid 3'7, of course, results from the fact that the programming element has moved to its position at'which contact '43 is permitted to make electrical connection with the commoncontact 41.- t

The armature of the solenoid 37 is connected with the mask 34 through a unidirectional coupling 60 consisting of a pin fixed to the armature and received in an'arcuate slot in the mask (see Figure '6). Since the coupling 60 is "close to the axis of the'shaft 22 about which the masks swing, the stroke of the armature of the solenoid 37 is sufiicient to pull the mask 34 back far enough to uncover four-teeth ofit's associated ratchet wheel and, accordingly, the pawl drops into that tooth which will bring the wheel 20 to its position at which its number one printing face'is in printing position.

In view of the fact that the connection between the armature of the solenoid 37 with .the mask 34 must be unidirectional as will be hereinafter pointed out, a separate spring 61 is provided to project the armature to its extended position and also hold the mask 34 in its normal position.

T o accommodate the leap year condition when February has twenty-nine days, so that the advance of the day of the month wheel at the end of February is only three steps, the connection 60 between the armature of the solenoid 37 and the mask 34 is changed to the socalled leap year slot 62, which being farther out from the center of rotation, will bring about a lesser degree of rotation on the partof the mask, despite the fact that the stroke of the solenoid armature is the same.

March being a thirty-one day month the procedure 'will be the same for the printing of its complement of days as was explained in connection with the printingof the January calendar.

At the end of April, however, since it has but thirty days, the day of the month wheel 24) must be advanced two steps rather than the customary one and, for this purpose, the master control or programming element, effects energization of the solenoid 37 by allowing contact 44 to engage the common contact 41. With energization of the solenoid 37, the mask 34 is swung a distance sufficient to uncover one more tooth of its associated ratchet wheel. The indexing stroke of the pawls thus moves the day'of the month wheel two spaces to thereby bring the number one printing face thereof into printing 'posit-ion.

For the rest of the cycle, the successive monthly operations will be readily understood from the preceding description, but it should be noted that, when the full year has been printed and the cycle completed, the day or" the week wheel must remain stationary during the next indexing operation to assure having the first of the year begin on the correct day. To illustrate, the 1st of January 1957, is a Tuesday, and the 31st day of December is also a Tuesday. Hence, in order for the first impression of the next cycle to show January 1st being '7 solenoid 36 to prevent any engagement of its pawl with its associated ratchet wheel.

For the printing of leap years, the solenoid 36 is moved to its dotted line position shown in Figure 5, and its armature is connected to the mask 33 at 63. Consequently, energization of the solenoid 36 now rocks the mask 33 counterclockwise to uncover another'five teeth and thereby bring the day of the week wheel to its proper position. To illustrate, the 1st of January, 1956, was a Sunday, but because of the additional day in February of this leap year (1956), the last day of the year was a Monday. To have the cycle start properly the day of the week wheel in this case would have to be in a position at which one of its Sunday faces was in printing po- .sition, and this is best done with the structure here provided by advancing the wheel six positions.

As noted hereinbefore, the connections between the armatures of the solenoids 37 with the mask 34 are unidirectional. ,This is necessitated by the fact that two separate solenoids act independently of one another upon the same mask. It is also for this reason that the mask 34 and the armatures of the solenoids 37 and 37 are yieldingly held in their normal positions by an external spring 61.

In the case of the solenoids 36 and 38, thespring by which the masks and the solenoid armatures are held in normal positions may be incorporated in the solenoids, as indicated for instance at 64.

From the foregoing description taken in connection with the accompanying drawings, it will be, readily apparent to those skilled in this art that this invention provides a far greater degree of flexibility in the printing of such work as calendar pads and dated coupon books than has heretofore been possible, and that, although the invention has been disclosed in conjunction with a web type printing operation, it should be understood that it is equally adaptable to a sheet fed press.

What is claimed as my invention is:

l. A press for cyclically printing such articles as complete daily calendar pads and coupon books which are comprised of a predetermined number of dated leaves bearing printed indicia including dates which are not necessarily consecutive on successive leaves, comprising: means providing an impression surface on which stock to be printed is supported; a plurality of rotatable type carriers each having a series of different printing faces arranged circumferentially about its periphery and concentrically to its axis of rotation; means rotatably mounting said type carriers for rotation about their respective axes and in such positions that one printing face of each of said carriers is always in printing position facing the impression surface; means to periodically effect relative motion between said impression surface and all of said type carriers to simultaneously cause the printing faces then in printing position to coact wtih the impression surface and thereby periodically produce printing impressions; power driven pawl and ratchet indexing means to individually index each type carrier and thereby bring another of its printing faces into printing position, the pa'wls of said indexing means being constrained to swing about the axes of their respective type carriers; power means to oscillate all of the pawls through the same predetermined angle with each printing impression, which angle is great enough to advance the type carrier with the greatest number of printing faces a plurality of increments; a mask for each pawl rotatable about the axis of its respective type carrier to control the operativeness of the pawl; a movable programming element separate and remote from the press; means to incrementally advance the programming element one step with each printing impression; and electrically responsive means governed bysaid programming element and operatively connected with said masks to control the positions of the masks and thereby govern the time at which a type carrier is advancedby its pawl and also thenumber of increments the carrier is advanced by its pawl.

2. A press for cyclically printing such articles as complete daily calendar pads and coupon books which are comprised of a predetermined number of dated leaves bearing printed indicia including dates which are not necessarily consecutive on successive leaves, comprising: means providing an impression surface on which stock to be printed is supported; a plurality of rotatable type carriers each having a series of different printing faces arranged circumferentially about its periphery and concentrically to its axis of rotation; means rotatably mounting said type carriers for rotation about their respective axes and in such positions that one printing face of each of said carriers is always in printing position facing the impression surface; means to periodically eifect'relative motion between said impression surface and all of said type carriers to simultaneously cause the printing faces then in printing position to coact with the impression surface and thereby periodically produce printing impressions; power means to individually index each type carrier and thereby bring another of its printing faces into printing position; a rotatable drum having electrical contacts on its periphery; stationary contactors cooperable with said drum carried contacts to close electrical control circuits as said drum is incrementally rotated;

means to incrementally advance the drum one step with each printing impression; and electrically responsive means rendered operative by the closure of said control circuits to activate said power means and effect indexing of the type carriers in accordance with the arrangement of the contacts on the drum.

3, The press of claim 1 further characterized by the fact that said programming element comprises a rotatable drumhaving electrical contacts on its periphery, and stationary contacts cooperable therewith to close electric control circuits as said drum is incrementally rotated; and by the fact that the control means for the indexing means includes control circuits having said contacts connected therewith. 1

4. The press of claim 1 but wherein the programming element comprises a longitudinally movable tape and aligned contacts at opposite sides of the tape and normallyheldout of engagement by the tape, and means on the tape to provide for circuit closing engagement of said contacts at predetermined positions of the tape; and wherein the control means for the indexing means includes control circuits having said contacts connected therein.

' References Cited in the file of this patent 2 UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,282,173 Besaw Oct. 22, 1918 1,821,360 Reinhardt Sept. 1, 1931 1,947,893 Wheelbarger Feb. 20, 1934 2,101,435 Lang Dec. 7, 1937 2,366,300 Wahl Ian. 2, 1945 2,451,045, Potts n Oct. 12, 1948 2,556,560 Smith June 12, 1951 r 2,641,997 Butterfield June 16, 1952 2,698,075 Luhn Dec. 28, 1954 Gustafsom May 6, 1958 way M

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