A method for manufacturing a tire involves successively performing steps that include: continuously converting a flat reinforcing strip into an undulating reinforcing strip; pressing peaks of waves of the undulating reinforcing strip one by one onto a surface of a tire blank that is driven in rotation by a drum about a drum axis; and winding the undulating reinforcing strip onto the tire blank. In the converting step, the flat reinforcing strip is converted into the undulating reinforcing strip in an immediate vicinity of the drum. The waves of the undulating reinforcing strip and movement of the peaks of the waves of the undulating reinforcing strip towards the surface of the tire blank extend in a plane substantially perpendicular to the drum axis.

A device, which converts a reinforcing strip from being flat to being undulating, includes a transporter that guides fingers along a closed circuit, with the fingers being able to bear against a first face of the strip; a support plate that rotates about a plate axis and that supports rollers having axes parallel to the plate axis, with the rollers being able to bear against a second face of the strip; and a synchronizer that synchronizes a rotation of the support plate and a forward motion of the transporter. The closed circuit has an intersecting portion at which the synchronizer allows the fingers and the rollers to move rotationally in a common plane perpendicular to the plate axis, with the fingers and the rollers being interposed at the intersecting portion so as to cause the strip to have undulating waves that extend in the common plane.

A method forms a butt joint between ends of first and second plies and splices the first and second plies together. The method includes the steps of: positioning a first splice edge of a first ply at a first location; positioning a second splice edge of a second ply at a second location, the second splice edge being left bare; wrapping a gum strip around the first splice edge such that the first gum strip forms a U-shaped structure in section that allows the first gum strip to extend from a first planar side of the first ply over the first splice edge to a second opposite planar side of the first ply; not wrapping a gum strip around the second splice edge; placing the first splice edge in abutting relationship to the second splice edge; and stitching the first splice edge to the second splice edge such that stitches each extend from the first planar side of the first ply, through the gum strip, to the first planar side of the second ply.

A bleeder cord affixing device is made up of an affixing roller extending in a width direction of the treatment member and adapted to be pressed into the treatment member being moved, thereby to be rotated; and a roller moving mechanism that moves the affixing roller to and away from the treatment member. The roller moving mechanism operates to move the affixing roller to a pressed position urged to the treatment member, with a result that the affixing roller is caused to be rotated due to the movement of the treatment member at the pressed position and attaches the rubber member to the treatment member under the pressing force, and then presses the bleeder cords onto the treatment member to continuously affix the bleeder cords onto the surface of the treatment member.

Method of calendering the continuous ply of reinforcing threads, during which: said ply of reinforcing threads is positioned between a continuous upper sheet of rubber and a continuous lower sheet of rubber, said sheets of rubber having a width greater than the width of the ply of reinforcing threads, so that the two lateral parts of said sheets of rubber which are not vertically aligned with the ply of reinforcing threads form selvedges. The assembly formed in the preceding step is introduced into the nip of a calendering comprising at least two rolls, so as to cause the rubber to penetrate the spaces between the reinforcing threads. Prior to the ply of reinforcing threads and the sheets of rubber being introduced into the nip of the calender, the two selvedges of one of the sheets of rubber are turned up on themselves.

Disclosed are a method and a cord organizer for organizing cords between a tire building creel and an extruder, wherein the method includes the steps of: providing a cord inlay station between the tire building creel and the extruder for preparing the cords for insertion into the extruder; collecting groups of the cords in a plurality of cord collectors at the tire building creel; and transferring said plurality of cords collectors with the groups of cords collected therein from the tire building creel towards the cord inlay station.

A guidance and maintenance machine (100) includes a guide roller (102) and an application roller (104), each having a plurality of respective grooves (102a, 104a) defined on a respective circumferential surface (102b, 104b). The guidance and maintenance machine includes at least one preparation comb (200) having a support (202) with an upper surface (202d) from which a plurality of teeth (204) extend. The teeth, with a predetermined uniform height, are aligned in parallel along a length of the support and are positioned at a pitch between them in correspondence with corresponding grooves (102a) of the guide roller (102) so that the comb (200) feeds filaments (50) from a supply creel (304), where the filaments are stored, to the guide roller (102) at a predetermined pitch positioning outside the guide roller.

A tire including a belt having a steel cord belt layer, and a bandage externally bearing radially on the belt. The bandage includes a rubber strip containing reinforcement cord. This rubber strip is wound about the belt at least from one axial belt end up to at least the other axial belt end, the ratio of the axial winding component to the circumferential winding component along the rubber strip is less than 0.01, and, over at least 70% of the axial belt width, does not vary by more than 2%. The spacing of two neighboring cords in two adjacent portions of the wound rubber strip at each circumferential position does not vary by more than 5% compared to the spacing of the cords in the rubber strip. The cords in the bandage are subjected to tension of at least 3 N/mm.sup.2 over at least 25% of the axial belt width.