The invention relates to a filter manufacturing apparatus including: —a feed path adapted to continuously feed a filter material along a longitudinal transport direction; —a forming device connected to a terminating end of the feed path and adapted to form the filter material into a rod-shaped continuous filter body and deliver the formed continuous filter body, the forming device including: a tubular element adapted to allow the filter material to pass therethrough to form the filter material into the continuous filter body; a heat source adapted to heat the filter material passing in the tubular element; —a diameter measuring device positioned at the outlet of the forming device and adapted to measure a diameter of the continuous filter body.

There is disclosed a method of making a filter element or mouthpiece (300) comprising the steps of: advancing filtering material in the longitudinal direction; drawing the advancing filtering material into a shaping element (110), to thereby form a longitudinally extending rod of filtering material comprising a channel extending longitudinally through the rod of filtering material; wherein the shaping element (110) comprises a chamber and a shaping rod (200) which extends longitudinally within the chamber, the inner surface of the chamber shaping the advancing filtering material to form the longitudinally extending rod of filtering material, and the shaping rod (200) shaping the advancing filtering material to form the channel extending longitudinally through the rod of filtering material; and wherein the shaping element (110) applies an additive to the filtering material.

A pleated filter preparation system is provided for accurately counting pleats along a continuous sheet of pleated filter material and cutting the sheet into filter strips to be formed into filters. The pleated filter preparation system includes a pleat driver having multiple drive gears that engage with the pleats of the pleated filter material to move the pleated filter material through the system. A pleat counter counts peaks and valleys of each pleat comprising the pleated filter material so as to identify a target pleat to be cut. The pleat counter clamps and stretches the target pleat to distinguish the target pleat among the other pleats. A punch cut station cuts the target pleat to form a filter strip having a desired number of pleats. A pleat compressor compresses the filter strips to a predetermined size and then ejects the filter strips into a suitable container or bin.

A piece of substrate material is formed under heat and pressure against a cavity into a shaped substrate sheet having one or more depressions. Two substrate sheets are bonded together to form a substrate wherein the one or more depressions form one or more interior channels. The substrate, if not formed with pre-coated substrate material, is coated with a dope and quenched to form a filtering membrane. A plurality of membranes may be placed side by side to form a bundle with permeating ends of the membrane, which are open to the one or more interior channels, separated by gaps or spacers. The bundle is connected to a header to produce a module. The module can be assembled into a cassette.

The invention relates to a filter manufacturing apparatus including a feed path adapted to continuously feed a filter material along a longitudinal transport direction, and a forming device connected to a terminating end of the feed path and adapted to form the filter material into a rod-shaped continuous filter body and deliver the formed continuous filter body. The forming device includes: a tubular element adapted to allow the filter material to pass therethrough to form the filter material into the continuous filter body; a heat source adapted to heat the filter material passing in the tubular element. A diameter measuring device is positioned at the outlet of the forming device and adapted to measure a diameter of the continuous filter body.

Systems and methods for automated fabrication of pleated filters that promote user-selected adjustment of the pleat spacing generated by the system. A lower conveyor of a pleat spacing station is operated at a selected conveyor rate. A gathered pleated segment of filter material is received at the pleat spacing station. The pleat spacing station expands a pleat spacing of the gathered pleated segment in forming a pleated filter segment. Expansion of the pleats at the pleat spacing station is accomplished by initially engaging the filter material along the lower conveyor, with the conveyor rate being alterable by a user, including on the fly alteration, to establish a desired pleat spacing and thus pleat density in the pleated filter.

The present invention relates to a method for manufacturing a paper straw, the method comprising: a paper roll transmission step, a paper strip heating step, a bonding and shaping step and a cutting step. Wherein, a plurality of raw paper rolls face a connection position jointly to transmit a raw paper strip, the raw paper strip includes a paper material and a dry hot-melt adhesive. The dry hot-melt adhesive of the raw paper rolls is heated for changing into flow hot-melt adhesive. Then the raw paper rolls is transmitted to the connection position for rolling jointly, and the flow hot-melt adhesives are bounded on another raw paper strip to form a pipe. Finally, the pipe is cut to form at least one paper straw after the pipe exceeds a setting length. The present invention uses dry adhesive to manufacture paper straw, without the excessive glue problem and mold phenomenon of the traditional wet bonding method as well as without an extra dry fixing step of traditional manufacture process, so the productivity will be raised significantly, and the defect rate will be reduced.

A piece of substrate material is formed under heat and pressure against a cavity into a shaped substrate sheet having one or more depressions. Two substrate sheets are bonded together to form a substrate wherein the one or more depressions form one or more interior channels. The substrate, if not formed with pre-coated substrate material, is coated with a dope and quenched to form a filtering membrane. A plurality of membranes may be placed side by side to form a bundle with permeating ends of the membrane, which are open to the one or more interior channels, separated by gaps or spacers. The bundle is connected to a header to produce a module. The module can be assembled into a cassette.

A pleated filter preparation system is provided for accurately counting pleats along a continuous sheet of pleated filter material and cutting the sheet into filter strips to be formed into filters. The pleated filter preparation system includes a pleat driver having multiple drive gears that engage with the pleats of the pleated filter material to move the pleated filter material through the system. A pleat counter counts peaks and valleys of each pleat comprising the pleated filter material so as to identify a target pleat to be cut. The pleat counter clamps and stretches the target pleat to distinguish the target pleat among the other pleats. A punch cut station cuts the target pleat to form a filter strip having a desired number of pleats. A pleat compressor compresses the filter strips to a predetermined size and then ejects the filter strips into a suitable container or bin.

A pleated filter preparation system is provided for accurately counting pleats along a continuous sheet of pleated filter material and cutting the sheet into filter strips to be formed into filters. The pleated filter preparation system includes a pleat driver having multiple drive gears that engage with the pleats of the pleated filter material to move the pleated filter material through the system. A pleat counter counts peaks and valleys of each pleat comprising the pleated filter material so as to identify a target pleat to be cut. The pleat counter clamps and stretches the target pleat to distinguish the target pleat among the other pleats. A punch cut station cuts the target pleat to form a filter strip having a desired number of pleats. A pleat compressor compresses the filter strips to a predetermined size and then ejects the filter strips into a suitable container or bin.