CONTAINER SEAM LOCATOR AND POSITIONER FOR CONTAINER PRINTING MACHINE

Mechanism for locating the seams where the terminal ends of containers such as steel cans are joined together in high-speed printing or decorating apparatus wherein a rotary mandrel drum must present the containers individually to offset printing blankets on a rotary printing drum in the same relative rotational position so that the seam of the can is never printed. The rotary mandrel has a series of circumferentially spaced mandrel lever assemblies with generally tangentially disposed laterally projecting mandrels thereon, mounted in line with printing blankets on the peripheral face of the rotary printing drum. The mandrel lever assemblies are provided with cam follower mechanism for engaging cam surfaces just upstream of the printing station which function to normally revolve the cans on the mandrels, and a can-engaging stop is provided which is biased to maintain engagement with each rotating can and halt further rotation thereof when the double thickness seam of the can is engaged. The additional cam surface utilized to bias the stops terminates just short of the printing station so that the cans, which have thus been positioned in preselected rotary positions on their mandrels, are now free to revolve with the mandrels, when engaged by the printing drum blankets.