The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1883-12-22
Needles Made by Hand.

Thatneedle making is an important
branch of industrial art is easily shown
bytigures, and it can also be made evil
dent that of late years it has attained to
extraordinary perfection. The process
as seen in a European establishment is
about as follows: Soft wire. of which
the needles are to be made, is first
wound upon large reels from which it
is cut in lengths of eight feet each.
These are cut again and again until the
pieces are of the length of two needles;
this is done with large shears, and the
wires are more or less bent in the cut
ting. To straighten them they are
gathered into bundles of five or six
thousand each. and put in furnace and
heated until they become soft--an-
nealed being the technical name. The
bundles are then laid on cast iron ia
bles in which there are grooves to re-
ceive the rings, and they are rolled and
pressed until all the wires are straight
The rings are then taken off and the
wires are delivered to the point grind
ers who take twenty or thirty of them
between thumb and forefinger and give
them rolling motion while holding
them on the rapidly revolving grind
stones. They thus sharpen first one
and then the other of the wires. From
the point grinders the wires 90 to the
middle grinders who grind out little
of the metal from the middle of the
wires where the heads and eyes of the
two needles are to be made. This is
done so that when flatteped and the i'm
preston made for the eyes the metal
will not be too thick.
The next operation is that of swedg-
ing or making the impression for the
eyes of the needles. This is done with
foot press carrying dies of the proper
shape. The operator puts wire be-
tween these dies, and with his foot
brings the one down upon the wire,
tiattening it and making an impression
which gives form to the heads and eyes
of the two needles at the same time.
The punching of the eyes is performed
in the same manner, only instead of the
die the press carries a punch having
two points, making the eyes of the two
needles bya single motion of the press.
The wire is now broken in halves, form
ing two rough, soft needles, with fins
or burs of metal on the heads. Forty
or fifty of these are strung or spitted
upon fine wires to hold the burs in line,
and these are placed in wise and the
fins filed off and the heads slightly
rounded. The wires are then taken to
the tempering room, where in lots of
two or three millions they are tempered.
From this room they 90 to the securing
room, where they are laid upon strips
of canvas smeared with oil, and only
covered with COLA dust and emery, and
are then rolled UP into bundles of half
million each, something like Jelly
cake rolls The bundles when corded
look like large torpedoes pointed at the
ends. These bundles are placed on
large fiat tables and heavy planks are
laid on them. The planks are given a
to and fro movement by machinery,
rolling the bundles backward and for
ward, by which the needles are forced
to rub upon each other in the pasty
mass of oil, COLA and emery. Eighteen
or twenty hours of this rolling wears
out the canvas covering and the need
les have to be transferred to new can
vas and fresh oil, COLA and emery
dust.
For the better qualities of needles
such as are commonly sold in this coun-
try this securing process has to be re-
peated from eight to ten times. So
rough and uneven are the needles when
made by hand that to polish them
properly takes from fifteen to twenty
days. At each change of the canvas
the needles are tumbled by placing
them in large casks with heated saw
dust and revolving the casks rapidly
for few moments. To remove the
sawdust they are winnOwed with a
tanning mill somewhat similar to those
used in separating the grain from the
chaff by the farmers.
When the needles have been sufli-
GENTLY secured and polished they are
again strung on soft copper wire which
is sprinkled with fine emery dust. The
wire is drawn rapidly through the eyes
of the needles until they are smoothly
rounded so as not to cut the thread.
The needles known as heliX-eyed are
so called because the wire upon which
the eyes are cleaned has been coiled
and is held in somewhat of a spiral po-
sition when drawn through the eyes of
the needles. Having been sufficiently
polished and the eyes cleaned, they are
arranged with the heads all in one di-
rection and then assorted. With the
best workmen and uniform wire the
needles made by hand vary in size.
When assorted they are put twenty Five
in each paper, ten papers in apack and