IMPROVEMENTS IN. MACHINERY FOR PRODUCING KNITTED OR LOOPED FABRICS
Year: 1864

page_text: PROVISIONAL, SPECIFICATION left by John Webster and John Langham,
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with their Petition,
on the 18th November 1864. .
We, JOHN WEBSTER and JOHN LANGHAM, junior, both of Leicester, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN.
MACHINERY FOR PRODUCING KNITTED OR LOOPED FABRICS," to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object improvements. in machinery for producing
knitted or looped fabrics, and is applicable to knitting machines where the
framé needles are set and slide in grooves in an upright position around a
cylinder. In these classes of machines the work as it is made, and as the
loops 'arè knocked over the heads of the needles passes away through the
cylinder around which the frame needles are set. In these classes of knitting
frames or machines there have in some cases been another set of needles
called machine needles applied. In some of these machines or frames there
have also been more than one feeder or thread carrier applied thereto, but
the number of feeders or thread carriers have been restricted by reason of the
means heretofore resorted to for working the independent or separate needles
known as machine needles.
Now our Invention consists in improvements in the means of constructing
and arranging the parts which carry and act with what are called the machine.

page_text: needles of a circular knitting frame, whereby the number of the feeders or
thread carriers employed in a machine may with advantage be greatly
increased, by which not only can the quantity of work be increased, but striped
fabrics may be more advantageously produced than heretofore.
The construction and arrangement of the parts connected to and working
with the machine needles, according to this Invention, may be varied, but it
is preferred that each of the machine needles should be fixed to the cranked
end of a slide in such manner that the machine needles may be in a hori-
zontal position with their heads or hooks outwards and upwards when the
heads or hooks of the frame needles are at their upper ends and turned out-
wards, which is the most usual position of the circle of frame needles. The
slides which carry the machine needles are carried by a grooved plate which
is above the heads of the frame needles. The inner end of each slide is
cranked or bent downwards, and it is to the end of this crank that the end of
the stem of a machine needle is affixed, hence the cranked end of the slide
comes near a point corresponding with and above the central axis of the
circular frame of needles, whilst the needle radiates outwards, and its head or
hook comes to a position to work with the circle of frame needles. The
outermost ends of the slides extend to a greater distance from such central
axis, so that the circle described by the ends of the slides is of larger diameter
when compared with the diameter of the circle of frame needles. By this
arrangement the inclines or cams which actuate the slides carrying the
machine needles being of comparatively large diameter facilitates their having
a larger number of motions given to them in each revolution, and admits of
the introduction of a larger number of feeders or thread carriers. The cylinder
which carries the frame needles and the frame or plate which carries the
machine needles are caused to rotate simultaneously, whilst the inclines or
cams which actuate or slide the needles remain stationary as heretofore, but
this
may be reversed.
It is not essential that the instruments which carry the machine needles
should be. slides, on the contrary, the instruments may be so formed as to turn
on axes, and in fact act as levers, and yet allow of the inclines or cams being
on a line of a greater length than the circumference of the circle around
which the frame needles are set. In some cases the machine needles may
be fixed to slides which may be acted on by levers or independent instru-
ments interposed between the slides and the inclines or cam surfaces which
actuate them.
The bobbins which carry the several threads may be placed around the

page_text: frame, the threads being conducted under the slides which carry the machine
needles. It is preferred to employ needles with folding or hinged tongues or
bits both for the frame needles and for the machine needles, but this is not
essential.