A CERTAIN IMPROVEMENT OR IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR MAKING OF NAILS
Year: 1835

page_text: SLOCUM, of Rotherhithe, in the County of Surrey, Mechanic, send greeting.
WHEREAS His present most Excellent Majesty King William the Fourth,
by His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Sixteenth day of February, in the fifth year of His reign,
did, for Himself, His heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said
Samuel Slocum, His especial license, full power, sole privilege and authority,
that I, the said Samuel Slocum, my exors, adññiors, and assigns, or such others
as I, the said Samuel Slocum, my exors, adiñiors, or assigns, should at any
time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all times during
the term of years therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use,
exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-
Tweed, my Invention of "A CERTAIN IMPROVEMENT OR IMPROVEMENTS IN
MACHINERY FOR MAKING OF NAILS;" in which said Letters Patent is contained
a proviso, that I, the said Samuel Slocum, shall cause a particular description
of the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, to be inrolled in His said Majesty's High Court of Chancery within
six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said in part
recited Letters Patent, as in and by the same, reference being thereunto had,
will more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Samuel Slocum, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention, and
the manner in which the same is to be performed, is described and ascertained
as follows, that is to say:-

page_text: The said Invention and improved machinery is exhibited in the Drawing
annexed to and forming part of this Specification, in which said Drawing the
several parts of the said machinery are noted, and are herein-after further
described by means of certain letters and figures placed on or near the same;
those parts which are exhibited in more than one Figure of the said Drawing
being denoted by the same letters and figures in each.
The Figure of the Drawing numbered 1 is a bird's-eye view of the machine.
The Figure numbered 2 is a side elevation of the same. The Figures numbered
3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, exhibit more in detail than the two former Figures
various parts of the machinery.
The improvement is exhibited in the said Drawing, and is herein described
in connection with a certain improvement or improvements in machinery for
making of nails, for and in respect of which. His said Majesty did cause to be
made to one James Jamieson Cordes, of Idol Lane, in the City of London,
Merchant, His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing
date at Westminster, the Eighth day of October, in the fifth year of His reign,
as by reference to the last-mentioned Letters Patent will more fully and at
large appear. The Figures in the Drawing hereunto annexed numbered
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, represent the same machinery, which is figured and
described in the description and Specification of the said last-mentioned
improved machinery, under the hand and seal of the said James Jamieson
Cordes, duly inrolled in His Majesty High Court of Chancery, according to
the tenor and proviso of the said last-mentioned Letters Patent, with such
alterations, nevertheless, as are useful and necessary for the adaptation of the
further improvement herein-after described and specified, it being expressly
understood that every part of the machinery which is not herein-after par-
ticularly described to be used in an altered form is used in the same form and
manner as in the said Specification of the said James Jamieson Cordes is
described and specified, the same letters and marks being used to denote the
same parts of the machinery as were therein used by the said James Jamieson
Cordes. The frame. A is made longer than in the machinery described in the
said Specification of the said James Jamieson Cordes, to admit a second opening
similar to that in which are placed the caps or castings D, for the purpose of
receiving a second pair of caps or castings A, herein-after described, between
the castings D and the clasp (J). This alteration occasions the sliding levers
(I) to be also lengthened by the same amount that the guiding slides (M) and
stretching holders (N) may occupy the same position as before relatively to
the compressing rollers (H). The toothed wheels (J) described in the said
Specification of the said James Jamieson Cordes are not used or represented

page_text: in the annexed Drawing, and instead thereof the spindles C are geared
together by two equal toothed wheels T.
The shear shaft (Y) carrying the rods (Z) is removed from its situation, as
described in the said Specification of the said James Jamieson Cordes, and is
placed nearer the front part of the frame (A), so that the shears may fall in
front of the compressing rollers instead of being behind them. The shear
levers and striker described in the said Specification of the said James
Jamieson Cordes are not used or represented in the annexed Drawing, and
instead thereof two shear levers L, represented in the Figure numbered 7
annexed to this Specification, are hung at one end upon a pin M, passing
through a projection or piece bolted to the upper part of the frame A; the
other ends are connected by the rods Z with two cranks on the shear shaft (Y).
To cach of the shear levers L is screwed or fastened a chisel N of steel or
other hard metal, which chisels have their cutting hedges at O. A striker P,
which receives its motion from a crank on the shear shaft Y, by means of the
rod Q, is used to strike the finished nail from between the heading holders
after it is headed. The holding bars are used and represented in the Figure
numbered 6 in the annexed Drawing as connected by spiral springs, and not
by the same form of spring as is represented in the said Specification of the
säid James Jamieson Cordes. Two moveable caps or castings A', similar to
the caps D, and fitteil, secured, and adjusted in the same manner, are placed
one directly above the other in an opening of the frame A, between two of the
posts E and two posts B', which form an additional part of the frame A, for
this purpose.
Each of the caps A has a shaft or spindle C' fitted to it,
carrying at one end a toothed wheel of equal diameter D¹, by which the
spindles Care geared together, and carrying also at their opposite ends, one
directly above the other, and nearly in contact, two grooved rollers E', which
I call reducing rollers. These reducing rollers are made of steel or other
hard metal, and are keyed to the spindles C' to facilitate their removal. The
width of the groove is equal to the thickness of the edge of the compressing
rollers (I). The reducing rollers are so adjusted in their places relatively to
the compressing rollers that a line drawn from the centre of the heading
punch R to the centre of the tube 3 would bisect the lines joining the centres
of each pair of rollers respectively.
The bottom of the grooves is divided into as many excentric segments
as there are on the compressing rollers H. A second pair of spindles F' are
fitted vertically to the farther side of the caps A', geared together by two
horizontal equal wheels H', one on the upper extremity of each, and carrying
at their lower extremities a second pair of grooved reducing rollers G placed

page_text: horizontally nearly in contact one directly opposite to the other just behind the
former pair of reducing rollers E, and so that their centres are in the horizontal
plane passing midway between the former pairs. These rollers are also made
of steel or other hard metal, and are keyed to the spindles F' to facilitate their
removal. The width of the groove in the rollers G¹ corresponds with the
horizontal dimensions of the rod introduced between them. It is convenient
to make the rollers G' less than the rollers E¹, and in that case the number of
excentric segments on the rollers G₁ must be correspondingly reduced, so
that the length of one of the segments measured on the circumference of the
rollers G and E and of the compressing rollers is the same. Another
horizontal spindle T fitted to the upper part of the upper cap A' carries at
one extremity a bevelled wheel J gearing into one equal bevelled wheel J,
keyed upon one of the spindles F', and at the other a spur wheel K' gearing
into another spur wheel R' secured upon the upper spindles C. The propor-
tion of the diameter of the wheel K' to that of the wheel R' is rather less than
that of the diameters of the second pair of reducing rollers G' to those of the.
first pair E. By this means the linear velocity of the circumference of
the second pair of reducing rollers G' is rather greater than that of the
circumference of the first pair E', which is intended in some degree to produce
the same effect as that produced by the variable velocity given to the com-
pressing rollers in the said Specification of the said James Jamieson Cordes.
The wheel R gears into an equal wheel S' secured upon the lower spindle C.
The wheels described in the said Specification of the said James Jamieson
Cordes as retarding wheels, the racks therein described as diminishing racks,.
the rocking shaft, sliding frames, and catch teeth, with the rest of the apparatus
therein described, to be used for the purpose of throwing the diminishing racks
in and out of gear, and for the purpose of communicating an intermitting
motion from the said diminishing racks to the said retarding wheels always
in the same direction, are not used or represented in the annexed Drawing,
and instead thereof an intermitting motion of the compressing and reducing
rollers always in the same direction is produced by the machinery herein-
after next described. A ratchet wheel V₁ratched into as many divisions as
there are excentric segments on the compressing rollers is bolted to the outer
side of the toothed wheel S. This wheel, as here represented, is ratched,
not upon the face of the rim, but on its exterior surface, and is propelled by
a spring slide U¹ placed at one end of a levee W', which I call the sector
Jever, which moves freely on the shaft that carries the ratchet wheel V.
On the other arm of the sector lever is attached a toothed sector, which
works into a rack X communicating by one of the rods q, with one of

page_text: the cranks S on the driving shaft (f). The other rod (7) and crank (5), as
described in the said Specification of the said James Jamieson Cordes, is not
used or represented in the annexed Drawing. By the continued motion of
the driving shaft (f) the rack X is alternately advanced and withdrawn, thus
giving to the sector lever a vibrating motion. The spring slide U¹ is pressed
against the ratchet face of the wheel V₁ by a spring concealed in the end of
the lever, and carries it forward by one division, and in returning slips
freely round the shaft, while the spring slide slides over the inclined plane of
the ratchet wheel, and falls in behind the shoulder of the next division. When
the driving shaft (f) is set in motion, the end of a heated rod is introduced
into the tube (3), and is caught and carried forward by and between the first
pair of reducing rollers, in the excentric grooves of which it is compressed on
two opposite sides. It then passes through a short tube (4) fitted between
the first and second pair of reducing rollers in the line of the tube (3). It is
conveyed through this tube to the second pairs of reducing rollers, by which
it is compressed on the other two sides, and is thus finally prepared for the
action of the compressing rollers. Having passed through both pairs of
reducing rollers, the rod will have assumed the form of a series of imperfectly
formed nails fastened together head to point. The broadest end preceding is
carried through a tube until it is caught by the compressing rollers, and at
the same instant the shears close in front of the last-mentioned tube at the
narrowest part of the rod, and cut off the first portion. The part thus,
separated from the rest of the rod passes through the compressing rollers, and
by their action the nail is completely shaped, and is carried to be headed in
the manner described in the said Specification of the said James Jamieson
Cordes. When this machinery is worked rapidly and uninterruptedly for any-
considerable time, the compressing and reducing rollers are liable to spoil in
consequence of the heat communicated to their external points by the heated
rod, which may be prevented by a jet of cold water thrown upon them without
injury to the work. I shall now enumerate the parts and combinations of
parts which alone I claim as new, protesting that I do not claim as new
or seek to appropriate, according to the tenor of the said first-mentioned
Letters Patent, any parts or combinations of parts of the said machinery, or
any manner of constructing or working the same or any parts thereof other
than is herein-after particularly claimed and specified; (that is to say,) I claim
as new, and seek to appropriate by virtue of and according to the tenor of the
said first-mentioned Letters Patent, the Invention and use of the combination
of the said reducing rollers combined and used with the said compressing
rollers. And whereas in the said Specification of the said James Jamieson

page_text: Cordes it is declared to be essential to the due and complete action of the
stretching holders therein described, and of the slides therein [described,
when they are made to act as stretching holders, when used in combination
with the said compressing rollers, that the velocity of motion of the said
stretching holders or slides be gradually encreased relatively to that of the
motion of the said compressing rollers to prevent the bending of the metal
rod during the formation of the nail; I hereby declare that when the said
reducing rollers are used in combination with the said compressing rollers, the
said increase of relative velocity of the said slides or stretching holders is not
essential to their due and complete action, but that the same may be used with
an invariable relative velocity, in the manner herein-before described.
In witness whereof, I, the said 'Samuel Slocum, have hereunto set my hand
and seal, this Fifteenth day of May, in the year of in the year of