IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR FOLDING FABRICS FOR PRESSING
Year: 1865

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Speakman Yates at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 13th.
April 1865.
I, WILLIAM SPEAKMAN YATES, of Stamford Street, North Street, Leeds, in
the County of York, Machine Maker, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR FOLDING FABRICS FOR PRESSING,"
to be as follows:-
In order to prepare fabrics for pressing, especially for hot-pressing, they,
have to be evenly folded with sheets of glazed paper, cardboard, or metal-
laid in between the folds; this operation, which is usually performed by hand,
I perform by machinery. The fabric to be folded is brought to the machine
on a roller, or it may be led through guide rollers, or conducted to the machine
in any other convenient manner. The fabric is then brought down through a
guide consisting of two parallel bars placed a short distance apart; this guide
I call the cuttle or folding bar. The end of the piece of fabric after passing
through the cuttle bar is secured to the edge of a table beneath it, and the
cuttle bar is made to travel to and fro over the table so as to lay the fabric in
folds upon it. On each side of the table on which the fabric is folded are two
other tables on which are laid piles of the papers or plates to be placed
between the folds; these sheets or plates are fed forward one by one by
mechanical fingers so as to cause them to project from the pile. The cuttle
bar carries two pairs of nippers, one on each side of it, and when the cuttle bar
comes to the end of its course in either direction the nippers on that side seize

page_text: the sheet or plate, and as the cuttle bar returns they draw it forward on to
the folding table, laying it on the top of the fabric. When the sheet or
plate is laid truly on the pile the nippers drop it, and then to prevent it
becoming displaced it is taken near its leading edge and held firmly down on
to the table by two clamps. When the cuttle bar returns it folds the fabric
over the edge of the sheet or plate thus laid in, and at the same time it draws
in another sheet or plate from the other side, and thus the work progresses.
As the pile on the folding table increases in depth the table gradually falls, so
as to keep the working surface always at the same level or thereabout, and
similarly, as in the working of the machine, the piles of papers or plates
diminish, the tables are made to rise to maintain a uniform working level. If
the machine is required to work with fabrics and sheets or plates of various
thicknesses change wheels or other similar contrivances are provided to vary
the speed of the rise and fall of the tables. There is a projection in com-
munication with one of the tables which acts on a lever when the table
approaches the end of its course and throws off the driving strap, otherwise
with an inattentive workman a fracture of some of the parts of the machine
might result. A motion is provided by which when the folding is complete
the tables may be run back to their starting points ready to fold another
piece. The several motions may be given to the parts of the machine in
various ways. The cuttle bar I prefer to mount on a slide on the frame, and
to actuate it by a lever and an adjustable crank. The mechanical fingers for
feeding the sheets or plates forwards are rods faced at the end with india-
rubber, and the weight of the arm is so adjusted that these faces bear with
sufficient friction on the sheet or plate to cause it to move forward with the
fingers; at the back stroke the fingers are lifted. The sheets or plates may,
if desired, be fed forward by hand. The nippers I have sometimes made
narrow and have placed them one at each side of the cuttle bar, so that they
take the sheet or plate by one corner only. I prefer, however, to make the
nippers to extend from side to side of the cuttle bar; one jaw of each nipper
is rigidly fixed as respects this bar, and the other jaw is by preference moved
by means of a slide or bolt, also mounted so as to move with the cuttle bar,
and this slide or bolt is traversed in its guides so as to shut one pair of nippers
and open the other by coming against an adjustable stop each time the cuttle
bar comes to the end of its course, or the nippers can be opened and closed
by the action of a cam or otherwise. The jaws of the nippers are lined with
india-rubber. In order to clear the sheets or plates out of the jaws of the
nippers I prefer to employ fingers fixed on rocking shafts, and the motion is
given to the fingers at the proper time by an arm on the rocking shaft coming

page_text: against a stop. In order that the nippers may take the sheets or plates truly,
and that they may enter between the jaws notwithstanding any tendency they
may have to buckle, each sheet or plate when it is protruded forward for the
nippers to take it is passed between lips or guides; the lower one is fixed and
the upper is moveable and bears on the sheet or plate by its own weight,
which is sufficient to hold the edge straight for the nippers to take it; these
lips are also useful in ensuring regularity in the feeding in of the sheets or
plates. The clamps for holding the sheets or plates in position on the folding
table I prefer to be drawn down towards the table by springs or weights, and
each time that a new sheet or plate is to be placed under the clamps they are
lifted by cams and turned partly round so as to be out of the way, they then
turn back so as to be over the pile of folded fabric, and they again descend
upon it over the sheet or plate which has just been laid in; or in place of
clearing the clamps out of the way by turning them partly round they may be
drawn back to clear them of the pile, and pushed forward again when the new
sheet or plate has been placed; or the clamps may pass through slots in the
sheets or plates; they then sink down through these slots to get out of the
way, and as each fresh sheet or plate is placed the clamps rise up through the
slots, then move forward over the pile, and descend upon it. The rise and
fall of the tables I prefer to obtain by screws driven by worms and worm
wheels.