IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINES POR CUTTING on MINCING MEAT, SUET, AND OTHER SUBSTANCES.
Year: 1865

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Albert Ward Hale, Civil Engineer, of the City and
State of New York, United States of America, for the Invention of
"IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINES POR CUTTING on MINCING MEAT, SUET, AND
OTHER SUBSTANCES.'
Sealed the 10th October 1865, and dated the 17th April 1865.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Albert Ward Hale at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 17th
April 1865.
I, ALBERT WARD HALE, Civil Engineer, of the City and State of New
York, United States of America, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINES FOR CUTTING OR MINCING MEAT,
SUET, AND OTHER SUBSTANCES," to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object improvements in machines for cutting or
mincing meat, suet, and other substances. The machine consists of two
spirally grooved or fluted rollers, such grooves or flutes decreasing in depth
from the front to the rear or discharge end of the machine. The rollers are
placed side by side, and revolve in opposite directions and towards each other,
one roller being operated by a crank and imparting motion to the other;
both rollers are enclosed in a case with spiral ribs or grooves on the interior.

page_text: The cutting is accomplished by the shearing of the edges of the spiral flanges
of the rollers upon a knife placed intermediate between the rollers, and at
such a height that the flanges, as the rollers revolve, are continually in contact
with the knife. The grooves or flutes in the rollers decreasing in depth from
the front to the rear, the pieces sheared off the substance fed into the machine
are continually, by the action of such tapering or diminishing grooves, carried
against the knife and reduced in size until they are cut fine enough to pass
through the shallowest end of such grooves. The substance or material to be
cut is carried from end to end through the machine, partly by the action of
the revolving rollers drawing the material in between them, and partly by the
action of the spiral ribs and grooves of the enclosing case.
So far the arrangement is similar to that described in the Specification of a
Patent granted to Joseph Willcock; this Patent, which is for an Invention
communicated to the said Joseph Willcock by me, is dated the 20th De-
eember 1859, No. 2896.
For cutting ordinary fibrous or solid meat the construction above described
would be all that is essential. When, however, a soft and adhesive substance,
like suet is to be cut, a different or somewhat varied construction of the
rollers is necessary.
All machines heretofore constructed and used, when
applied to the cutting of such substances as suet, have become so clogged that
very soon they ceased to feed, and consequently to discharge. This difficulty
and tendency I obviate by making the flanges on the rollers of a greater
diameter, and thicker at the feed or front end of the machine than at the
discharge or rear end, at the same time making them to overlap each other
more at the feed than at the discharge end. As the rollers revolve, the flanges
overlapping each other to a great extent at the feed end compress and press
forward the material collected in the grooves, so that at every revolution of
the rollers a considerable space is left in the grooves under the feed funnel
for the reception of fresh material. The rollers thus act not only to draw in
the material to be cut, but also, by the considerable overlap of their flanges
at and near the feed end, they continually press forward the substance being
cut, thereby making room for the constant reception of fresh material. In a
machine so constructed suet can be fed and cut successfully, which has never
before been accomplished by any meat-cutting machine.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Albert Ward Halo in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
13th October 1865.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, ALBERT WARD
HALE, Civil Engineer, of the City and State of New York, United States of
America, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Seventeenth day of April, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-five, in the twenty-eighth year of Her
reign did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, tho
said Albert Ward Hale, Her special licence that I, the said Albert Ward Hale...
my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Albert
Ward Hale, my executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any time agree
with, and no others, from time to time and at all times thereafter during
the term therein expressed; should and lawfully might make, use, exercise,.
and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland,. the
Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINES
POR CUTTING OR MINCING MEAT, SUET, AND OTHER SUBSTANCES," upou the con-
dition (amongst others) that I, the said Albert Ward Hale, my executors
or administrators, by an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one
of their hands and scals, should particularly describe and ascertain the nature
of the said Invention, and in what manner the same was to be performed,
and cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office within six
calendar months next and immediately after the dato of the said Letters
Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Albert Ward Hale, do hereby declare
the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement thereof, that is to say :-
This Invention has for its object improvements in machines for cutting or
mincing meat, suet, and other substances. The machine consists of two
spirally grooved or fluted rollers, such grooves or flutes decreasing in depth
from the front to the rear or discharge end of the machine. The rollers are
placed side by side, and revolve in opposite directions and towards each other,
one roller being operated by a crank and imparting motion to the other; both
rollers are enclosed in a case with spiral ribs or grooves on the interior. The
cutting is accomplished by the shearing of the edges of the spiral flanges of
the rollers upon a knife placed intermediate between the rollers, and at such

page_text: a height that the flanges, as the rollers revolve, are continually in contact
with the knife. The grooves or flutes in the rollers decreasing in depth from
front to the rear, the pieces sheared off the substance fed into the machine
are continually, by the action of such tapering or diminishing grooves, carried
against the knife and reduced in size until they are cut fine enough to pass
through the shallowest end of such grooves. The substance or material to be
cut is carried from end to end through the machine, partly by the action of
the revolving rollers drawing the material in between them, and partly by the
action of the spiral ribs and grooves of the enclosing case.
So far the arrangement is similar to that described in the Specification of a
Patent granted to Joseph Willcock; this Patent, which is for an Invention
communicated to the said Joseph Willcock, by me is dated the 20th December
1859, No. 2896.
For cutting ordinary fibrous or solid meat the construction above described
would be all that is essential. When, however, a soft and adhesive substance
like suet is to be cut, a different or somewhat varied construction of the rollers
is necessary. All machines heretofore constructed and used, when applied to
the cutting of such substances as suet, have become so clogged that very soon
they ceased to feed, and consequently to discharge. This difficulty and tendency
I obviate by making the flanges on the rollers of a greater diameter, and
thicker at the feed or front end of the machine than at the discharge or rear
end, at the same time making them to overlap each other more at the feed
than at the discharge end. As the rollers revolve, the flanges, overlapping
each other to a great extent at the feed end, compress and press forward the
material collected in the grooves, so that at every revolution of the rollers a
considerable space is left in the grooves under the feed funnel for the reception
of fresh material. The rollers thus act not only to draw in the material to be
cut, but also, by the considerable overlap of their flanges at and near the feed
end, they continually press forward the substance being cut, thereby making
In a machine so con-
room for the constant reception of fresh material.
structed suet can be fed and cut successfully, which has never before been
accomplished by any meat-cutting machine.
And in order that my said Invention may be most fully understood and
readily carried into effect, I will proceed to describe the Drawings hereunto
annexed.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS.
Figure 1 is a side view, and Figure 2 is a plan of a machine constructed
according to my Invention; Figure 3 is a plan of the same, with the top or
cover opened back.

page_text: The case is made in two parts a and a', hinged together at a, and having
a latch or fastening as to hold the parts together when closed; a', a', are the
bearings for the rollers; a³ is the feeding hopper; a is the nozzle by which
the minced material escapes from the machine; and a' are spiral ribs cast on
the interior of the case; b, b, are the rollers, they have each two sets of flanges
or ribs upon them, the main ribs b' running from end to end, and the others 6*
intermediate of the first, rising up gradually about midway of the length of the
roller in the hollows between the first ribs and continuing on to the smaller end
of the roller.
Figure 4 shows an end view of the rollers at their larger ends, and
Figure 5 a similar view at their smaller ends. It will be observed that the
ribs of the rollers lock together much deeper at the feeding end than at the
delivery end of the machine, and also that the ribs at the feeding end are of
larger diameter and much thicker than they are at the delivery end.
c is a crank handle, applied at the end of one of the rollers to turn it,
and the roller so turned drives the other; d is a knife, the back of it drops
into a shallow groove in the bottom of the part a of the case, and it rests on
the adjusting screws c, e, by which its edge can be raised so as to stand just
at the line where the ribs on the two rollers meet.
As before mentioned, the machine is similar to that described in the Speci
fication of Willcock's Patent, but I claim as my improvements under my
Patent, the making the ribs on the rollers thicker and of greater diameter
at the feeding end of the machine than they aro at the delivery end thereof,
and the making the said ribs to gear into each other more deeply at the feeding
end of the machine than they do at the delivery end.
In witness whereof, I, the said Albert Ward Hale, have hereunto set
my hand and seal, this Nineteenth day of September, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-five.
ALBERT WARD HALE. (L.S.)