IMPROVEMENTS IN THE APPARATUS FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF CERT
Year: 1861

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Thomas Holstead, of Botchergate, in the City of
Carlisle, in the County of Cumberland, Confectioner, for the Invention
of "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE APPARATUS FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF CERTAIN
LETTERS PATENT to Thomas Holstead, of Botchergate, in the City of
Carlisle, in the County of Cumberland, Confectioner, for the Invention
of "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE APPARATUS FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF CERTAIN
ARTICLES OF CONFECTIONERY AND BISCUITS AND OTHER ARTICLES FROM PLASTIC
SUBSTANCES."
Sealed the 15th August 1861, and dated the 20th February 1861.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Thomas Holstead at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 20th
February 1861.
I, THOMAS HOLSTEAD, of Botchergate, in the City of Carlisle, in the County
of Cumberland, Confectioner, do hereby declare the nature of the said Inven-
tion for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF CERTAIN
ARTICLES OF CONFECTIONERY AND BISCUITS AND OTHER ARTICLES PROM PLASTIC
SUBSTANCES," to be as follows:-
My Invention consists of an improved method of rolling the paste or dough
for lozenges and biscuits, and cutting the same and other articles from plastic
substances into shapes, and of panning or spreading the same after having
been cut. I pass the paste between rollers to bring it to a proper thickness
to form the lozenge, biscuit, or other article. After the paste has passed
through the first or second pair of rollers I have a contrivance to dust it on
both sides with flour, sugar, or other powdered substance as the article may
require to prevent it adhering to the rollers. I effect this by sifting the

page_text: powder on the upper side of the paste when the same is horizontally disposed,
and I dust the under side of the sheet by means of a brush revolving in a box
supplied with the powder, which is thereby thrown through apertures in the
plate, which supports the dough as it passes from one roller to another against
the sheets, and I also by the same means dust the under pairs of rollers at or
forming the sides of the box. The paste is then carried over a table in which
are perforations, and through which hollow cutters are caused to work in order
to cut or divide the said paste. The paste is held against the cutters or
pressed towards them whilst the cut is being made by a disc or button, acted
upon by a spring or springs from behind, so arranged and of sufficient strength
that when the cutters are pressed against the paste, the article severed enters
the interior of the cutters, which are made agreeably to the form of the
intended article. After the lozenge, biscuit, or other article has been severed
from the dough or sheet of paste it is then discharged through the hollow
cutters by means of plungers situated over against the cutters, and which
plungers are made or caused to protrude beyond the buttons into the interior
of their opposite cutters, and received upon boards or pans travelling beneath
at such a speed as to cause the lozenge, or biscuit, or other article to be
distributed over the boards or pans in such manner as is required. The
plungers are then withdrawn to the face of the buttons, and the operation is
repeated. After each operation of cutting, the waste or paste which remains
is conveyed by an endless cloth into a box.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Thomas Holstead in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
20th August 1861.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
HOLSTEAD, of Botchergate, in the City of Carlisle, in the County of Cum-
berland, Confectioner, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twentieth day of February, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, in the twenty-fifth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said.Thomas Holstead, Her special licence that I, the said Thomas Holstead,
my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Thomas
Holstead, 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

page_text: 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 THE APPARATUS
FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF CERTAIN ARTICLES OF CONFECTIONERY AND BISCUITS AND
OTHER ARTICLES PROM PLASTIC SUBSTANCES," upon the condition (amongst others)
that I, the said Thomas Holstead, by an instrument in writing under my hand
and seal, 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 date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Thomas Holstead, do hereby declare
the nature of my 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, that is to say :-
My Invention consists of an improved method of rolling the paste or dough
for lozenges and biscuits, and cutting the same and other articles from plastic
substances into shapes, and of panning or spreading the same after having
been cut. The means by which I effect these improvements are as follow;
namely, I pass the paste between rollers, which are marked o, o¹, o², on the
Drawing accompanying this Specification, in order to bring the same to a
proper thickness to form the lozenge; biscuit, or other article. I use these
rollers to reduce the paste to such thickness. The rollers o* I call glass rollers.
p are scrapers, which are applied to the 2nd and 3rd pair of rollers. The
scrapers are not shewn on the Drawing as applied to the lower rollers, but I
make use of them to both upper and lower rollers to clear them from any
portion of the paste which may adhere to them. In my Provisional Speci-
fication I described a contrivance for dusting the paste on both sides, but I
have since found the said contrivance not to be of any practical utility, I
therefore disclaim the use of such revolving brushes. The paste, having been
delivered to the rollers on the board q, after leaving them is received on the
travelling cloth a', and transmitted to the cloth a³, and is thereby carried over
a table r. In working the machine the paste is passed through three pairs of
rollers (one or more pairs of which may be made of glass instead of iron, as is
commonly used for this purpose), by which it is prepared and reduced to the
thickness which is required. These rollers are driven at different speeds
proportioned according to the diminished thickness of the paste. As soon as
the paste is delivered upon the cloth a¹ the rollers are thrown out of gear, and
the speed of the cloth a¹ is immediately reduced to the speed of the cloth a',
which receives it from the cloth a¹ and carries it over a table in which are

page_text: perforations corresponding to the number of cutters S. As soon as the paste
has been delivered upon the cloth a² the rollers are again set to work to
receive a further quantity of paste which has been placed upon the board q,
and which is then passed through the rollers and is prepared and carried
forward in a similar manner to the former. The paste is polished by passing
through the rollers; but as some lozenges may require a finer polish than can
be given to them by the rollers alone, the machine is constructed to admit of
a higher polish being given to the paste without diminishing the quantity of
its productive manufacture. During the time when the rollers are out of gear
the paste is polished by hand on one side upon the cloth a', which may either
be kept at rest or driven, according as is required; the paste is then reversed
by hand, with or without the assistance of a plate or roller, or by some other
convenient method, and is then laid upon the cloth a², and is polished on the
side now uppermost in the same manner as the other side, whilst the cutters
are at work.
The aforesaid cutters are hollow; one of them is shewn sectionally in Fig. 3,
which is drawn to a scale of half the full size. They are for the purpose of
dividing the paste into the shape proper to form the required lozenge or other
article. The paste is held against the edges of the cutters S, or pressed towards
them whilst the cut is being made by a disc or button t, which is made to
reciprocate by being attached to the moving frame '; but in order to allow
for any inequality in the range of this moving frame, or any irregularity in its
movement, I use a spring or springs in connection with each of the plungers,
to which the aforesaid dises or buttons are attached, which spring or springs
are so arranged that when the frame is carried to and fro to cut the lozenge
or other article, the pressure upon the disc or button given by the apparatus,
part of which is shewn Figure 3, is transmitted through the said spring or
springs, which may be of any suitable material, but which, in the Drawing, is
shewn to be of india-rubber, and marked thereon "u," the regidity or flexibility
of which spring can be tempered by the adjusting screw and nut "a¹," so that
neither the button or disc on the one hand may be indented, nor the edge of
the cutters on the other be destroyed, by a too forcible contact. Thus incisions
into the paste may be made by each stroke of the frame, and each plunger
with its disc or button is brought to bear on its corresponding cutter with the
proper amount of pressure by the adjustment of the aforesaid springs. But
I do not confine myself to any particular form of spring, nor to the position of
such spring, as it is obvious that a similar result may be obtained by a different
arrangement of the springs.
The paste having been pressed against the knife edges of the cutters is

page_text: thus severed, and enters their interior. The articles thus formed are dis-
charged through the hollow cutters, and fall either by their own weight, or
are forced downwards by the succeeding formed lozenge. The vibration of
the machine consequent upon its being driven at a rapid rate about 120
strokes per minute assists in the facility of the discharge, and that to so great
an extent, that I am enabled to dispense altogether with the ejectors which
I described in my Provisional Specification, and I therefore disclaim the
same, because these are not of any practical utility. The lozenge or other
article, after having been cut and ejected, is received upon trays placed upon
an endless web a³, which carries them forward at a suitable speed to receive
the lozenges as they fall from the cutters. The scrap paste, after it leaves
the cutters, is delivered upon the ascending cloth g³, which carries it forward,
and delivers it into a box m², which is set to receive the same.
Having now described my Invention generally, I proceed to give a more
particular description of the Drawings which represent the form of machine I
find best adapted to carry out my said Invention. I do not confine myself to
the details given on the Drawings. There are parts of the machine, some of
which are represented on the Drawing which I do not think it necessary to
detail more fully, and others which are not shewn at all; but I have given
ample directions in the Specification and Drawing attached to enable any
qualified workman to construct a suitable machine.
to
Fig. 1 is an elevation, and Fig. 2 a plan of the machine; e is a catch-box
with
gear spur pinioni and claws e' on roller f, driven by the drums h, h²,
when the dough is required to be rolled. The lever n throws the belt on to
the fast pulley h' by the plate n' until sufficient paste has been received on the
cloth a¹. The catch box can also be thrown into gear with the mitre wheel g,
having claws e. The shaft k then becomes the driver of the roller f, and the
cloths a¹, as, then travel at one speed until the paste is delivered to the cloth a²;
the rollers can then be set to work again. m is a moveable ratchet lever
attached to a ratchet box, the pin m² being made to shift to alter the movement
of cloth for the different sizes of lozenges during the operation of cutting the
same into shapes. The pinion i drives all the paste rollers, and when the
catch box e is in gear with it, the cloth is arranged for taking the paste from
the rollers o². When the paste has travelled so far as the cloth a², the catch is
thrown into the mitre wheel g, which then becomes the driver, and a¹, a³,
travel at the same speed; p² are spur wheels to actuate rollers; p³ are balance
weights for the scrapers; k¹, ², are wheels to drive rollers f³, f, respectively.
a are V-slides upon which the spring box & cutting frame 6¹ works; this
box is carried up and down by the cam t, the ring t, and plunger . The

page_text: cam revolves once each time the paste is cut.
There may be several cutters
in connection with the cam, or seperate cams for each cutter. I make use of
a spring of india-rubber to raise the cutting frame rapidly for a short distance
after the cam has done its work, which spring is attached to the rod to, but
.which is not shewn on the Drawing. I prefer vulcanized india-rubber for the
springs. The cutters are attached to a plate d³, which may be adjusted on
the slides a.
In witness whereof, I, the said Thomas Holstead, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Seventeenth day of August, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-one.
THOMAS HOLSTEAD. (L.S.)