Improvements relating to the Shrinking and Fulling of Felt or other Fibrous Materials, Chiefly Designed for use in the Manu- facture of Felt Hats.
Year: 1890

page_text: Date of Application, 11th Mar., 1890-Accepted, 12th Apr., 1890
[Communicated from abroad by PETER VANNESS HUSTED, of H 353, Fifth Avenue,
New York, United States of America, Gentleman.]
Improvements relating to the Shrinking and Fulling of Felt or
other Fibrous Materials, Chiefly Designed for use in the Manu-
facture of Felt Hats.
1, HENRY HARRIS LAKE, of the firm of Haseltine, Lake & Co., Patent Agents,
Southampton Buildings, in the County of Middlesex, do hereby declare the nature of
this invention and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly
described and ascertained in and by the following statement :—
The object of my invention is to apply an electric current to the shrinking and
fulling of felt, cloth, hats and all other articles whether woollen or not, of such
character that the individual fibres are suscepticle to electric or magnetic attraction,
so that the drawing together of those fibres and concentrating the same around a solid
or partially solid base may make the resulting substances firm and strong.
My invention is more particularly intended for use in the manufacture of hats, but
can be applied to a grest many other purposes in which this condensing or fulling or
shrinking, as it is technically known, would be an advantage. The process of applying
the electricity apart from the particular apparatus used would be of about the same
character whatever the character of the articles to be treated might be and I will
therefore describe the application more particularly as I have used it in practice in
the manufacture of hats.
Heretofore when the felt, more or less loosely blown upon the fragile base which is
afterwards shrunk to the size requisite for a bat, leaves the machina from which the
felt has been blown upon it, it is placed in hot water and there submitted to an
agitating action on the part of the workman whose duty it is to take out a hat as soon
as it has reached a certain stage of shrinkage, unfold it, roll it, fold it again and
return it to the bath in which a further shrinkage takes place and this process is kept
up until the bat is shrunk the desired number of inches necessary to get it to a size
suitable for a hat. Of course in this shrinking the body of the hat becomes much
fuller and firmer and attains the quality required in its subsequent use as a hat. This
process uses up a great deal of time which cannot well be spared where a large
quantity of hats have got to be put through a factory, passing through many hands
itterly dependent upon the amount of work brought to them from the shrinking
room.
My invention by a skilful application of electricity to the hats or felt while in the
bath facilitates the shrinking to a very marked degree, enabling one workman to turn
out three or four times as many hats in a given space as can be done either by the old
process of using hot water alone, or even when a sort of agitating and rolling machine
is employed in connection therewith. This latter machine is known in the trade as a
starter, but my invention entirely dispenses with the need of such machinery which is
both cumbersome and expensive.
My invention consists in the process of shrinking or fulling fibrous substances by
the aid of electricity which consists of resting such substances when in the bath upon
independent supports and charging said supports with electric currents of opposite
polarity so that electric discharges may take place from support to support through
said fibrous substances, as hereinafter explained.
One form of apparatus by means of which my invention can be applied is shown in
the accompanying drawing it being understood that though the apparatus shown is
more particularly adapted to hals, the changes necessary to use my invention for all

page_text: Dy electricity would 08 very sight and are Clanicu as coming witomy
process.
Figure 1 is a top plan of the shrinking tub.
Figure 2 is a longitudinal section.
Same letters indicate similar parts in the different Figures.
.The shrinking tub is of peculiar construction and is connected with a battery or
dynamo machine by electric wires so as to form a circuit; where more than one tah
is used they may, if preferred all he operated by the same battery or dynamo
machine.
A represents the tub proper, which is preferably a deep oblong box made water-
tight; BB are tables or shelves projecting on each side of the oblong tub leaving the
ends of the tub free; these tables slope slightly toward the tub so that the moisture
which comes out of the hats while being handled by the workmen who stand one at
each of the points marked in Figure 2 will flow back into the tub.
The shelves D D are arranged two on each side and are composed of metal or other
good conductor of electricity the two on the same side of the tub being supported and
connected by a metallic plate I the centre of which descends some distance into the
tub. The inner end of the shelves is protected by the upright flange E, so that the
hats may not roll off and fall into the tub. At each end of the tub between the shelves
is the bracket F projecting inwards from the solid frame at that end of the tub.
The metallic bar at each side of the tub which bears the shelves, as before described, is
hung by means of the bent piece G, also metallic, which fits over the upper edge of
the tub in which by means of a set screw of usual construction, is clasped one of the
wires constituting the circuit. It is obvious that in this way an electric current which
is received by the cap on one side of the tub will spread through the metallic plate I
to the shelves D, and if no other escape is provided will pass across through the water
in the tub which comes up over the shelves to the corresponding shelves of the
opposite side of the tub which by means of a commutator have received an electric
discharge of opposite polarity, as of course all the impulses of one polarity are sent to
one side of the tub, and all those of the opposite polarity sent to the other side.
In using this apparatus hats which are generally operated upon in threes, three hats
being rolled around each other in a coil, are placed upon the shelves D D running
across the open space at the ends of the tub. The shelves DD slope a little toward
the upright flanges, before described, so that there is a tendency of the hats to roll
down against those flanges. The hats being placed on the shelves which are intended
to accommodate three rows of three hats each, which are covered by hot water, as
before stated, the electric current is turned on and as soon as the workmen standing
as before stated at CC find that the row of hats nonrest the upright flange has shrunk
sufficiently to make refolding and rolling advantageous they remove said roll, the next
roll falling down into the place thus vacated. As soon as the roll taken out of the tub
has been subjected to the handling usual in shrinking hats it is returned to the place
then vacated which is the one nearest the end of the tub. The centre of the hats, of
course, is supported by the bracket F, during the process.
The shrinking is very much accelerated by the electricity from the fact that the
hats furnish a better path for the electricity to flow in springing from shelf to shelf
than the water alone does, and this electric current cannot pass thus through the hat
from shelf to shelf without causing the fibres which are more or less loose to be
attracted toward each other under the magnetic or electric influence.
A steam. pipe is provided as shown in Figure 1, by means of which the water in
the tubs is always kept at a sufficiently high temperature, steam being introduced
when the temperature gets too low.
The uses and advantages of my improved process are, I think, sufficiently obvious
without further description, it being evident that many changes of details might be
made in the apparatus used, or in the character of the articles to which electricity is
anplied.

page_text: Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of the said invention
and in what manner the same is to be performed, as communicated to me by my
foreign correspondent, I declare that what I claim is :-
The process of shrinking or fulling fibrous substances by the aid of electricity
which consists of resting such substances when in the bath upon independent supports
and charging said supports with electric currents of opposite polarity, so that electric
discharges may take place from support to support through said fibrous substances,
substantially as and for the purposes specified..
Dated this 11th day of March 1890.
HASELTINE, LAKE & Co.,
45, Southampton Buildings, London, Agents for the Applicant.