IMPROVEMENTS IN ARM-PIT DRESS-SHIELDS, AND MEANS FOR PRODUCING THE SAME
Year: 1881

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Isaac Andrews Canfield, of Middletown, United States of
tr
America, Manufacturer, for an Invention of IMPROVEMENTS IN ARM-PIT
DRESS-SHIELDS, AND MEANS FOR PRODUCING THE SAME.”
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION filed by the said Isaac Andrews Canfield at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents on the 26th May 1881.
ISAAC ANDREWS CANFIELD, of Middletown, United States of America,
Manufacturer. "IMPROVEMENTS IN ARM-PIT DRESS-SHIELDS, AND MEANS FOR
PRODUCING THE SAME."
Figure 1 is a side view of the dies and heating box made use of.
Figure 2 is a view of the same in vertical transverse section on the plane,
denoted by the broken line x--x, Figure 1.
Figure 3 is a view of a former made use of.
Figure 4 is a view of the product of the apparatus and process.
This Invention relates to apparatus for producing shields to be used inside ladies'
dresses at the arm pits of the wearer, projecting partly into the sleeve and partly
down toward the waist, to serve as a barrier to prevent perspiration having access
to the material of the dress, it also relates to the shield itself.
The stock for the making of these shields consists of a very thin sheet of india-
rubber containing sufficient sulphur to permit subsequent vulcanization, and
having upon each side thereof a thin layer of textile fabric (or some equivalent
thereof) caused to adhere to the rubber by heat and pressure; this stock is an
article known to the rubber trade; it is cut into pieces each of a size for making
one of these shields, which are then put through the process and apparatus
hereinafter described.
The letter a denotes a male die, having a concave working face a³, and b denotes
the corresponding female die as a whole, having a narrow and deep matrix or
mortise 6, at the bottom of which is the convex working face 6", corresponding to
the concavity of the working face of the male die.
The female die is set and fastened into the (mortise made in the) heater box c
intended to contain steam, hot air, or any other suitable heating medium, thereby

page_text: giving heat to the dies which it is possible to use cold, but which work better when
suitably heated, as the heater-box containing steam would naturally beat them.
The blank cut from the stock as described is laid upon and across the top of the
female die, and the male die, worked by any suitable power and apparatus, moves
downward into the female die, doubling the stock before it, and finally forming it
between the concave and convex faces of the dies; when the male die reaches the
lower limit of its play it is allowed to remain there two or three seconds to give a
set to the stock, then the male die moves up and out of the female die, and the
operator removes the stock now doubled upon itself and curved at the doubling
point.
The letter d denotes a former, usually of sheet metal, having pins d¹ on the
periphery; this former is substantially of the shape that the shield is intended to
be. As the blank of stock comes from the dies it is put upon this former, one fold
thereof and then the other being fastened on the pins d', and in this condition is
laid in an oven and vulcanized [heat 260° Farenheit] which gives the double and
the curve of the blank a permanent set. The blank is now taken off the former d,
placed upon another former very much like it but without the pins, and the
workman with a knife cuts or trims the blank to conform to the shape of the
former, after which the edge is ornamented, scolloped, or as it is called in America
pinked," giving a finished product like that shown in Figure 4.
"
I have said that the exterior layers of the shield are of textile fabric; it is obvious
that a knitted fabric, a felted fabric, or possibly a paper fabric, would answer
an equivalent purpose, and all such are included within the purview of my
Invention.
I claim as new,-
1. The dies for forming arm-pit dress-shields, constructed and designed to operate
substantially as herein shown and described.
2. The dies for forming arm-pit dress-shields, combined with a steam-box or
other equivalent device for heating the same, substantially as herein shown and
described.
3. The process of producing arm-pit dress-shields from stock blanks, having a
sulphurized india-rubber centre, consisting in doubling and curving the blanks in
dies, then vulcanizing the blank upon a former, and finally trimming the shield to
shape, all substantially as described.
4. A seamless arm-pit dress-shield composed of a sheet of india-rubber, faced
with textile or other suitable fabric formed to shape and vulcanized, all substantially
as described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Isaac Andrews Canfield, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Fourteenth day of May in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and eighty one.
ISAAC ANDREWS CANFIELD. (L.S.)