IMPROVEMENTS IN OR CONNECTED WITH MACHINERY OR APPARATUS FOR WASHING OR DYEING
Year: 1879

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by George Barnley at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents on the 30th December 1879.
GEORGE BARNLEY, of Keighley, in the County of York.
"IMPROVEMENTS IN OR
CONNECTED WITH MACHINERY OR APPARATUS FOR WASHING OR DYEING."
The objects of this Invention, which relates to improvements in or connected
with machinery or apparatus to be used in effecting the washing or dyeing of
piece-goods, of family and household linen, and of other fabrics or materials in the
piece or as separate articles, are to effect these operations by an improved method
and means wherein the usual hand-rubbing motion of the laundress is imitated,
and whereby a considerable saving of time and labor is effected, and unnecessary
friction and injury to the fabrics or materials operated on avoided.
My improved apparatus comprises three essential provisions, which are hereinafter
described, and which may be used either separately or in combination as required.
One part of my Invention consists in the use of one or more pairs of rubbing-
surfaces which I term "artificial-hands," one of each pair of which (preferably the
lower one) is made larger than the other and is fixed to or carried by some
convenient part of the frame of the apparatus, the other or upper oue having
imparted to it a backward and forward, side to side, diagonal, or other desired
rubbing movement, imitative of the motion of the human wrist, about the under
one. Each band is formed with a "reeded" or roughened surface to imitate the
the knuckles of the laundress, and the lower one is made with a slit, or is provided
with a spring, or is otherwise adapted to hold the materials to be operated upon.
The hands may be made of wood, or metal, or of any other suitable substance, and
their rubbing faces may be covered with cork or india-rubber or with any other
suitable substance which will impart a flexibility and firmness resembling the human
knuckles; and the degree of pressure with which they can be brought together
may be obtained and regulated by the use of springs or weights, or otherwise.
These hands are designed especially, though not exclusively, to effect the
cleansing of such parts of garments or other articles as get more soiled than other
parts, such as the wrist-bands and collars of shirts, so as not to require that the
whole garment shall be submitted to so vigorous or rubbing-treatment as is
necessary to cleanse the most soiled parts, a feature of great importance and novelty
and economical as regards the expenditure of power.
When being operated upon, the articles are placed with the washing ley or suds
in a washing tray or tub, and the parts thereof to be treated are placed between the
said rubbing surfaces or hands and are very quickly cleansed by the motion of the
upper one.
The motion of the upper hand may be obtained by a wheel with a fluted edge,
or a device like that for ringing the bell in an alarm-clock, or by any other
suitable means; but a very advantageous way I find is to connect it (by a ball-
and-socket or otherwise so as to have freedom of movement) to a rod operated by
an excentric mounted on an upper shaft, the shaft carrying a spur-pinion which is

page_text: actuated by a spur wheel on a cranked axle which is operated by a treadle and
connecting-rod, or by a winch-handle, or otherwise. Or the spur wheel may be
carried by the one side of a "drum," the shaft of which at its other end carries a
hand-wheel or winch-handle, or is otherwise rotated, the lower hand being
carried by an under cross-shaft, which also carries an eye through which the rod of
the upper hand works freely.
The "drum," to which reference has just been made, constitutes another part of
my Invention, and consists of a vessel of an octagonal or any other suitable shape,
and into which the articles to be washed or dyed are placed. It may be made
with but one compartment, or with two, three, or more compartments, and it is
mounted so as to be capable of revolving upon a horizontal axis supported in a
strong framework of wood or metal, it being caused to revolve by the band-wheel,
winch-handle, or other means above referred to.
When combined with the above described "artificial hand" washing-mechanism,
the side of this drum opposite to that on which the handle is situated carries the
above mentioned spur wheel which actuates the hands; and when thus combined
they may be driven together by the treadle and cranked axle as above referred to,
the drum then acting as a fly-wheel
When dividing the drum into two, three, or more chambers, I partition each
chamber completely off from the remainder. I make the inner face thereof reeded
or provide it with rounded battens, and furnish each chamber with a steam-tight
door (secured by a bar buttoning into side slots, or otherwise) for introducing and
removing the materials to be treated and the washing ley, and provide it with a tap
for the escape of the superfluous steam.
When the drum is divided thus, I fit the interior of each chamber with a
partition in such a way as to cause the contained materials to be inclined towards
the centre of the drum as the chambers successively rise, so as to diminish the dead
weight lift and cause an abundant moving about of the materials under treatment,
the said materials again falling towards the circumference as the chambers
successively again become part of the descending side of the drum, thus economising
the power needed to rotate the latter, the articles being cleansed simply by their
friction against the bars or battens, and their motion through the washing ley or suds.
Into one or more of the chambers of the drum, I put a plunger or "dolly,"
constituting the third part of my Invention. This "dolly" may be made of wood
or pottery-ware, or of any other suitable substance; it is preferably made with
projecting ends which are deeply indented, though it may be made of any other
suitable shape. It is provided with trunnions which have great freedom of play in
in comparatively large recesses in the ends of the drum.
The dolly revolves and is shifted about partly by the force of gravitation, and
partly by the shifting of the contents of the chamber in which it 18. The recesses
which receive its axle ends or trunnions are sufficiently large to allow the dolly to
work at a higher or lower level, so as to act with an almost uniform pressure upon
the articles in the chamber, whether the quantity thereof be large or small.
When I require to produce a constant gentle squeezing action I make the said
recesses circular or nearly so, but when I require the dolly to have quick or
plunging movements I make the said recesses more of a trefoil shape, or with more
or less decided detaining and releasing projections or recesses, so as to cause more
or less sudden movements of the dolly. Thus the recesses being so much larger
than the axle-ends of the dolly, cause the latter not only to sweep round so as to
press on almost all parts of the inner surface of the chamber in succession, but to
adapt itself to the quantity of articles being operated upon at any one time.