AN IMPROVED MANUFACTURE OF ELASTIC FABRIC
Year: 1844

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
UNSWORTH, of Derby, Silk Weaver, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by
Her Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing
date at Westminster, the Second day of November, in the eighth year of
Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto
me, the said Thomas Unsworth, Her especial licence, full power, sole privilege
and authority, that I, the said Thomas Unsworth, my executors, administrators,
and assigns, and such others as I, the said Thomas Unsworth, my executors,
administrators, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and no others, from
time to time and at all times during the term of years therein mentioned,
should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England,
Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention of "AN
IMPROVED MANUFACTURE OF ELASTIC FABRIC;" in which said Letters Patent is
contained a proviso obliging me, the said Thomas Unsworth, by an instrument
in writing under my hand seal particularly to describe and ascertain the nature
of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, and
to cause the same to be enrolled in Her Majesty's High Court of Chancery
within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said
in part recited Letters Patent, as in and by the same, reference being
thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Thomas Unsworth, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention,
and the manner in which the same is to be performed, is particularly

page_text: described and ascertained in and by the following description thereof, reference
being had to the Drawings hereunto annexed, and to the letters and figures
marked thereon (that is to say)
This Improved Manufacture of Elastic Fabric is designed to produce
ornamental elastic articles of silk (and other fibrous materials if required)
having velvet surfaces or portions of velvet or plush, that is a pile on one or
both faces of the fabric, the ground being of any of the ordinary kinds of
woven work, twist work, or gauze work, and the velvet or pile wrought in or
upon the ground in stripes or various devices or patterns. I propose also to
introduce occasionally into the groundwork, and also into the velvet, em-
broidered figures or devices of gold, silver, or colours; and in the fabric I
work either elastic cords or wire springs, or strands of indian rubber, either
covered or uncovered, with any filamentous materials, which india rubber, after
the fabric is finished, may be rendered elastic by heat in the ordinary way.
This fabric is, when desired, to have open edges of network, of any kind or
form of meshes or interstices, with fancy work wrought in the net. The
goods, when finished, are to be appropriated to the making of frills or plaited
bands, collars, flounces, fringes, and other ornamental trimmings, principally for
ladies' dresses, being puckered, plaited, or drawn up into flutes, which may be
done by the abovesaid introduction of elastic cords inserted in loops, or by
strands woven into the material; which material is then to be puckered or
otherwise drawn up into flutes to form the frills or plaits of the required
articles. This fabric is produced in an ordinary loom furnished with the several
kinds of warps suited to the work to be made of silk or other materials, and
suitable kinds of weft are to be shot in during the weaving, consisting of
threads or cords of gold, silver, and colored silks, according to the desired
pattern. For making the velvet or pile parts, wire may be introduced into the
work as usual, or any of the other known modes of raising loops and pile may
be had recourse to. A drawboy is to act upon the figuring harness of the
loom, or some of the modifications of the Jacquard may be employed. The
warp for the network, tatting, gauze, or other fringe on the edges, is to be of
doubled or single threads and cords, and those parts of the warp intended to
make these edgings must be crossed in order to get the tie of each mesh.
The characters or kinds of work which I propose to combine in the production
of my improved elastic fabrics are so well known, and the modes by which
they are usually made so familiar to weavers in general, that it is scarcely
necessary to describe the operations requisite for carrying out my intention.
But in order to render the modes of operating more evident, I have appended
to this my Specification Drawings representing in several views an ordinary

page_text: loom with an arrangement of parts capable of producing the improved fubrics,
which arrangement I shall now proceed to describe :-
Fig. 1 is an elevation of the front of a loom so arranged; Fig. 2 is a side
elevation of the same; and Fig. 3, a horizontal section of the saine, shewing
the warp beams. A, A, are the standards of the loom; B, the lathe or
batten; C, the headles or harness; D, the beam on which the yarns are
wound to constitute the main portions of the warp or ground of the fabric.
E is the beam containing the threads for producing the warps of the gauze or
net. F is the beam which carries the indian rubber (where that is employed
to form the elastic strands). G, G, are beams for carrying the threads or
yarns which produce the pile. H is the beam for carrying the fancy yarns
to be acted upon by a Jacquard. I is the rack wheel fixed on the end of the
breast beam gearing into a train of wheels communicating by rods with the
treadle K, by which the work, as it is woven, becomes gradually wound upon
the beam. The several headles of the harness are connected to their respective
warps in the ordinary way according to the kind of work intended to be made.
The three headles a, b, and m (see Fig. 2), are intended to operate upon the
gauze or net yarns of the beam E. The headle C works the indian rubber
yarn from the beam F; the headles d, e, act upon the pile yarns from the
beams G, G; the headles f, g, h, i, work the ground warps from the beam D.
The headle acts counter to a and m, the headle to b, in operating the
gauze warps, all of which headles are connected to and actuated by the several
treadles at bottom. The fancy warps from the beam H are intended to be
worked by hand by a drawboy by a mounture (not shewn) in connection with
the Jacquard. The work is made by the use of two shuttles, or three in the
event of introducing satin figures with the velvet figures. These shuttles are
placed in the moveable boxes L, L, which boxes are raised and depressed,
when so required; by the ordinary means known to weavers. In producing
work having a double pile, I first depress the headles a and m, and raise
6 for opening the shed of the gauze threads. I also depress the indian-
same time depress the two
rubber warp by sinking the headle c, and at the
headles d, e, in order to throw the pile yarns below. Half of the ground
warps are likewise at this time thrown below, and the other above by depressing
.the headles 9, i, and raising f,h. The weft thread is then thrown across by
In the second
the binding shuttle, and the batten beats up the work.
operation I reverse the actions of all the above-mentioned headles except that
of the indian rubber C, which again opens the shed of the warps; and I then
throw the weft across back again by the same shuttle, and beat up as before.
At the third opening of the sheds I raise the headles a, m, and depress b, as

page_text: in the first operation, and bring up the indian rubber by raising the headle c,
and depress the pile headles d, e; and of the ground headles I raise f, g, h,
and sink i, and then the weft is to be thrown across by the same shuttle,
which will bind the indian rubber strands to the back of the work. At the
fourth operation I raise the headles of the pile warps d, e, sinking all the
other warps, and then introduce the wires for forming the loops of the pile.
The fifth operation is effected by sinking the headles a and m, and raising b,
and depressing the india rubber warp, and also the pile warps, by sinking the
headles c, d, e; and I divide the ground warps as in the first opening, and then
throw across the weft by the same shuttle, and beat up. In the sixth
operation the headles a and m are to be raised and b & c depressed, and the
pile headles d, e, raised. The ground warps are also to be divided, raising g, i,
and sinking f, h. I then throw the weft by the same shuttle and beat up at
the seventh opening of the sheds; the headles a, m, are to be raised, and b
and c depressed. I also depress d, e, raise f, h, and depress g, i, throw the
weft from the same shuttle, and beat as before. In the eighth opening of the
sheds the whole of the headles are raised except d, e, which are depressed;
and I then raise the shuttle box L, and bring the shuttle into operation that
carries a coarser temporary thread as a substitute for a wire. This thread is
then thrown across a weft, but which is to be ultimately drrawn out or cut
out, according as I may wish to make terry or pile; the work is then beaten
up. At the ninth opening of the sheds the headles d, e, are raised and all the
others depressed, when a wire is introduced between the open sheds to make
the loops of the pile as before, which is then beaten up and the course is
completed. At the tenth opening of the sheds the wire is bound in by raising
and depressing the headles, as stated in the first operation, and the weaving
proceeds in the order described.
This is a series of operations of the loom as arranged in the Drawings which,
if carried out as stated, will produce the work I call my improved fabric. But
it must be understood that I do not intend to confine myself to this precise
series of improvements, as different weavers may think proper to arrange the
warps and connect them to the several headles in another order to effect the
same work. It is therefore to be understood that I have only pointed out one
mode of arrangement by which my object may be effected, intending to avail
myself of any other arrangement of the warps and movements of the headles
by which the combined operations of weaving velvet or pile on one or both
sides of the fabric, with cloth work, twist work, gauze or satin, and elastic
strands, may be effected, which is the novel production of elastic fabric that I
claim to have invented.

page_text: Figures 4, 5, and 6, are front views of the headles m, a, and b, shewing the
manner in which I prefer to work the gauze thread from the beam E by cords
extending from the eyes of the warps to the headle m passed through the loops
of the headles a and b, which is commonly called the dupe or half leaf, and is
well understood by weavers.
In witness whereof, I, the said Thomas Unsworth, have hereunto set
my hand and seal, this Second day of May, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and forty-five.