IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT, CLEANSING, AND FINISHING OF TEXTILE FABRICS
Year: 1855

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Andrew Robertson at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 8th September
1855.
I, ANDREW ROBERTSON, of Nether Holehouse, Neilston, in the County of
Renfrew, North Britain, Bleacher, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT, CLEANSING, AND FINISHING OF
TEXTILE FABRICS" to be as follows, that is to say:-
This Invention relates to various mechanical arrangements to be used for
bleaching or chemically treating, washing, and cleansing textile fabrics, more
especially sewed muslins or embroidered goods. The improvements compre-
hend several stages of the bleacher and finisher's routine of operations. In
operating according to this Invention upon sewed muslins, instead of deposit-
ing a mass of the pieces or ornamental goods in the pot, boiler, or treating
reservoir, the goods are formed into a species of endless chain by putting them
in layers in a long open net or permeable bag. This chain of goods is passed
between a pair of nipping rollers, set up in connection with the pot or vessel
through which the goods are to be passed for. the chemical or cleansing treat-
ment, or a single roller only may be used for passing the chain in and out.
During the operation at this stage the nipping rollers are caused to revolve at
a slow rate, so as to continually draw the chain of goods through the chemical

page_text: or cleansing ingredient. As one side of the chain emerges from the pot or
vessel, the other passes in; hence the ingredients in the vessel can never act
injuriously upon the goods. The effect of the chemical or cleansing ingredients
is thus rendered uniform as well as complete. The effect of the nipping
rollers is to direct the chemical or cleansing ingredients right into the centre
of the thickness of the chain of goods, so that the concealed layers are acted
upon equally as well as the open and external ones. The rollers have also the
mechanical effect of forcing out and disintegrating the dirt or other objection-
able foreign matter present in the goods, & which foreign matter it is most
desirable to remove at the earliest possible stage.
Another portion of the Invention relates to the beating of sewed muslins or
other embroidered goods. The muslins, in proper sized bundles, are clamped
up in a simple holding or binding apparatus, and a set of such filled clamps
are disposed round the periphery of a revolving drum, carried on a horizontal
shaft, and rotating in an enclosing case or outer chamber. This outer chamber
contains in its lower part the chemical ingredients or cleansing fluid necessary
for the process; it also contains a flat beating surface at the bottom, elevated
slightly above the level of the fluid. The clamps of goods being set round the
drum at regular distances asunder, the drum is set in rapid motion, and as
each bundle of goods comes round it dips well into the fluid, and then passes
over to the heating surface or table. The effect of this is, that the beating is
performed with the exact severity required, whilst, the heated fluid and the
goods being covered in from the atmosphere, the operation is far more satisfac-
torily done than it is by the existing open manual process. All these improved
processes or modifications are intended to dispense, as far as possible, with
handling, mechanical agitation being substituted for the manual operations
of workmen.