Improved Apparatus for Making Bats for Use in the Manufacture of Various Articles of Pottery.
Year: 1886

page_text: Date of Application, 23rd Dec., 1886.
Specification Accepted, 25th Jan., 1887.
Improved Apparatus for Making Bats for Use in the Manufacture
of Various Articles of Pottery.
I, WILLIAM BOULTON, of Providence Foundry, Burslem, Staffordshire, Engineer,
do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to
be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement:
This Invention relates to improved apparatus for making bats used in the manufac-
ture of plates, saucers, cups, and other articles in plastic clay.
The improved apparatus is illustrated on the accompanying drawings in elevation in
Fig. 1, and, in part, in sectional plan view in Fig. 2.
The improved apparatus is constructed with a screwed rod, 1, which is cut to any
required pitch in accordance with the required thickness of the bat, and works in a
nut, 2, which may be bolted to a bench or frame, B.
The top part of the screwed rod, 1, is adapted with a light handwheel, 4, by which
it can be conveniently turned, and on a lower part of the rod, I, there is secured a
radial extension, 5, from which to a more forward extension, 6, depending from the
rim of the hand-wheel, there is stretched a wire, 7; the arrangement being such (as
best seen in Fig. 2) that the wire does not radiate from the screwed rod, 1, but from
the extension. 6, projecting behind it, considering the direction of the motion of the
parts; the effect being that a better and more even cutting of the clay lump, 8, is
effected than if the wires were radially stretched and were dragged straight through
the clay. In order that the cut surface of the clay shall be left smooth, I cause the
wire, as it is carried round, and before it comes in contact with the clay lump, to be
wetted by a jet or spray of water issuing from a conduit and nozzle, 9, falling from
a convenient reservoir, 10, and escaping to any convenient receptacle, 11. Each
revolution of the wire, 7, cuts off from the clay lump a slice of a thickness
corresponding with the pitch of the screw.
prefer that the lump, S, of clay should be formed to the size and shape required
by applying an extra mouthpiece to the pug mill so that it will make a piece of clay
into the required shape and size at the same time that it is pugging the ordinary clay,

page_text: but the said lump, 8, of clay may be formed of the desired shape and size by passing
it through a squeezing box; or by rolling it round to the proper size by hand, and
one or more of such lumps may be placed on end on the work bench in such a position
as to be operated on in the manner aforesaid by the wire as it is brought round.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my said Invention, 5
and in what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that what I claim is :-
In apparatus of the class hereinbefore indicated.
1. The combination of the screw, 1, nut, 2, handwheel, 4, depending arm 5,
extension, 6, and stretched wire, 2, substantially as hereinbefore described.
2. The use of such apparatus in combination with means of wetting the wire as it 1
is carried round, substantially as and for the purpose hereinbefore described.
DAY, DAVIES & HUNT,
321, High Holborn, London, W.C.,
Agents for the Applicant.