IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS TO BE APPLIED TO REAPING AND MOWING MACHINES FOR LIFTING LAID CROPS
Year: 1875

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Alfred Hughes, of Brampton Ash, Market
Harborough, in the County of Northampton, for the Invention of
" IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS TO BE APPLIED TO REAPING AND MOWING
MACHINES FOR LIFTING LAID CROPS."
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION filed by the said Alfred Hughes at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition and
Declaration, on the 10th April 1875, pursuant to the 9th Section of
the Patent Law Amendment Act, 1852.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, ALFRED
HUGHES, of Brampton Ash, Market Harborough, in the County of
Northampton, send greeting.
WHEREAS I am in possession of an Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS
IN APPARATUS TO BE APPLIED TO REAPING AND MOWING MACHINES FOR LIFTING
LAID CROPS," and have petitioned Her Majesty to grant unto me, my
executors, administrators, and assigns, Her Royal Letters Patent for
the same, and have made solemn Declaration that I am the first and
truc Inventor thereof.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Alfred Hughes, do hereby declaro
that the following Complete Specification, under my hand and seal,
fully describes and ascertains the nature of the said Invention, and in
what manner the same is to be performed, in and by the following
statement, that is to say.-
-
This Invention has for its object improvements in apparatus to be
applied to reaping and mowing machines for lifting laid crops.
In the Specification of a former Patent, No. 2468, in the year 1872,
I have described a crop lifter, which has proved very successful in
raising laid crops, enabling reaping machines to cut them without
becoming clogged.
In the use of these lifters I found from my own observation, as well
as the evidence of all who had used them, that another very important
feature had followed, namely, that the reapers of all makers worked
lighter with lifters than without them. The apparatus I now desire to
Patent greatly developes this important object, at the same time
retaining all the essential points of an efficient lifter. Those essential
points I consider to be these.
To apply to the bar of a reaping or mowing machine a keen projecting
instrument, which shall underrun the prostrate crop in advance of the
cutters and raise it above the cutters without pushing it.
The highest part of the lifting instrument should be immediately
over the cutters and as low as possible in order that the incline should
not be steep, and for this reason the huge or joint in the lifter should
not be placed in advance of the jaw of the finger.
That the instrument should be jointed upwards only so as to allow its
point to rise over inequalities in the ground but not to fall into hollows
That it should be perfectly rigid in itself, and also as to its joint
laterally.
It is also important that the point of the lifter should be so formed
as not to hinder its picking up straws lying close to the ground, and
yet that it should clear itself if it should enter a sudden rise. It is also
expedient to control this point with a spring.
If sufficient weight is put into the point to prevent its jerking about
with the little unevenesses of ploughed land it is apt to pull the crop up
by the roots and fling grit into the cutters.

page_text: . In order to lift a crop the lifters need not be placed less than ten inches
or a foot apart.
By my present Invention in place of fixing my lifter upon the platform
of the machine I make a special finger to receive it. I form on the
upper side of the finger two side checks, between which the butt or rear
end of the lifter is received, and it is pin-jointed to the finger imme-
diately over the notch or recess in which the knife works.
The body of the lifter is of wood, or it might, but less conveniently,
be cast in metal and hollow; and as formerly I provide it with a cast-
iron point I also fix a trough like cap on the upper surface of the
lifter where the crop .bears upon it, and this cap covers the upper edges
of the side checks of the finger, so that the crop may not catch-upon
them or find its way between the cheeks and the body of the lifter so
as to impede the working. The form given to the body of the lifter
prevents the crop hanging upon the end of the finger or its side checks.
A spring is applied to press the end of the lifter against the land more
firmly than it would boar simply by its weight.
In order that my said Invention may be most fully understood, and
Figure 1 is a sido clevation; Figure 2 a longitudinal section; and
Figures 3, 4, and 5, arc transverse sections of a corn lifter constructed
according to my Invention. It is represented full size, and together
with parts of a reaping machine to which it is applied.
a, a, is the finger bar of a reaping machine, and b, b, are irons by
which the platform of the machine is fixed to it; c is a finger adapted
to receive a lifter (usually I apply a lifter at every third or fourth
finger); it is fixed by a bolt to the finger bar, and to give additional
stiffness the hinder end of this finger may be so formed as to abut on
the finger on either side of it. The knife works through the finger c
cutting the crop in the same way as at the ordinary fingers; c', c¹, are
the side cheeks of the finger; d is the wooden body of the lifter; e is a
wooden pin passing through the cheeks of the finger and through the
body of the lifter, and serving as an axis on which the lifter is able to
work, so as to allow its point to rise and fall, following the irregularities

page_text: of the ground; is the metal point of the lifter; and g the cap covering
its upper surface and shielding the edges of the checks c', c'; h is a
coiled spring pressing upwards the butt end of the lifter and holding its
other end down. One end of the spring is lodged in a hollow formed
in the body of the lifter, and the other rests on the base of the socket 5
of the finger. It will be seen that the point is so formed as not to
penetrate the land, and so that even should it touch upon an inequality
the point of the lifter will not dig in but rise and pass over it. I make
lifters for mowing machines in a similar manner but of smaller size.
On the side of a reaping machine next to the standing corn I some- 1
times_apply an car lifter to prevent cars of the uncut crop which lean
over from being caught by the cutting apparatus. The arrangement is.
shown at Figure 6, which is a longitudinal section; and Figures 7, 8,
and 9, are transverse sections. An additional cast tip is applied to the
lifter and secured in the manner shown, and in this tip is a socket into 1
which a steel rod is secured by a key.
What I claim is, the construction of crop lifters, and the application
of the same to reaping and mowing machines, substantially as
described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Alfred Hughes, have hereunto set 2
my hand and seal, this Ninth day of April, in the year of our