IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR FEEDING WOOL, COTTON, OR OTHER FIBROUS MATERIALS TO CARDING OR OTHER MACHINES."
Year: 1869

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Philip Charles Evans, Cloth Manufacturer, of
Brimscombe Mills, in the County of Gloucester, and Henry James
Hogg King, Engineer, of Glasgow, in the County of Lanark, for
the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR FEEDING WOOL,
COTTON, OR OTHER FIBROUS MATERIALS TO CARDING OR OTHER MACHINES."
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Philip Charles Evans
and Henry James Hogg King at the Office of the Commissioners of
Patents, with their Petition, on the 13th December 1869.
We, PHILIP CHARLES EVANS, Cloth Manufacturer, of Brimscombe
Mills, in the County of Gloucester, and HENRY JAMES HOGG KING,
Engineer, of Glasgow, in the County of Lanark, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR FEEDING
WOOL, COTTON, OR OTHER FIBROUS MATERIALS TO CARDING OR OTHER MACHINES,"
to be as follows, that is to say :-
This Invention relates to further improvements in apparatus of the
kind described in the Specification of certain Letters Patent granted to
the present applicants, and dated 20th January 1869 (No. 184), and also
referred to in the Provisional Specification accompanying an application
for Letters Patent by the present applicants lodged on 25th November
1869 (No. 3402).

page_text: One improvement consists in hinging the door of the opening through
which the fibrous material is dropped upon the weighing scale to the
upper edge of the opening, or in otherwise carrying it upon rods in such
a way that the material passes out under it and not down the outside of
it as before.
By a second improvement the hooked roller and doffer are placed at
the top of one side of the box containing the fibrous materials, and an
apron with one end fixed just under the hooked roller is placed in the
box so as to hold the fibrous material as in a bag. The other end of the
apron is gradually drawn up by a counterweight or otherwise so as to
raise the materials up to the roller in proportion as the roller feeds them
forward.
A third improvement consists in constructing the box from which the
fibrous material is fed in the form of a hopper with an outlet at the
bottom, at which there is placed a revolving hooked or fluted roller to
throw out the material, being assisted by a spiked doffing roller or
beater. When the weighing scale is full the outputting of the material
is stopped either by a door which closes the outlet or by stopping the
motion of the hooked roller; this roller being by preference driven in
the latter case through worm wheel gearing by a small revolving shaft
that is easily thrown out of or into gear.
By a fourth improvement the fibrous material first separated from a
mass by a hooked roller and doffer is carried by a reciprocating paddle
or rake to the top of an incline, down which it falls into the weighing
scale.
By a fifth improvement a rake worked with a short reciprocating stroke
is used instead of a revolving beater for throwing back the surplus of
fibrous material taken up either by an endless hooked apron or by a
hooked roller.
By a sixth improvement a current of air produced by a blowing fan
or otherwise is directed upon the fibrous materials, which may be
detached from the mass by a hooked roller or otherwise, and carries
them forward along a duct to the weighing apparatus. A valve is
arranged in the duct so as by altering the direction of the air current to
stop the supply of material at the periods when the weighing scale is
being emptied.
In all the modifications the supplying of the fibrous. material to the

page_text: weighing scale may be stopped at the time when the scale is being
emptied either by means of a door or deflector directing it back again,
or by means of any convenient disengaging clutch or appliance which
stops the motion of the supplying parts.
A seventh improvement relates to the contrivance for drawing down
the weighing scale described in both the Specifications herein-before
referred to, and consists in using a blade spring or other suitable spring,
or an clastic roller, which whilst guiding the pin of the drawing-down
rod yields sufficiently when the projecting tooth of the hooked wheel
happens to encounter the pin to prevent jamming.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent;
filed by the said Philip Charles Evans and Henry James Hogg
King in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 11th June 1870.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, PHILIP
CHARLES EVANS, Cloth Manufacturer, of Brimscombe Mills, in the
County of Gloucester, and HENRY JAMES HOGG KING, Engineer, of
Glasgow, in the County of Lanark, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Thirteenth day of December, in the year
of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-nine, in the thirty-
third year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give
and grant unto us, the said Philip Charles Evans and Henry James
Hogg King, Her special licence that we, the said Philip Charles Evans
and Henry James Hogg King, our executors, administrators, and assigns,
or such others as we, the said Philip Charles Evans and Henry James
Hogg King, our executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any
time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all times
thereafter during the term therein expressed, should and lawfully might
make, use, exercise, and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR FEEDING WOOL, COTTON, OR OTHER
FIBROUS MATERIALS TO CARDING OR OTHER MACHINES," upon the condition
(amongst others) that we, the said Philip Charles Evans and Henry
James Hogg King, our executors or administrators, by an instrument
in writing under our, or their, or one of their hands and seals, should

page_text: particularly describe and ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and
in what manner the same was to be performed, and cause the same to
be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar months next
and immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that we, the said Philip Charles Evans and Henry
James Hogg King, do hereby declare the nature of our said Invention,
and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly
described and ascertained in and by the following statement in writing,
reference being had to the accompanying Drawings, that is to say:-
Our said Invention relates to improvements in apparatus of the kind
described in the Specification of certain Letters Patent granted to us,
and dated 20th January 1869 (No. 184), such apparatus being now
known as "first feed" apparatus for wool carding and similar machines.
And in order that our said Invention and the manner of performing
the same may be properly understood, we have hereunto appended two
Sheets of explanatory Drawings to be herein-after referred to, and repre-
senting modifications embodying such of the improvements described or
referred to in the Provisional Specification deposited with our application
for the herein-before in part recited Letters Patent as we now consider
of sufficient utility to be practically carried out.
Figure 1 on Sheet 1 of the Drawings is a side elevation of a modi-
fication of our improved first feed machine embodying improvements
described in our Provisional Specification relative hereto as the third,
fifth, and seventh improvements; the machine being shown complete,
with the other principal parts as described in the Specification of our
earlier Patent herein-before referred to. Figure 2 is an elevation of the
front of the feed machine which faces the carding or other machine in
connection with which it is to work; and Figure 3 is an inside view of
mechanism concerned in emptying the weighing scale.
A box or hopper 1 carried by side standards 2 is provided, into which
the fibrous materials are thrown in a loose state. An endless apron
shown by dotted lines at 3 in Figure 1 forms the bottom of the box, and
is moved in the direction to carry the fibrous materials towards a
roller 4 shown by a dotted circle in Figure 1, and occupying the other-
wise open front side of the box. This roller 4 has hooks fixed all over
its surface, and turning in the direction shown by the arrow picks up
the fibrous materials and carries them from the front end of the bottom
apron 3 round over its top, any excess being prevented from passing over

page_text: by a vibrating paddle 5. A revolving paddle indicated by dotted lines
at 6 in Figure 1, and working under a hood or cover 7, beats the fibrous
materials off the hooked roller 4, so that they fall into a weighing
scale 8. This scale 8 is carried by arms 9 on a horizontal spindle 10
supported by brackets 11, 12, and is counterbalanced by adjustable
weights 13. To one end of the weighing scale 8 there is loosely jointed
pendent rod 14, having at its bottom end a pin projecting across a hook
toothed wheel 15, shown separately in Figure 3, and which is constantly
revolving inside of an open box 16. The rim of the box is nearly in
contact with the teeth of the wheel round the sides and bottom, but is
at the top shaped to allow the pin of the pendent rod 14 to rise clear of
the teeth, the top consisting of a spring which allows the parts to yield
when the point of a tooth happens to strike the pin improperly. As
soon as the accumulation of the fibrous materials in the scale 8 causes
the scale to begin to descend the pin of the pendent rod 14 engages
with the toothed wheel 15, and that wheel draws down the scale
quickly, emptying it and then carries it up again. The fibrous materials
drop from the scale 8 down upon the endless apron (not shown in the
Drawing, but) which carries them into the carding or other machine.
The various movements herein-before described are all derived from a
transverse horizontal shaft 17, which is itself to be driven from the
carding or other machine by means of a pitch chain or otherwise. A
cord transmits motion from a pulley 18 on the shaft 17 to a pulley 19,
which is on a stud, and which has fast to it a pinion gearing with a
spur wheel 20 fast on the spindle of the toothed wheel 15 which draws
down the weighing scale. From another pulley 21 on the shaft 17 a
cord transmits motion to two pulleys, one 22 being on the spindle 23 of
the doffing paddle 6, and the other 24 on a stud, and having an eccentric
pin, which by a connecting rod 25 jointed to a crank arm on the
spindle 26 of the paddle 5 gives the vibrating motion to that paddle.
The hooked roller 4 is driven by means of the spindle 23 of the doffing
paddle 6, a belt from a pulley on that spindle being passed round a
pulley 27 on an inclined spindle, which has fast on it a worm 28
gearing with a worm wheel 29 fast on the spindle 30 of the hooked
roller 4. The pulley 22 on the paddle spindle 23 has a loose pulley
beside it, but the positions of the parts are such that the driving belt
from the pulley 21 tends to run on the fast pulley. When however the
weighing scale 8 is being emptied a fork 31 carried by a vertical rod 32
moves the belt to the loose pulley, in consequence of which the motions

page_text: of the hooked roller and of the doffing paddle cease for the time. The
rod 32 is held up by a catch lever 33 which engages under a shoulder
formed on it, but when the weighing scale 8 begins to descend a pin 34
fixed to it throws off the catch lever 33, and the rod 32 descends by its
own weight (aided if necessary by a spring). In descending the rod 32
turns by the action of a pin on it in an inclined or spiral guide 35, and
thereby causes the fork 31 to shift the belt, at the same time a spring
blade 38 fixed to the rod moves into contact with an extension of the
pulley 22, and acts as a brake to stop the motion of the shaft 23. After
each emptying of the scale 8 the feeding is discontinued until the
rod 32 is again raised, which is done by a cam adapted to the speed
and requirements of the carding or other machine. Thus it be
conveniently done by a cam on the spindle of the outermost roller of the
feed or entering apron of a carding machine. A pulley 36 on the
spindle 30 of the hooked roller transmits motion by a cord to pulleys 37
on the spindles of the rollers of the endless apron 3 at the bottom of the
box or hopper 1. When the scale 8 returns up after emptying it is
retained in its elevated position by a light spring (not shown) fixed to the
framing, and this spring is moved out of the way by a pin on the rod 32,
when this rod is again raised.
may
Figure 4 on Sheet 2 of the Drawings is a copy of part of Figure 1 of
the Specification of our earlier Patent herein-before referred to, but
altered to show the application of the first improvement described in
our Provisional Specification relative hereto. This improvement consists
in hinging the door 6 of the opening through which the fibrous material is
dropped upon the weighing scale 8 to the upper edge of the opening, or
in otherwise carrying it upon rods in such a way that the material passes
out under it and not down the outside of it as before.
Figure 5 is a vertical section showing a modification of our apparatus
embodying what is described in our Provisional Specification relative
hereto as the second improvement. In this modification the hooked
roller 4 and doffer 6 are placed at the top of one side of the box 1
containing the fibrous materials, and an apron 40 with one end fixed
just under the hooked roller 4 is placed in the box 1 so as to hold the
fibrous materials as in a bag. The other end of the apron or bag 40
is gradually drawn up by a counterweight or otherwise so as to raise the
materials up to the roller 4 in proportion as the roller feeds them
forward. The apron or bag 40 is shown as passed over a roller 41 at the

page_text: back, by which roller actuated by worm wheel gearing it is gradually
wound up, and so raises the fibrous materials as required.
The arrangements described in our Provisional Specification relative
hereto as the fourth and sixth improvements not having been as yet
worked out by us so as to be of practical utility we do not now include
them as forming any part of our said Invention.
Having thus particularly described our said Invention, and the manner
in which the same is to be performed, we have to state that we do not
restrict ourselves to the precise details herein described or delineated; but
that what we believe to be novel and original, and claim as the Invention
secured to us by the herein-before in part recited Letters Patent is,―.
1. The applying of the hooked roller 4 and accessory details sub-
stantially as herein-before described with reference to Sheet 1 of the
accompanying Drawings for transferring the fibrous materials from the
hopper 1 to the weighing scale 8.
2. The improved arrangement herein-before described of the mechanism
for emptying the weighing scale 8.
3. The hinging of the door 6 to the upper edge of the opening, or the
supporting of it in an equivalent manner, as herein-before described with
reference to Figure 4 on Sheet 2 of the accompanying Drawings.
4. The lifting of fibrous materials up to a hooked feeding roller by
drawing up one end of a bag or apron, the other end of which is fixed, as
herein-before described with reference to Figure 5 on Sheet 2 of the
accompanying Drawings.
In witness whereof, I, the said Henry James Hogg King, on
behalf of the said Philip Charles Evans and myself, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Tenth day of June, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy.
0 Witness,
EDMUND HUNT,
Patent Agent,
Glasgow.
H. J. H. KING. (L.s.)