Year: 1840

page_text: LONDON:
PRINTED BY GEORGE E. EYRE AND WILLIAM SPOTTISWOODE,
PRINTERS TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY:
PUBLISHED AT THE GREAT SEAL PATENT OFFICE,
25, SOUTHAMPTON BUILDINGS, HOLBORN.

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS, SHALL COME, I JAMES
MOLYNEUX, of Preston, in the County of Lancastor, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her.present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Sixteenth day of December, in the fourth year of Her reign,
did for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said James Molyneux, Her especial licence that I, the said James Molyneux,
my exors, adñors, and assigns, or such others as I, the said James
Molyneux, my exors, adñiors, 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 expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and
vend, within England, Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my
Invention of "AN IMPROVED MODE OF DRESSING FLAX AND Tow;" in which said
Letters Patent is contained a proviso, obliging me, the said James Molyneux,
by an instrument in writing under my hand and 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
said 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

page_text: 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 James
Molyneux, do hereby declare the nature of my said Invention to consist in dress-
ing the flax and tow on a machine similar in many respects to a silk dressing
machine, but adapted by various alterations and additions to the purposes of
my said Invention, and necessarily of much larger dimensions and of increased
strength. And in further compliance with the said proviso, I, the said James
Molyneux, do hereby describe the manner in which my said Invention is to
be performed, by the following statement thereof, reference being had to the
Drawings on 'two Sheets, marked A and B, annexed, and to the figures and
letters marked thereon, similar letters being used to denote similar parts
wherever they occur in all the Drawings.
In Sheet A, Figure 1 represents a side view of one of the said machines.
The parts marked A constitute the frame of the machine; B is the table for
holding the strick boards and intermediate slips, and is here shewn as run under
the carding combs or heckles. This table runs upon the small truck wheels
C, C, on a railway D, D, and turns at its centre on a pivot pin E, for the
convenience of presenting the stricks in opposite directions to the heckles by
turning the table, end for end, when the flax has been heckled sufficiently in
one direction. The boards which hold the stricks in this table are precisely
similar to those in silk machines, except that they are stronger and of larger
dimensions, and their intermediate slips broader. The boards and slips are
screwed firmly together, side by side, with end set screws in the same way
also as those of the silk dressing machines. F, F, are the lever segments
which raise the table, and consequently the flax, up to the heckles gradually,
while drawing the segment into the position shewn by dotted lines, by means
of the chain G and connecting rod or bar g. This gradual elevation of the
table causes the heckles to commence their action on the surface of the strick
and gradually to penetrate through it, completing the straightening of the
fibre as they proceed. The parts marked H are the combs or heckles on an
endless band moving in the direction of the arrows. In order to clear these
heckles as the work proceeds, I have invented the following apparatus :-I is
an arm forming the support, together with a similar one on the opposite side
of the machine, of the two rollers J, J, which carry the endless band K,
furnishing with brushes L, which clear the heckles of the tow collected upon

page_text: them during the heckling, process, and these brushes are in turn cleared by the
stripper or doffer wheel M, which strips the tow off from them and throws it
into the tow box N, where it is collected to be afterwards dressed or acted
upon in my improved mode if required. O, P, are two set screws to regulate
the tension of the web or endless band on which the heckles are placed,
the rollers over which this band passes being set in sliding frames, Q, R,
which are acted upon by the set screws, O, P, for that purpose. When
the table has been raised up to the proper height it is necessary that
it should drop again for the next operation, and to accomplish this, I
have invented the small contrivance S, which is a trigger lever acted
upon by the table when at its greatest elevation, as shewn by the dotted
lines. When this lever S is lifted, its end passes off from the end of the
bob-weighted lever T, which then falls, and thus raises the small forked
lever V which acts under the creeper bar W, and forces it upwards away from
the ratchet wheel, which, being thus set at liberty, the weight of the table brings
it down to its starting or rest point again, when the click is raised and the
handle wheel Y turned backwards by its handle Z. This creeper bar W winds
up the table B gradually by means of the eccentric X, in the same manner as
is common to silk dressing machines. Y is the fly or handle wheel for
lowering the table, and Z its handle, by which the necessary motions are given
to the table, while a, a, is the driving band working over the fast-and-loose
pully 6, which drives the web containing the heckles and the geering con-
nected therewith, the various motions of which are as follow:-The band
a, a, drives the pulley b'; the pully 6 has a pinion on its axis, which drives the
toothed wheel d, and this toothed wheel is fixed on the axis of the drum or
roller e, which carries and drives the endless web on which the heckles H are set.
This web drives the opposite roller f, and on the axis of this roller is the
toothed wheel h and pully wheel i, which latter wheel i, by means of the band
j, (or geering as the case may be), drives the doffer, while the former wheel h
drives the two pinions m, n, through the medium of the connecting wheel r.
The pinion n is fixed on the shaft of the roller J, over which the endless band
carrying the brushes passes, and which band drives the corresponding roller,
also marked J, and thus the whole of the upper parts of this machine is set in
motion, while the lower parts take their motion from the creeper bar. W'as
follows: Each time that the eccentric X revolves, the creeper bar W forces
round the ratchet wheel, in which the creeper works, a tooth or more as the
case may be. On the shaft of this ratchet wheel is the pinion y, which turns
the toothed wheel z below it, while the pinion on the shaft of the wheel z
turns the toothed wheel, on the shaft k of which is a conical drum'x,

page_text: which winds the chain G upon it. To raise the table, t is a click or paul
fixed to the framing A, to prevent the table falling suddenly when the
creeper bar W is removed, and holds it up till the operator takes hold of the
handle Z of the wheel Y, and removes the click t, when, he can gently lower
the table.
"
Figure 2. is a plan of the under side of the. table B; Figure 3 a longitudinal
section; and Figure. 4 a transverse section of the same. Figure 5 is a
perspective view of one of the strick boards, open to receive the flax; and
Figure 6 the same boards, filled with flax and closed, ready to be inserted in
the table.
.'
In Sheet B, Figure 1 represents an end view of the machine described in
Sheet A, Figure 1. In this view the table is shown run. out on the rails
D, D, from under the machine. ✗,.is the conical drum on which the chain G
is wound, and which by its conical form gradually. diminishes the speed at
which the table rises, in proportion as the teeth of the heckles get deeper into
the flax. Figures 2, 3, 4, and 5, show the various sizes or coarseness of the
teeth used in the progress of dressing the flax, beginning always with the
strongest and ending with the finest; and Figures 6, 7, 8, and 9, represent
the leather backs into which the said teeth are set.
Now, whereas I claim as my Invention, dressing flax and tow in a machine
such as I have herein described, having the clearing and doffing apparatus
shewn in the Drawings, and the stopping bob-weighted lever apparatus
S, T, V, also shewn in the Drawing attached thereto; and such my Invention
being, to the best of my knowledge and belief, entirely new, and never before
used in that part of Her said Majesty's United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland called England, nor in Her Dominion of Wales, nor in the Town of
Berwick-upon-Tweed, I do hereby declare this to be my Specification of
my said Invention, and that I do verily believe this my said Specification
doth comply in all respects, fully and without reserve or disguise, * with
the proviso for that purpose in the said Letters Patent contained, where-
fore I do hereby claim to maintain exclusive right and privilege to my said
.Invention.
In witness whereof, I, the said James Molyneux, have hereunto set my
JAMES (L.s.) MOLYNEUX.

page_text: AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Eleventh day of June, in the
year of our Lord 1841, the aforesaid James Molyneux came before our said
Lady the Queen. in Her Chancery, and acknowledged the Specification
aforesaid, and all and every thing therein contained and specified, in form
above written. And also the Specification aforesaid was stamped according
to the tenor of the Statute made for that purpose.