IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF NAILS
Year: 1881

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by James Lockwood Heward at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents on the 27th April 1881.
JAMES LOCKWOOD HEWARD, of Newport, in the County of Monmouth, Engineer.
“IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF NAILS,"
In the method for which a Patent was granted to me and dated 14th October,
1870, No. 2711; of heading machine made wrought nails, they are compressed for
about a third of their length in two grooved dies held in side levers closing together
and squeezing the nail shank while the header presses out the head on the face of
the dies.
In the method I now employ, in accordance with my present improvements, four
dies are used of which the bottom one is stationary, the top one working up and
down on it by means of the machinery hereafter described, and the other two side
dies being put in their places and held there by the usual motion of the ordinary
heading machine, with this difference as regards the side dies, that whereas the
forward motion of the slide box was used only for the header, I now adapt it for
placing these side dies in their position, using the ordinary side lever motion only to
compress them more tightly when so placed.
The bottom die, as before said, is fixed in a die seat or recess formed in the bed
plate of the machine. It has a narrowed projection in front against which the side
dies come up, and has two guides working up and down in springs in recessed
chambers underneath.
That part of this die which is exposed to wearing action is made removable, so
as to keep up good working surfaces.
The top die is of the same shape but without the guides and descends on to the
bottom one holding the nail shank firmly along its whole length between their two
tapered faces. While in this position the two side dies attached to square rods
working in square bearings are pushed along until they are in the same vertical
plane as the front end faces of the top and bottom dies, forming between the four
dies thus placed a square hole from which the end of the shank about to be headed
projects.
Pressure being now brought to bear by the ordinary motion on the side dies,
and at the same moment the top die pressing down on the bottom one, the header
moves forward and spreads out the metal of the shank into the head of the nail.

page_text: On the header returning the side dies follow it, and springing back while the
eccentric motion of the headstock shaft raises the top die, draw the nail out by
the head from between the top and bottom dies, when it falls out of the machine.
The motion of the top die is as follows:-A headstock containing the die works
on a shaft fixed to a standard frame bolted to the bed plate. This shaft has a
double eccentric on it which works in the box formed head of the headstock, and
as the shaft revolves raises and depresses the headstock in which the top die is
fixed by set screws. A knuckle joint converts the eccentric motion into the
vertical motion of the lower part of the headstock containing the top die. An
eccentric in the centre of the shaft also works in the same manner a spindle up
and down inside the headstock and carries at the lower end a cutter which cuts
off or detaches the shank about to be headed from the one succeeding it, and at
the same time forms a point curved or otherwise on the shank at the instant the
head is being put on.
This process of heading, cutting off, and pointing is applicable to the nail
shanks connected together and made in the manner described in the Provisional
Specification of Letters Patent now being applied for by me.
There is a pair of top and bottom dies also fixed immediately behind those
described and worked in the same manner, and which serve the purpose of
straightening the shanks as they are fed in between them before coming under
the first pair of dies, the cutter detaching and pointing the shank between the
four first dies as described while this is going on.
A pair of feed rolls worked with an intermittent motion from a ratchet plate
and pinions below serve to feed the nail rod into the dies at regular intervals as
the dies open after having headed the nails.