IMPROVEMENTS IN THREAD-WINDING MECHANISM
Year: 1877

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Charles Adolphus Henry Jonas at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents on the 13th April 1877. A communi-
cation from abroad by Augustus C. Carcy, of Malden, Massachusetts, in tho
United States of America.
CHARLES ADOLPHUS HENRY JONAS, of Studley Road, Clapham Road, in the
County of Surrey. "IMPROVEMENTS IN THREAD-WINDING MECHANISM." A com-
munication from abroad by Augustus C. Carey, of Malden, Massachusetts, in the
United States of America.
This Invention relates to improvements in thread-winding mechanism, and is
in this instance described as embodied in a device for winding sewing machine
bobbins.
The Invention has special reference to the combination with a rotating spindle of
a pressure pad, grooved or corrugated, as herein-after described, to prevent a coil of
thread being wound from over-riding a coil just wound and adjacent thereto.
Also in the combination with a rotating spindle and pressure pad of a thread-con-
trolling guide wire connected with the pressure pad, and moving with it away from
the axis of the bobbin or spool being wound.
Machine-wound thread, as found on commercial spools, is laid uniformly and evenly
in layers from end to end of the spool, and such thread when used in machine sewing
unwinds uniformly. Thread as commonly wound from commercial spools upon
small bobbins for use in sewing machine shuttles, is guided by hand and wound very
unevenly; the coils over-ride each other; the layers of the thread do not extend
evenly from end to end of the bobbin; the surface of the thread is left irregular,
and being wound irregularly, less thread is wound upon the bobbin than would be
the case if evenly wound. Thread so imperfectly wound cannot be delivered from
the shuttle at a uniform tension as is necessary for the best sewing and stitch. To
obviate this bad hand winding and consequent imperfections in sewing, numerous
devices have been contrived to be applied to sewing machines, but none of them have
been sufficiently simple in construction and accurate in operation to come into
general use. To obviate this evil of unequal draft from imperfectly wound bobbins,
it has been attempted to wind small shuttle bobbins of wood in regular thread-
winding machines, such wound bobbins being used in the shuttle instead of the
Povice 1

page_text: usual metallic bobbins, filled as needed by the usual bobbin winder of the sewing
machine.
It has been ascertained by experiment that the thread being wound should meet
the bobbin, or the surface of thread thereon, immediately at or just in advance of
the point in the direction of, and in line with the axis of the bobbin at which the
front of the pressure pad meets the layers of thread already wound.
The thread controlling guide wire, from which the thread extends as a tangent to
the bobbin, should also vary its position with relation to the axis of the bobbin, as
it, wound with thread, increases in size, as thereby the thread is always delivered
upon the bobbin surface at a uniform position with relation to the pressing portion
of the pad.
The body of the bobbin winding device may be that employed on the Wilson
shuttle machine, the spindle being rotated through the action of a balance or fly
wheel on a rubber covered roller at the end of the body. One end of the bobbin
enters a cavity at the end of the spindle, and the journal at the other end enters a
proper spring-pressed centring device, the bobbin being thereby held so as to be
rotated in unison with the spindle. The pressure pad is pivoted and is pressed down
upon the bobbin by a spring, and connected with this pad is a thread-controlling
guide wire, about which the thread is passed over or wound one or more times,
preparatory to its passage to the bobbin. A hole at the rear end of the pad which
is to receive the pin upon which the pad pivots, is so enlarged with reference to the
diameter of the pin, that the pad, besides rising with the thread as it is wound on
the bobbin, can also move a little longitudinally in the direction in which coils are
to travel, as the thread on reaching the end of the bobbin shifts its direction of
movement, and also so that the pad can rock to adapt itself to the new and old
layers on which it rests part of the time. The front of the pad is rounded, as arc its
ends, and the under surface is scored, notched, or corrugated diagonally and in reverse
directions. These notches extend in opposite directions to operate on the thread as it
travels from right to left, or vice versa.
When for any reason the thread of the coil, being wound, attempts to over-ride an
adjacent coil already wound, the portion of the coil so raised or elevated above the
surface of the adjacent layers will be caught in one of the grooves and thrown off* into
its proper position, the thread being wound and extending to the bobbin touches
the bobbin or cylindrical surface of wound thread just in advance of the rounded
front portion of the pad, and consequently when the thread is being properly and
evenly wound, the single tangential strand cannot enter either of the diagonal grooves,
but if the strand over-rides an adjacent wound coil, then it, raised from its proper
position, enters a groove at the front of the pad, and is immediately thrown down to
its proper position. When the thread completes a cylindrical layer from head to
head of the bobbin, the strand extending from the guide wire strikes the bobbin
head, and is immediately reversed, and as the loop of thread changes the direction
of its movement along the guide wire, the pressure pad also moves a little in
the same direction. This pad, under the action of the moving strand of thread, is
pressed constantly in the direction of movement of the coils which also tends to
prevent over-riding of the coils.
The rounded ends of the pad permit the thread to over-ride at the ends of the
bobbin, so as to commence a new layer in a reverse direction, and to facilitate the
passage of the thread under the pad.
A spring presses upon the centre of the pad, and the pad, pivoted as before des-
cribed, is therefore permitted to rock so as to adapt itself to the surface of the
bobbin composed of the new layer being wound and an old layer already wound,
their surfaces being on different levels. By this device it is possible and practical
to rapidly and quickly wind sewing machine bobbins as smoothly as the ordinary
machine wound spools of commerce.
The thread outside the guide wire extending, it may be from a spool from which
the bobbins is being wound, need not be directed or moved by hand along the guide
wire. The thread held at a point within the plane of the heads, or substantially

page_text: central with relation to the bobbin's length may pass directly from a spool of com-
merce to or about the guide wire, and the strand being laid, acting against the
adjacent round layer, will cause the loop of thread about the guide wire to travel
from end to end of such wire, and the movement of the thread along the wire will be
automatically reversed as above described.
If desired the thread may extend around a pulley arranged to turn freely about
and slide longitudinally upon the guide wire. The shape of the bobbin winding
frame may be changed without departing from this Invention, and may be of the
usual shapes applied to any of the well-known sewing machines.