CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MEANS OF FINISHING SILKS, WOOLLEN CLOTHS, STUFFS, AND OTHER SUBSTANCES REQUIRING HEAT AND PRESSURE
Year: 1834

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JACQUES
FRANCOIS VICTOR GERARD, of Redmond Row, Mile End, in the County of
Middlesex, send greeting.
WHEREAS, in consequence of a communication from a Foreigner residing
abroad, I am in possession of an Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE
MEANS OF FINISHING SILKS, WOOLLEN CLOTHS, STUFFS, AND OTHER SUBSTANCES
REQUIRING HEAT AND PRESSURE:" And whereas His present most Excellent
Majesty King William the Fourth, by His Letters Patent under the Great Seal
of Great Britain, bearing date at Westminster, the Eighth day of February,
in the fourth year of His reign, did, for Himself, His heirs and successors,
give and grant unto me, the said Jacques Francois Victor Gerard, His especial
licence, that I, the said Jacques Francois Victor Gerard, my exors, adñiors,
and assigns, or such others as I, the said Jacques Francois Victor Gerard,
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, "the said Invention;" in
which said Letters Patent is contained a proviso obliging me, the said Jacques.
Francois Victor Gerard, by an instrument in writing under my hand and seal,
particularly to describe and ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in
what manner the same is to be performed, and to cause the same to be
inrolled in His said Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six calendar
months next and immediately after the date of the said recited Letters Patent,

page_text: as 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
Jacques Francois Victor Gerard, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention to consist in an improved apparatus herein-after described for hot-
pressing silks, woollen cloths, stuff's, and other fabrics or substances requiring
that operation, whereby the heat applied may be constantly kept up to any
required degree of temperature, and whereby, when the fabric has been suffi-
ciently heated and pressed, it may be at once cooled, in order to be removed
without loss of time, and to fix more permanently the dress on its surface
which the hot pressing has given to it. And in further compliance with the
said proviso, I, the said Jacques Francois Victor Gerard, do hereby describe
the manner in which the said Invention is to be performed, by the following
statement thereof, reference being had to the Drawing annexed, and to the
figures and letters marked thereon, that is to say:-
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING.
Figure 1 represents a front elevation of the said Invention. A, A, A, A, is
the framework of an ordinary hotpresser's press, C being the top or cover
acted upon by the screw B in the usual way. The part coloured pink repre-
sents the cloth under pressure. D, D, D, D, D, D, are six hollow metal
shelves or flat boxes, each containing a long bent or serpentine pipe embedded
in wood, answering the purpose and supplying the place of the ordinary hot-
metal plates. c, c, c, e, e, are pipes of communication leading from the serpen-
tine pipe in one shelf to the serpentine pipe in the shelves next adjoining.
E, E, is a steam pipe leading from any ordinary boiler, and f, G, is an exit
pipe leading into a condenser. J may be called a waste pipe, though its use
is two-fold, as will be explained hereafter. K is a tank to receive the waste
water; and II is a supplying tank for cold water. Before I proceed to
describe the mode of putting the said Invention into operation I must describe
moro particularly the hollow shelves marked D, and their internal arrange-
ment, whereby I am enabled to keep up the temperature to any required
degree of heat.
Figure 2 represents a plan of one of the said shelves or flat boxes with its
top or upper side removod, in order to shew the serpentine pipe within it,
supposing this to be a plan of the bottom shelf. S is the place where the
steam pipe E is connected with the serpentine pipe R, which pipe, extending
in a serpentine direction, as here shown, from one end to the other of the
shelf, finally makes its exit from the shelf again at W, where an aperture is

page_text: made for it considerably wider than the serpentine pipe itself, in order to
admit of adjustment. A similar provision is made also at S. When the
serpentine pipe leaves the shelf at W, it becomes one of the communication
pipes marked e in Figure 1, and passes in a slanting direction upwards to
become the steam admission pipe for the serpentine pipe in the shelf next
above it, where it enters a similar surpentine pipe to that in the hollow shelf
below it, and so on through the whole series of hollow shelves, until at length
it becomes the exit pipef, communicating with G, which leads to the con-
denser. It should be observed here, that the serpentine pipe in the hollow
shelf should be laid in a wooden bed hollowed out to receive it, and here
shown coloured brown. Figure 3 is a front view of one of the hollow shelves.
It is only necessary further to state, that the pipes of communication marked
e are united to the serpentine pipes at each end by ordinary screw nuts, rings,
and washers, shewn separately at Figures 4 and 5. In order to put the said
Invention into operation, the cloth should be folded over the cards in the
usual manner, and one of the hollow shelves placed wherever a hot metal
plate would be placed on the old plan. The pipes of communication marked
e should then be screwed on, as shewn in Figure 1, and steam admitted
through the steam pipe E into the serpentine pipe of the lower shelf or box,
whence it will find its way from shelf to shelf till it reaches the exit pipe G,
through which it will pass off into the condenser. When the cloth has been
sufficiently pressed and heated, the steam must be shut off by the cock at E,
the cock at J must be opened, and cold water admitted from the tank II
into the pipe G, and allowed to flow through the apparatus into the tank K
until the cloth be sufficiently cooled for removal, when a fresh supply of cloth
having been inserted, as before, the heating and cooling processes are repeated,
giving a much better finish to the cloth than the method of hotpressing now
in use, and in a much less time. Now whereas it is evident that hot air may
be used instead of steam for the purposes of the said Invention, and in an
exactly similar apparatus, but I prefer steam; and I claim as the said Inven-
tion the following improvements, that is to say :-
First, heating the cloth or other substance when under pressure by means
of hollow shelves or flat boxes, with internal serpentine or other steam pipes,
surrounded wooden or other the like conducting media, as herein-before
described, whereby I am enabled to secure the continuance of the heat at any
required temperature for any given time without the risk of singeing the cards
or the fabric under pressure; and,
Secondly, the arrangement of the tanks H and K, by which I am enabled
to cool the apparatus and the cloth or other fabric as soon as it has been

page_text: sufficiently pressed, so that it may be removed without loss of time, while a
much higher finish is retained upon the face of the fabric thereby.
And such Invention being, to the best of my knowledge and belief,
entirely new, and never before used within that part of His said Majesty's
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland called England, His said
Dominion of Wales, and Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, I do hereby declare
this to be my Specification of the same, and that I do verily believe this my
said Specification doth comply in all respects fully, and without reserve or
disguise, with the proviso in the said herein-before in part recited Letters
Patent contained: Wherefore I do hereby claim to maintain exclusive right
and privilege to the said Invention.
In witness whereof, I, the said Jacques Francois Victor Gerard, have
hereunto set my hand and seal, this Eighth day of August, in the
year of our Lord Que thousand eight hundred and thirty-four