A New or Improved Device for Indicating or Counting the Num of Picks Woven in Looms.
Year: 1889

page_text: COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
A New or Improved Device for Indicating or Counting the Num
of Picks Woven in Looms.
I, CONRAD HÄMIG of Pfersee, near Augsburg, in the Empire of Germany,
Manufacturer, do hereby declare the nature of this invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by
the following statement :-
The object of this invention is a mechanism for indicating the number of picks
made by a loom or of weft threads inserted, thereby allowing the work to be
controlled and the quality of the fabric to-be determined.
In mechanical looms, it has been sought to perform the above important work by
means of toothed-wheel devices, which are indeed of some assistance, but fail to give
satisfactory results that is to say to allow the number of weft threads contained in a
piece of fabric to be independently and with absolute certainty ascertained, it being
more or less in the power of the weaver to modify by means of various manipulations
the number of threads designated for a certain area of fabric. Moreover the said
devices by no means exclude the occurrence of spontaneous irregularities which is
proved by the fact that several equally constructed looms having the same controlling
device nevertheless differ in the number of weft threads worked into the same space
of fabric and instead of showing, for instance, a uniform insertion of 16 threads
each, frequently prove to have worked 15, 15, 16, 16 or even 17 threads.
These inconveniences are intended to be obviated by the improved controlling
contrivance, which shews at any time on a dial the exact amount of weft yarn
consumed by the loom.
Referring to the accompanying drawings:
Fig. 1 is a front view, along line A B.Fig. 2.
Fig. 2 a side view of the device in connection with a partial lateral view of the
loom.
The shaft a of the loom is provided with a support b carrying a dial c with
recording mechanism and secured rearwards at d. The worm e rigidly attached to
the shaft a and lodged, in the device illustrated, in the upper part of the support,
communicates the movement of said shaft to a toothed driving wheel or disc of the
counting mechanism as soon as it is actuated through the lever gh having its fulcrum
inf and serving to advance the cog wheel i. The latter and the intermediate toothed-
wheel kare likewise rigidly secured on the shaft a which imparts its motion in the
usual manner by means of the gearing l m n to the cloth roller.
The support p attached to the rail o serves as bearing for the shaft and gearing.
In the new apparatus, a forward or backward movement of the wheel produced for
any purpose by the weaver or the necessitated removal of a number of threads cannot
affect the reliability of the counting mechanism, which counts back any number of
removed threads and therefore always indicates the actual number of weft threads
contained in the piece.
The counting mechanism may be of any suitable construction according to that of
the loom and it may be adapted to present the desired numerals either in an easily
determinable or in a complicated not generally comprehensible form.
The improved device which is applicable to looms of any system, evidently allows
the progress of the work and the amount of fabric that is-or, in the event of a fire,
had been-finished, to be accurately ascertained.

page_text: Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of this inven-
tion, and in what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that what I
claim is :
The application, in looms, of a device actuated directly or indirectly by the loom
shaft a and indicating the progress of the latter, or of the cog wheel i connected
therewith, on a dial or dials of a counting mechanism, for the purpose of allowing the
number of weft threads worked into the piece to be at any time ascertained, substan-
tially as set forth.
Dated this 17th day of October 1880
C. HÄMIG.
Per Huelser & Co.,
Of 142, Fleet Street, London, Attorneys..