AN IMPROVEMENT IN MACHINERY FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF LOOPED FABRICS
Year: 1858

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to John Whiteley, of Stapleford, in the County of
Nottingham, Lace Manufacturer, for the Invention of "AN IMPROVEMENT
T
"
Sealed the 10th September 1858, and dated the 20th April 1858.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said John Whiteley at the
Office of the Commissioners' of Patents, with his Petition, on the 20th
April 1858.
I, JOHN WHITELEY, of Stapleford, in the County of Nottingham, Lace
Manufacturer, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "AN
IMPROVEMENT IN MACHINERY FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF LOOPED FABRICS," to be as
follows:-
My Invention consists in a combination or arrangement of needles or hooks
and grooved points for the purpose of pressing off the loop in the manufacture
of looped fabrics, whereby pressers and presser bars are dispensed with. In
the manufacture of looped fabrics as now ordinarily practised, the needles are
formed with long and pliant barbs, to enable the point of the barb to be
depressed in order to allow of the loop being pressed off therefrom. Now, I
make my needles to terminate in short rigid hooks, but they have a groove, and
are similar in other respects to ordinary needles. I cause my grooved points
to slide forward within the loop, resting upon the groove in the needle, and on

page_text: under the rigid hook, the end of the book entering the groove in the point,
whereby the thread is guided over the point of the hook and off from the
needle; suitable motions, as will be well understood by workers of looped
machinery, being imparted to the needles or points, or both to needles and
points. The thread is laid on the needles in the usual manner to form the
fabric.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said John Whiteley in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 20th
October 1858.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JOHN
WHITELEY, of Stapleford, in the County of Nottingham, Lace Manufacturer,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twentieth day of April, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight, in the twenty-first year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said John Whiteley, Her special licence that I, the said John Whiteley, my
executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said John
Whiteley, my executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any time agree
with, and no others, from time to time and at all times thereafter during
the term therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise,
and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the
Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "AN IMPROVEMENT IN
MACHINERY FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF LOOPED FABRICS," upon the condition
(amongst others) that I, the said John Whiteley, my executors or adminis-
trators, by an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of their hands
and seals, should particularly describe and ascertain the nature of the said
Invention, and in what manner the same was to be performed, and cause the
same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar months
next and immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said John Whiteley, do hereby declare the
nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed,
to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement
thereof, reference being had to the Drawings hereunto annexed, that is to say:
My Invention consists in a combination or arrangement of needles or hooks
and grooved points for the purpose of pressing off the loop in the manufacture

page_text: of looped fabrics, whereby pressers and presser bars are dispensed with. In
the manufacture of looped fabrics as now ordinarily practised, the needles are
formed with long and pliant barbs, to enable the point of the barb to be
depressed in order to allow of the hoop being pressed off therefrom. Now, I
make my needles to terminate in short rigid hooks, but they have a grove,
and are similar in other respects to ordinary needles. I cause my grooved
points to slide forward within the loop, resting upon the groove in the needle
and on under the rigid hook, the end of the hook entering the groove in the
point, whereby the thread is guided over the point of the hook and off from
the needle; suitable motions, as will be well understood by workers of looped
machinery, being imparted to the needles or points, or both to needles and
points. The thread is laid on the needles in the usual manner to form the
fabric.
Figure 1 of the Drawings hereunto annexed shews so much of a machine
as will illustrate the manner in which I carry my Invention into effects: A is
the needle bar, extending the whole width of the machine. Leads B, having
needles or hooks cast in or attached to them, are secured to the bar by the
plates F.
C are the sinkers or hooks, one to each needle, similar to those
ordinarily employed; a, a, are guides or thread carriers, cast in leads and
screwed on to the bar H; c is a bar extending the whole width of the machine,
to which leads are screwed, having points 6' cast in them; there is one of
these points to each needle; a¹ and e are brackets to receive the arms d¹, to
which the bar c is attached; these brackets act as guides or supports to the
arms d' in their backward and forward motions. The grooves formed on the
upper surface of the needles extend to the end under the hook, as shewn at
Figure 2. The points 6', which are cast in the leads b (a detached view of
one of which is given at Figure 3), enter the grooves formed in the needles.
The points b¹ have also grooves formed in them at their upper part, as shewn
at Figure 4, and are made flat from the termination of the groove to the
lead, this part being tempered in such manner that it will be elastic or form a
spring, in order that when the points 6¹ enter the grooves in the needles they
will be retained there, even if the needles be disturbed. The operation of
the several parts is as follows:-Supposing the loops which were made the
previous course to be within the sinkers or hooks C, then on motion being
communicated to the machine the guides or thread carriers a, a, will pass up
through the needles, and when above them will be moved one needle to the
right or left, as the case may be, to lay the thread on the needles; the guides
then descend. When the threads are on the needles the points b¹ in the
leads 6 advance towards the ends of the needles, and drive the threads under

page_text: the hooks of the needles. As soon as the points b¹ are under the hooks of the
needles, and the books well buried in the grooves of the points, the sinkers C
rise and throw the work over the hooks. The points b¹ in the leads 6 are
drawn back, the sinkers descend taking the fabric with them, thus leaving the
front of the needles bare and ready to receive the thread to form a fresh loop,
as just described..
And having now described the nature of my said Invention and in what
manner the same is to be performed, I declare that I claim as my improve-
ments in machinery for the manufacture of looped fabrics, the combination or
arrangement of needles or hooks and elastic points working in the grooves of
the needles, essentially in the manner herein-before described and illustrated
in the Drawings hereunto annexed..
In witness whereof, I, the said John Whiteley, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Sixteenth day of October, One thousand eight
hundred and fifty-eight.
Witness,
THOMAS DALLEY,
Stapleford.
JOHN WHITELEY. (L.S.)