CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OP CARPETS, RUGS, AND OTHER SIMILAR FABRICS
Year: 1852

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, JOHN
GERALD POTTER, of Over Darwen, in the County of Lancaster, Carpet
Manufacturer, and MATTHEW SMITH, of the same place, Manager, 'send
greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Thirty-first day of July, in the sixteenth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto us, the said
John Gerald Potter and Matthew Smith; Her espécial licence, full power,
sole privilege and'authority, that we, the said John Gerald Potter and Matthew
Smith, our exors, admors; and assigns, and such others as we, the said John
Gerald Potter and Matthew Smith, our exors, adiñors, and assigns, should
at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all
times during the term of years therein mentioned, should and lawfully
might make; use; exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and the Town
of Berwick-upon-Tweed; and in all Her Majesty's Colonies and Plan-
tations abroad, and in the Islands of Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark,
and Man, our Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE
OP CARPETS, RUGS, AND OTHER SIMILAR FABRICS;" in which said Letters Patent
is contained a proviso obliging us, the said John Gerald Potter and
Matthew Smith, by an instrument in writing under our hands and seals,.
or under the hand and seal of .one of us, particularly to describe and ascer

page_text: tain the nature of our said Invention, and in what manner the same is
to be performed, and to cause the same to be inrolled in Her Majesty's
High Court of Chancery within six calendar months next and immediately
after the date of the said in part recited Letters Patent, 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, we, the said
John Gerald Potter and Matthew Smith, do hereby declare that the nature of
our said Invention, and the manner in which the same is to be performed,
is particularly described and ascertained in and by the following description
thereof, reference being had to the Drawings hereunto annexed, and to the
letters and figures marked thereon, and in which similar parts are marked
with similar letters or figures of reference (that is to say):-
Our Invention of Improvements in the Manufacture of Carpets, Rugs, and
other similar Fabrics, consists of certain apparatus or combination of parts to
be added to and used in conjunction with looms for weaving such fabrics for
the purpose of introducing into the shed of the warp the wires upon which
the terries or loops of the fabric are to be formed, and afterwards withdrawing
those wires after the terries have been formed. For this purpose we furnish a
loom with three or more wires fixed in wire carriers or runners or slides which
are attached to or connected with levers; we furnish a loom with three or more
wires in this manner for the purpose of causing it to produce a more even
terry surface on carpets or other similar fabrics than is usually produced on
such like fabrics when woven by power with a loom furnished with two
wires only.
In Figures 1, 2, and 3 of the said Drawings we have shewn a mode of
carrying out this improvement with a loom furnished with four wires. We
attach these wires separately to runners, carriers, or slides, two of which are
placed on each side of the machine and run horizontally on guides, and are
actuated by levers to which they may be connected in any convenient manner.
The levers which actuate the runners, slides, or wire carriers act much in the
same way as the picking sticks of a common power loom. Each of these levers
lever connected by a
is mounted on a shaft which is furnished with an arm or
rod to one end of a lever below, and which is alternately raised and depressed
by cams on the main shaft, and thereby causes the levers (which may be
called picking levers) to push the wires into the shed or withdraw them from
the fabric.
Fig. 1 of the said Drawings represents a side elevation of a carpet loom to
which our improvements have been applied; Fig. 2 is a front elevation, and
Fig. 3 a plan shewing the application of our improvements to the same loom.

page_text: The breast beam is shewn at a, a, and to this beam is bolted a bar b for the
purpose of supporting the two parallel guide rails c, d, and c, d, one pair of
which is placed at each side of the loom. The rails c and d are connected
together by cross pieces c', c², c³, c, the rails c and d of each pair of rails being
about two inches apart. The runners, wire carriers, or slides e and f are made
to work in longitudinal slots or grooves on the inner sides of the guide rails c
and c, and similar runners 9 and h are made to slide in similar slots or grooves
on the inner sides of the guide rails d and d. Each of the runners e and f
is furnished with a stud or projecting finger c, c, and upon the ends of these
two studs the terry wires e¹ and fare fixed. The terry wires g' and h¹ are
fixed to their runners g and h, and the runners, slots, and studs are so placed
that the ends of the studs c, c, shall not come in contact with the carriers g
and h or the ends of the wires g' and h' respectively attached to those carriers
when the loom is in operation. The positions of these wires is shewn in
Figures 1 and 3 and more distinctly in Figure 8. The wires are made of such
length and so fixed to their slides that when inserted in the shed the place
where cach wire is fixed to its slide is sufficiently far from the selvage of the
cloth to allow the wire to be bent forward by the batten and also by the cloth
as it is drawn forward by the breast roller r to the place where the wire is
drawn out of the fabric. When drawn out of the fabric the end of the wire
which is released will spring back to the back part of the slotted plate ', and
will thus be brought into a proper position to be again introduced into the shed.
The slides e, f, g, and h are actuated by the picking levers i, k, which are
keyed on to the shafts i and k. The shaft i is supported in bearings fixed to
the right-hand side of the loom, and the corresponding shaft k is mounted in
bearings placed at the left-hand side of the loom; the lower of the levers i¹
and
and connecting
The shafts i and k
are provided with anti-friction rollers, as shewn in the Drawings, and
these rollers work in vertical slots made in the slides e, f, g, and h, and when
acted on they will move the slides on wire carriers, and, consequently, tho
terry wires, into the shed or out of the fabric, as may be required. The shafts
i and k and their respective levers and receive their motion from the
tappet (see Fig. 1) through the intervention of the lever
link or rod and the levers 2 and 2, Figures 2 and 3.
are mounted in their bearings in such a manner that they may be moved
endways by means of the forked elbow lever m, which is by means of the link
or rod m¹ connected to the lever m³, the lower arm of which is furnished
with a bowl, and is acted upon by a tappet plate in the ordinary manner.
Upon the cross bar b are fixed the two slotted plates b₁ (one of which drawn
half size is shewn detached in Fig. 4). These plates support and guide the

page_text: wires into the shed, and to the same cross bar bare also fixed the spring
pieces which bear upon the wires, and hold the fabric tight on to the cross
bar b. Such of the other parts of the loom as are shewn in the Drawing are
of the ordinary construction, and as they are only introduced to illustrate the
application of our improvements, it will not be necessary to describe them in
detail. The operations of the various parts are as follows:-The lever ¹ is
represented in the Drawing as in the act of pushing the wire f¹ into the shed,
the other wires g', h', and e' all being in the fabric. As soon as the wire f¹
has completed its traverse across the shed, the shaft i will be moved endways
in its bearings in the direction of the arrow in Fig. 3 by means of the lever m
and the parts in connection therewith, until one of the anti-friction rollers at
the lower end of the lever is withdrawn from the central groove in the
slide f, and the other anti-friction roller on the opposite side of the small
lever has entered in the groove of the slide h. During the moving of the
shaft the shuttle is made to throw two shoots of weft across the shed in order
to bind the wire f¹ into the fabric, and at the same time the wire e', now
shown nearest the breast beam, will be drawn out of the fabric by the lever k¹
and replaced into the shed behind the wire f', the shaft k' is then moved
endwise in the direction of its arrow so as to bring the anti-friction roller at
the end of the lever into the groove of the slide e, two shoots of the weft
are again thrown across and at the same time the wire h¹ has been withdrawn
from the fabric by the lever and replaced into the shed. These operations
continue in succession, each wire nearest the breast beam being withdrawn
from the fabric and replaced into the shed in regular rotation behind the
others. By this means there are always three wires in the terries at the
time of beating up the weft. In working a loom with our improvements the
tappets may be arranged to work the headles so as to form a linen shed under
the worsted or figure shed, and allow the binder weft and a terry wire to be
thrown in at the same time.
The Diagram Fig. 5 represents a cross section of the terry fabric produced
in the above-described loom. n is the dead warp; o, the binding warp; p, the
figure warp; 7, 7, are the terry wires; and r, r, the two weft threads which
are thrown in between each terry.
Another mode of working four wires with our improvements, so as to
produce the effect above described with reference to Figures 1, 2, and 3,
consists in placing the rails c and d of each pair of guide rails one above the
other instead of side by side. In this case we should recommend the use of
a separate lever to each slide instead of moving the antifriction rollers at the
lower end of the levers and k¹ from the groove of one slide into the groove

page_text: of the other. Each lever, acting on its own particular slide, should be moved
by a separate tappet, and they should be arranged to act in regular succession,
leaving at all times three wires in the fabric, the wire nearest the breast beam
being in the act of being drawn out of the fabric while the one nearest the reed
is being put into the shed.
In working looms with our improvements it may sometimes be advantageous
to employ only three wires, one slide and wire being placed on one side of the
loom, and the other two slides and wires on the other side. By this arrange-
ment the terries would be formed over wires, two of which would be in the
fabric while the third was being drawn out and replaced in the shed.
When using only three wires the slide carrying the wire on that side on
which there is only one wire should be attached to the lever on that side,
and the shaft i or k, upon which that lever works, should be deprived of
its capability of being moved endways, and the tappets which actuate the
picking levers must be so placed as to cause the wires to be introduced into
the shed and withdrawn from the fabric in regular succession.
In Figures 6 and 7 we have shewn another combination of machinery for
producing terry fabrics by the use of four wires attached to slides. Many of
the parts in this arrangement being similar to those above described in reference
to Figures 1, 2, and 3, they are marked with corresponding letters and figures
of reference, so that the description of the former arrangement may, to a great
extent, apply to the present. The shafts i and k in the present instance do not,
however, require to be moved endways in their bearings, but each shaft is
furnished with two levers i, , and k', k, for actuating the slides e, f, g, and h.
The levers marked and k¹ are keyed or fixed on the shafts i and k, while
those marked and are mounted loosely thereon. The link k' connects the
fast lever to the loose lever , and the link connects the fast lever to
the loose lever . The mode of operation is as follows: -The lever i is
supposed to be pushing the wire f¹ (seen best in Fig. 8) across the shed;
and as the lever is connected to the lever by the link or connecting
rod, it is evident that the wire e', which is fixed to the slide e, will be
drawn out of the terries at the same time that the wire f' is advancing across
in the shed. When the wire f' has completed its passage through the shed
two or, if required, more shoots of weft are thrown in, and then the lever
kbegins to operate, and the wire g', which is shewn in the fabric, is drawn
out while the wire h' is being pulled across in the shed, the lever being
connected to the loose lever ³, as before described. From the foregoing
lescription it will be evident that only two wires are in the fabric at the time
of beating up the weft, as two wires are withdrawn when the other two are