CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN MA- CHINERY EMPLOYED IN MANUFACTURING HOSIERY GOODS, OR WHAT IS COMMONLY CALLED FRAMEWORK KNITTING
Year: 1840

page_text: одам.
ME, 1, WILLIAM
BEDFORD, of Hinckley, Leicestershire, Framework Knitter, 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 Seventeenth day of September, in the fourth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said William Bedford, Her especial licence, full power, sole privilege and autho-
rity, that I, the said William Bedford, my executors, administrators, and assigns,
and such others as I, the said William Bedford, my executors, administrators,
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 mentioned, should and lawfully
might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and the Town
of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN MA-
CHINERY EMPLOYED IN MANUFACTURING HOSIERY GOODS, OR WHAT IS COMMONLY
CALLED FRAMEWORK KNITTING;" in which said Letters Patent is contained a pro-
viso, obliging me, the said William Bedford, by an instrument in writing
under my hand and seal, particularly to describe and ascertain the nature of
my 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, 1, the said
William Bedford, do hereby déclare that the nature of my said Invention,

page_text: and the manner in which the same is to be performed, are 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, that is to say:
My improvements in machinery employed in manufacturing hosiery goods,
or what is commonly called "framework knitting," consist in certain novel
arrangements and simplifications in the construction of the working parts of a
stocking frame, by which I am enabled to expedite the production of work, and
at the same time to diminish the amount of labour, which improvements are
set out as follows:-
In the accompanying Drawings Fig. 1 is a front elevation of my improved
machine in complete working order; Fig. 2 is a back elevation of the same;
Fig. 3, a horizontal view, shewing the parts as seen from above; Fig. 4 is an
end elevation of the machine as it would appear when viewed at the right-
hand end of the front; Fig. 5 is a vertical section taken transversely through
about the middle of the machine in the dotted line Z, Z, of Fig. 1, and the sub-
sequent Figures represent detached portions of the working parts of the machine
drawn upon an enlarged scale: The respective letters of reference pointing out
the same parts in all the Figures. The wooden framework A, A, A, supports
the iron standards B, B, B, B, which carry the working parts of the machinery.
The front pair of standards are connected together by a bar, C, C,, which is,
called the main bar, extending horizontally through the machine. A series. of
barbed needles a, a, a, of the ordinary form, set in leads, are mounted upon a
horizontal bar D, D, which bar is attached to two ond trucks E, E, running to
and fro upon bed plates b, b, fixed upon the bases of the standards. This bar
D, with its trucks, therefore constitutes a carriage, by which the needles are
enabled to advance and recede, as will be more evidently seen in the detached
Fig. 6, representing in a horizontal view a portion of the needle bar with its truck,
and the bed plate on which it runs. A presser bar F is made fast by screws.
in front of the main bar C, the use of which stationary presser bar will be
hereafter described. A series of jacks c, c, c, are mounted upon-a-fulcrum.rod
d, in a comb e fixed in the stationary jack bar G, which is supported by.
transverse bars ff, connected to the back and front standards. From each of
these jacks a sinker g is pendant upon a rivetted pin h, the use of which sinkers
is well understood by stocking makers. A series of thin curved pieces of metal
i, called by me dividers, are placed under the presser bar, and fixed in a bar
k, screwed to the main bar between it and the presser bar. These dividers
are intended for the same purpose as that for which ordinary lead sinkers are
commonly employed, that is, for dividing all the work into equal loops. The

page_text: thread from which the stocking fabric is to be produced, being wound upon a
bobbin placed in any convenient situation above the machine, is led off' from
the bobbin by a carrier l, which travels to and fro along the front of the
machine. The thread carrier is a small tube (of which there may be
two or more, according to the number of pieces of fabric intended to
be wrought) attached by an arm m to a slider n mounted on a longitudinal
bar H, which slider is moved to and fro by cords o, o, connected to the slur
wheel I and treadles J and J* below. In beginning to work this machinery,
the parts will be situate as represented in their state of rest at Fig. 5, the
jacks c, c, c, being all held up by a series of bent springs p, p, fixed in a
longitudinal rail K, the action of the jacks being confined laterally by a comb
of guides q. The work having been set on the needles in the ordinary way,
and the workman seated upon the bench in front of the machine, he depresses
the treadle J by his foot, which gives a partial rotary movement to the slur
wheel I, and thereby causes the cord o to draw the slider n and carrier
toward the left, by which means the thread is laid over the upper surfaces of
the needles. There are also attached to the slur wheel I other cords t, t,
which pass over pullies in the fixed bar 1, and are connected to the carriage
of the slur cocks M. These cords t, t, are allowed to be rather slack,
so that the slider with the carrier tube shall have moved some little
distance onward before the cords t, t, are brought into tension. By
these means the slur cocks are made to follow the carriers, in order that the
jacks and sinkers may be depressed immediately after the thread has been laid
over the needles, by means of which loops are produced between every two
needles, as shewn in the partial front elevation, Fig. 7, and transverse section,
Fig. 8. Fig. 7 exhibits a portion of the presser bar F, several of the sinkers g,
and also of the needles a, a, a, and Fig. 8 is a transverse section of the same,
with the dividers and needle carriage, the length of the loops being regulated
by the position of the falling bar in the ordinary way. The slider consists of
two parts, there being a slight bar r, r, to the ends of which the cords o, o, are
attached; this bar is passed through slots in bracket arms extending from
the slider n, and is held in contact with the slider by a spring s. It will
therefore be seen that by drawing the cord o the bar ? and slider n, with the
arms m and tube 7, will all move together until the progress of the slider is
arrested by adjustable stops u, u, placed to regulate the width of the work;
the rod, however, is by the slight pressure of the springs s allowed to slide
on further in order to bring the cordo again into a state of tension.
business of the slur cock M, as in other stocking frames, is to depress the
jacks and sinkers, and it being now supposed that it has travelled over
The

page_text: the jacks and effected that object, the next movement is produced by raising
the handles N, N. The handles N, N, are attached to a longitudinal bar O,
the ends of which are made fast to two upright levers S, S, hanging upon
fulcrum pins fixed to the wooden frame, as shewn at v, v. The first cffect of
raising the handles and lever N and S will be to withdraw the arms W,
attached to the bar O, from the projections a, a, at the under parts of the
-levers P, P, in the back of the machine; these levers P hang upon stationary
fulcrums y, y, and at their other ends are connected to bent rods Q, Q, and
levers R, R, the latter of which hang on fulcrum pins z, z, in fixed brackets,
extending from the front standards; by thus withdrawing the arms W from
the projections x, x, the compound levers P, Q, and R, are set at liberty. The
weight of the carrier tubes 7, 7, their arms m, m, the sliding apparatus n, r, and s,
with the bar H, bearing upon the outer ends of the levers R, being no longer
held up by the levers, they are now allowed to descend, guided by pins and
slots in the ends of the bar H, and the brackets of the standards, which causes
the tubes to pass down between the needles a, a, and thereby carry the
threads below the needles as if laid by the hand of the workman. The raising
of the levers S by the handles N as described causes the levers to act upon
the needle carriage E, which is done by a notch or fork 1 in the upper end
of each lever S, taking hold of a pin 2 in the carriage E, as seen best in
Figures 6 and 9; thus the raising of the levers S drives back the needle
carriage, as in Fig. 9, and brings the beards or barbs of the needles under the
presser bar F, the threads previously looped and held by the sinkers between
the needles, as described, being by the receding of the carriage drawn to the
heads of the needles, whilst the work previously laid on hangs behind the
beards. It is now again necessary to remark that the presser bar is stationary,
in order to shew that it is made to close the beards into the eyes of the needles
by the carriage E at the moment required, passing over a small elevation 3 on
the bed plate b, by which means the heads of the needles are raised up against
the under edge of the presser bar, as represented at Fig. 9. When the
operation of making the work has advanced thus far it is necessary that the
jacks should be raised, wh
which is done by the following means: Attached to
the upper ends of each of the levers S, there is a small friction roller 4, which,
as the levers S rise, come into contact with the inclined planes T affixed to
arms U, U, hanging upon the fulcrum pin of the jacks at the ends of the
machine. By these uieans the arms U, U, are raised, and with them a longi-
tudinal bar V, which coming into contact with the under parts of the jacks
lift them up until they are severally caught hold of by the bent springs P, P,
as seen in Fig. 10. A bar Z, Z, pendant from the back of the rail K, having

page_text: spring bearings, depresses the jacks to their proper clevations. The needle
carriage still continuing to recede, the needles a, a, a, as they pass between the
dividers i, i, draw the loops of thread under the curved edges of the dividers,
as shewn in Figures 10 and 11, by which means the loops are all equalized
and divided, allowing a similar portion of thread to every needle. In this
receding movement of the needles, whilst their beards were held down by the
presser bar F, the stitches of the previously made work are slidden over the
depressed beards, and by the time that the carriage has reached its ultimate
receding point the stitches of the work have been drawn over the heads of the
needles, and made to embrace the loops under the beards in the heads of the
needles, and thereby to form of the said loops a new series of stitches or range
of work, as seen in Figures 12 and 13. By the workman now depressing the
handles N, N, the needle carriage is brought forward again, by which move-
ment, the work being held by a lever frame W is slidden toward the back parts
of the needles, the parts of the machine being then in the positions shewn in
Figures 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, ready to commence a new course of work. The
lever frame W is formed with an opening chap W*, which is confined by
catches, and the whole turns upon pivots 5, fixed to brackets connected to the
standards, and the lower end of one of the levers W has a cord 6 attached to
it, which passing over a pulley is connected to a treadle X at the lower part of
the machine. By depressing this lever, the workman is enabled to bring forward
the work to the heads of the needles, when required, and the lever frame is
made to resume its position by a weighted cord 7. The narrowing of the
work is effected by the introduction of any number of moveable stops u, u,
into the groove of the carrier bar H, which arrests the lateral progress of the
slider n, and in order to make a tight selvage to the work two sliders Y, Y, in
front of the machine are to be so adjusted upon their fixed bar that the cleva-
tions 9, 9, shall stand immediately under the outside jacks of each range of
work. By these means the sinkers pendant from these outside jacks, having
a little nib fixed on each, will, by the elevations 9, 9, be prevented from falling
so far as the other sinkers, and thereby produce short loops.
In witness whereof, I, the said William Bedford, have hereunto set
my hand and seal, this Sixteenth day of March, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and forty-one

page_text: AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the same Sixteenth day of
March, in the year above mentioned, the aforesaid William Bedford came
before our Lady the Queen in Her Chancery, and acknowledged the Speci-
fication aforesaid, and all and every thing therein contained, in form above
written. And also the Specification aforesaid was stamped according to the
tenor of the Statute in that case made and provided.
Inrolled the Seventeenth day of March, in the year above written.