IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR HACKLING FLAX AND OTHER FIBROUS SUBSTANCES.”
Year: 1877

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to George Horner, of Belfast, in the County of Antrim,
Ireland, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR HACKLING
FLAX AND OTHER FIBROUS SUBSTANCES.”
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said George Horner at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 3rd December 1877.
GEORGE HORNER, of Belfast, in the County of Antrim, Ireland. "IMPROVEMENTS
IN MACHINERY FOR HACKLING FLAX AND OTHER FIBROUS SUBSTANCES."
My Invention relates to those machines known as vertical intersecting sheet
hackling machines, and to other kinds of hackling machines in which the tow is
stripped from the hackles with stripper bars, and it consists in effecting the cleaning
of the revolving brushes by reducing their speed, so that the surface speed of the
hackle pins is greater than that of the brushes; and when it is necessary to clean
the hackle pins, or prevent the gummy substances from accumulating, the brushes
are made to revolve quicker until their surface speed is greater than that of the
hackle pins, these alternate speeds being obtained by a simple mechanical con-
trivance. The brushes are thus always made to revolve in the same direction, the
result being that they will wear much longer.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent filed by
the said George Horner in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 3rd June
1878.
"IMPROVEMENTS
GEORGE HORNEK, of Belfast, in the County of Antrim, Ireland.
IN MACHINERY FOR HACKLING FLAX AND OTHER FIBROUS SUBSTANCES."
My Invention relates to vertical intersecting sheet hackling machines and to
other hackling machines, and it consists in effecting the cleaning of the revolving
brushes used for cleaning the hackle pins and preventing the gummy substances
from accumulating by reducing the speed of said brushes at intervals until their
surface speed becomes less than that of the hackle pins, the brushes being at other
times (that is to say, whilst they are cleaning the hackle pins) made to revolve at a
surface speed greater than that of the hackle pins, those alternate speeds being
obtained automaticallay by a simple mechanical contrivance.
I am aware that various means, such as stationary, oscillating, and revolving
brushes, have been proposed for removing the gummy or sticky substance that is
liable to accumulate when hackling certain kinds of fibrous materials, but there has
always been a difficulty in cleaning the brushes themselves.
It has been proposed to clean revolving brushes by reversing them at intervals,
but this method causes great strain and wear in consequence of the brushes
revolving in the opposite direction to the motion of the hacklo pins. Now according
to my Invention I avoid this objection by always running the brushes in the same
direction, which is that in which the hackle pins run; and the cleaning of the
brushes is effected by simply reducing their speed at intervals until their surface
speed is less than the surface speed of the hackle pins, as above mentioned,
whereby the cutting sides of the hackle pins are cleaned, and the brushes are
cleaned at the same time by the hackle pins passing through them; the rear side of
the hackle pins being cleaned when the surface speed of the brushes is higher than
that of the hackle pins. In this way the gummy material is got rid of and mixed
with the tow.
This alternate speed of the brushes can be accomplished by a great variety of
mechanical contrivances, but the arrangement I prefer is that hereafter described
in detail and shown in the accompanying Drawings, in which the brushes are
driven by belts, to which motion is transmitted through one or other of two sets of
change wheels, thrown into and out of gear alternately by a device on the lifting
frame. The brushes may be applied to the whole length of the hackles, or to any
number of hackles, as circumstances may require.
DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS.
Figure 1 is an end clevation of a duplex vertical sheet hackling machine, part of the
gearing being omitted, or indicated only by pitch circles; and Figure 2 is a front
elevation of the same machine, with the improvements of my Invention applied.
The same letters of reference indicate the same parts in all the Figures.
a are the hackles running on drums and shafts A, A¹, all as usual; B are the
rotary brushes used for cleaning the hackles a. Motion is imparted to them from
a pulley D by a belt E running over pulleys b fixed on the brush shafts, and
over guide pulleys e carried on a bar X, which swings on a stud fixed to the
frame end.
Although the Drawing shows a duplex machine, I have only shown the belt
applied to one set of brushes, but it will be readily understood how another belt
would be arranged to run on another pulley on the same axis as pulley D, and
revolving therewith for driving the other set of brushes.
The pulley D revolves on a fixed stud d, and receives its motion from a gear
wheel, say wheel F, on the axis of one of the drums A' on which the hackles a run,

page_text: the motion being transmitted through one of two sets of wheels and pinions g, g³,
h, h, h, alternately thrown into gear with wheel F.
The wheels and pinions g, h, h², are carried by a lever I oscillating on stud d and
weighted at . This lever I is connected by a rod J to one arm of an elbow
lever K mounted on the frame of the machine, and provided with a roller k, running
on a stud at the extremity of the other arm in a position to be acted on by a
block L, fixed to the lifting frame M, which raises and lowers the trough N, carrying
the holders n with the stricks of flax clamped in them. When the block L rises
with the lifting frame M, and strikes roller k, it oscillates levers K and I, and throws
wheel g out of and wheel h into gear with wheel F, thereby putting the brushes on
the slow speed; and when block L descends below roller k the weight i oscillates
levers K and I in the reverse direction, thereby throwing g into and h out of gear,
thus putting the brushes on the quick speed. This is the position shown in the
Drawing
It will be seen that wheel h is fixed to or cast in one with the pinion h³, so as to
turn together. This pinion h' gears with wheel h³, and the wheel g gears with g',
the wheels h and gl, and the pulley D, being cast or fixed together. The studs on
wheels h and g turn are fixed in slots in the arms of lever I; and the rod J is con-
nected to lever K by a stud and slot, in order that the relative positions of the parts
may be readily adjusted, so that the wheels shall gear properly together.
"
It will be evident that the brushes B may be used both on what are called
stripper bar" machines, that is to say, machines on which the tow is removed
from the hackle pins by stripper bars, and also on what are known as "brush and
doffer" machines, in which the tow is removed by brushes and doffers, the brushes B
being in either case independent of the "stripper bars" or "brushes and doffers," as
the case may be.
In the case of brush and doffer machines, the brushes B would clean the cutting
side of the hackle pins, their rear side being already cleaned more or less by the
ordinary brushes, which remove the tow from the hackles, and which are them-
selves cleaned by the doffers.
Having described the nature of my Invention, and the manner of performing the
same, I declare that what I claim as my Invention to be protected by the herein-
before in part recited Letters Patent is, in a sheet hackling machine, the employ-
ment of revolving brushes running at surface speeds alternately faster and slower
than that of the hackle pins, for the purpose of alternately cleaning both the hackle
pins and the brushes themselves, substantially as herein set forth.
In witness whereof, I, the said George Horner, have hereunto set my hand
and seal, this 25th day of May, in the year of our Lord One thousand
eight hundred and seventy-eight.