IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINES FOR PREPARING SILK. FLAX. AND OTHER FIBROUS MATERIALS
Year: 1860

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Samuel Cunliffe Lister, of Manningham, in the
County of York, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINES FOR
PREPARING SILK. FLAX. AND OTHER FIBROUS MATERIALS."
Sealed the 28th December 1860, and dated the 14th July 1860..
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister.
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
14th July 1860.
I, SAMUEL CUNLIFFE LISTER, of Manningham, in the County of York, do
hereby declare the nature of the Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINES FOR
PREPARING SILK, FLAX, AND OTHER FIBROUS MATERIALS," to be as follows:-
My improvements consist in preparing before combing or hackling, or a like
process, silk, flax, and other fibrous material, upon screw gills combined with an
endless strap, so that the ends of the fibrous material being first combed out
by the teeth of the gill are, as soon as they project beyond the teeth of the gill,
seized, and further worked and split by a toothed endless strap upon which the
fibrous material is allowed to accumulate, and then removed from time to time
by the workman. I find an intersecting gill especially adapted for preparing
flax before being combed either with or without the endless strap, also the
endless strap can be used with advantage for preparing flax or silk apart from
the gill.
Another plan which is more particularly adapted for silk is to feed it to a

page_text: toothed drum or other toothed surface, and to have working rollers so arranged
that a brush or like instrument shall always keep them clean by brushing the
fibre from the back of the teeth of the working rollers on to the drum.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister in the Great Seal Patent Office on!
the 14th January 1861.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, SAMUEL
CUNLIFFE LISTER, of Manningham, in the County of York, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Fourteenth day of July, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty, in the twenty-fourth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said
Samuel Cunliffe Lister, Her special licence that I, the said Samuel Cunliffe
Lister, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said
Samuel Cunliffe Lister, my executors, administrators, and assigns, should at
any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all times there-
after 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 "IMPROVEMENTS IN
MACHINES FOR PREPARING SILK, FLAX, AND OTHER FIBROUS MATERIALS," upon the
condition (amongst others) that I, the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister, my
executors or administrators, 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 Samuel Cunliffe Lister, do hereby
declare the nature of the 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, that is to say :-
My improvements consist in preparing before combing or hackling or a
like process, silk, flax, and other fibrous material upon screw gills combined
with an endless strap, so that the ends of the fibrous material being first
combed out by the teeth of the gill are, as soon as they project beyond the
teeth of the gill, seized, and further worked and split by a toothed endless

page_text: strap upon which the fibrous material is allowed to accumulate, and then
removed from time to time by the workman. I find an intersecting gill
especially adapted for preparing flax before being combed either with or
without the endless strap, also the endless strap can be used with advantage for
preparing flax or silk apart from the gill.
Another plan which is more particularly adapted for silk is to feed it to a
toothed drum or other toothed surface, and to have working rollers so
arranged that a brush or like instrument shall always keep them clean by
brushing the fibre from the back of the teeth of the working rollers on to
the drum.
I will now proceed to describe the best means with which I am acquainted
for carrying my Invention into practical operation.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING.
In the machines used at the present time for preparing and straightening
the fibres of wool before combing, the unprepared fibres are fed through a pair
of rollers which present those fibres to a series of travelling gills or hackles,
which moving faster than the rollers, open out, and prepare the fibres. After
the fibres have passed through the rollers they are carried by the travelling
gills or hackles to another pair of fluted rollers having an endless drawing
leather between them. This second pair of rollers draws the fibres through
the gills or hackles, and forms them into a lap or endless sheet, which is
broken off from time to time by the workman, the fibres being then separated
from one another and laid side by side.
Now the first part of my Invention consists in substituting for the second
pair of rollers and drawing leather above described, an endless sheet of card
teeth or other toothed surface, which as the gills or hackles present the fibres
they have carried from the feed rollers shall further operate upon and hackle
such fibres. The fibres so hackled are allowed to accumulate upon the card
sheet and are removed from time to time in the form of a
workman.
lap by the
The Drawing shews a section of so much of the working parts of a machine
for preparing fibrous material before combing, as will together with the
following description enable a person acquainted with this class of machinery
to construct and work a machine according to this part of my Invention.
a, a, are feed rollers through which the unprepared fibrous material is fed ;
the rollers a, a, present the fibres to the gills or hackles b, b, which are caused
to travel in the direction of the arrows by screws, as in the machine commonly
known as the "screw gill"; the hackles b, b, are caused to travel at a greater

page_text: surface speed than the rollers a, a, and by that means comb out or hackle the
fibres presented by the rollers a, a, and carry those fibres forward to the endless
sheet of card teeth c, which is caused to. travel at a greater speed than the
hackles b, b, and consequently submits the fibres presented by the movement
of the hackles b, b, to a further hackling or splitting process. The endless
sheet c passes over a small roller c¹ close to the hackles b, b, so as to lay hold
of the fibres as soon as they are presented beyond the gills or backles b, b..
The sheet c also passes over the larger roller c² by the revolution of which the
sheet c is caused to travel. The fibres are allowed to accumulate on the endless
sheet c, which is caused to stop from time to time, and the fibres are then
removed in the form of a lap by the workman. d is a circular brush running
at a surface speed slightly less than that of the sheet c; the brush d assists.
in carrying the fibres forward from the hackles b, b, to the sheet c; e is another
circular brush which presses the fibres down among the pins of the pointed
surface c, and I would here remark that the endless sheet c, though shewn
and described as a card sheet, may be constructed of bars or hackles, connected
together by chains, or belts, or otherwise; and I would also remark that I have.
found it advantageous to cause the hackles b, b, to travel ten inches while the
feed rollers present one inch of fibrous material, and further to cause the
endless sheet c to travel one hundred inches while the hackles b, travel onc
inch; but these speeds may be greatly varied without departing from the.
nature of this part of my Invention, which consists in constructing and working
a machine for preparing fibrous material before combing, as shewn and
described.
When preparing, splitting, and hackling flax before combing, I find it
especially advantageous to employ an intersecting screw gill in the place of
the open gill b, b, shewn and described in the first part of my Invention. The
intersecting screw gill is shewn and described in the Specification of a Patent
granted to Thomas Greenwood and James Warburton on the Third day of
November, in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-one,
and is so constructed as to strike into the flax under operation, first, on one
side and then on the other, and by that means to more completely split and
open the fibres. When working and preparing flax by means of this form of
screw gill the endless card sheet c (shewn in the Drawing, and described in
the first part of my Invention) may be used in combination with it, or the rollers
and drawing leather in ordinary use described in the first
Invention
part of my
may be employed in the place of the endless card c, and when preparing,
hackling, and splitting flax before combing, according to this part of my
Invention, the ordinary preparing machine, such as is used for wool, may be.

page_text: employed, or the gills or hackles b, b, shewn in the Drawing may bo
removed, and the fibres be presented direct from the rollers a, a, to the endless
sheet c, c, without any intervening apparatus without departing from the nature
of this part of my Invention, which consists in preparing, splitting, and hackling
flax before combing, by means of pointed surfaces or hackles as above
described.
When preparing silk waste before combing, I employ a machine described
and shewn in a Patent granted to me on the Twenty-third day of March,
in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty (No. 761),
and which is described as being more particularly applicable to the opening
and preparing of cocoons for combing. In this machine the fibre is presented
to a rotating pointed drum by feed rollers or other feeding apparatus, and is
carried forward on the points of the drum to a series of pointed rotating working
rollers which catch and hold the fibres while they are further worked and
prepared by the pointed drum, the pointed working rollers being stripped of
the fibres which they carry from the surface of the drum by a series of rotating
brushes, the brushes being so arranged and worked as to carry the fibres back
again to the pointed drum, somewhat after the manner of a carding engine;
the fibres after being in this manner thoroughly worked and prepared are
pressed in among the points of the drum, which from time to time is caused to
stop, and the fibres are then broken off in the form of a lap by the workman.
Now I have found that silk waste, other than cocoons, may be advantageously
worked and prepared before combing in the above described machine, and this
part of my Invention consists in working and preparing before combing, silk
waste, other than cocoons on the machine described above.
In witness whereof, I, the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister, have hereunto set
my hand and seal, this Eleventh day of January, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-one.
Witness,
JOSEPH LANGRICK.
S. C. LISTER. (LS.)