IMPROVEMENTS IN WEAVING
Year: 1853

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Crofts at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on
the 4th October 1853.
(Void by reason of notice to proceed not having been given within the
time prescribed by the Act.)
I, WILLIAM CROFTS, of Derby Terrace, Nottingham Park, Manu-
facturer, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for
"IMPROVEMENTS IN WEAVING" to be as follows;-
The Invention relates to improvements on modes of arranging
& combining machinery described in the Specification of a Patent
granted to me the 1st of April 1853, in which it was proposed to
employ two guide bars, with their rows of guides, as a means of
causing the warp threads to recede from, approach to, and go past
each other, in order to open angular sheds for the passage of shuttles
or thread carriers.
Points, or sleys, or reeds, being used for the beat up; and the
present improvements consist of moving the rows of warp threads from,
towards, and past each other, for the opening and changing of sheds.
by using only one row of guides or like moving instruments, or guide
bars, on one side only, (which guides may be independent of each other,)
to guide one row of warp threads, the other row of warp threads
simply passing over a bar or other plain surface, which, with the heam
from which such set of warp threads passes, has a to and fro movement

page_text: given to it, to assist in the opening & changing of sheds. Also to
using one row or set of guides or other moving instruments for one
row of warp threads, (which guides or other moving instruments may
be independent of each other,) & a sley or reed or other row of
guides for the other set of threads, the guides or other moving instru-
ments being caused to carry their threads so as to open a shed on
each side of the threads ja sed through such sley or reed or other
guiding means, & the shuttle race being arranged to conduct the
shuttle or other weft thread carried into either shed, as desired. The
sley or reed I prefer to form the shuttle race, and it may have an end-
way movement when desired.
The Invention also consists, when using several guide bars carrying
different rows of threads, as explained in my application for Patent
protection, bearing date of yesterday, in employing strands or threads of
india-rubber, which strands of india-rubber I prefer to be placed in
some of the central rows of threads, by which they will be better
covered by the other threads, & an elastic fabric will be obtained. And
when causing the sheds to be opened for the passage of the shuttle at
an angle to the front & back of the machine, & the shuttle or other
weft thread carrier passes therethrough at such angle as explained in
my application of yesterday.
My Invention consists (when making narrow fabrics) of applying
combs or bolts to receive the shuttles or other thread carriers placed
at a like angle, & affixed to bars by which they may have an end-way
shogging motion given to them, as in lace machinery.
The guides or reed, in either arrangements or combination, may act
as a shuttle race, as in the before referred to Specification (of Patent
dated Ap. 1, 1853); also, the beat-up may be effected by the reed
or by points, and the threads may have a shogging motion end-ways of
the machine given to them to lay the rows of threads or some of them
across others for cross weaving.