IMPROVEMENTS IN LOOMS FOR WEAVING PILE FABRICS
Year: 1871

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Samuel Cunliffe Lister, of Manningham, in the
Parish of Bradford, in the County of York, Silk Spinner and
Manufacturer, and José Reixach y Gispert, of the same Place,
Clerk and Manager for the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister in his said
Business of Silk Spinning and Manufacturing, for the Invention of
D
Sealed the 4th July 1871, and dated the 27th April 1871.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister
and José Reixach y Gispert at the Office of the Commissioners of
Patents, with their Petition, on the 27th April 1871.
We, SAMUEL CUNLIFFE LISTER, of Manningham, in the Parish of
Bradford, in the County of York, Silk Spinner and Manufacturer, and
JOSÉ REIXACH Y GISPERT, of the same Place, Clerk and Manager for
the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister in his said Business of Silk Spinning
and Manufacturing, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN LOOMS FOR WEAVING PILE FABRICS," to be as follows:-
-
These improvements relate to looms for weaving two pieces of velvet
or other pile fabric face to face at one operation, the said pieces being

page_text: connected together by means of the pile threads, upon severing which
two separate and distinct pieces of pile fabric are produced.
The cutting knife or blade employed for severing the pile is mounted
upon a carriage working in a transverse slide, and is drawn backwards
and forwards by means of cords. When the knife comes to rest at one
side of the loom it enters between sharpening rollers, one above and
the other below it. The rollers are mounted so that they can rise and
fall; either the upper or lower roller is brought into contact with the
edge of the knife, and the knife is at the same time caused to travel
slowly across it, the roller always, giving the same pressure to the edge
of the knife; the other roller is then brought into contact with the
knife, and the knife is caused to travel slowly back, by which means
the edge of the knife is perfectly and evenly sharpened.
The rollers are made concave so as to give the knife a circular edge,
and they may be made of leather covered with a composition of shellac,
emery, rottenstone, and tallow, mixed so that they form a hard surface
on the roller; or, if desired, these rollers can be made of Turkey or
other hard sharpening stones, or they may be made of steel, or otherwise.
Another improvement consists in having two stones or other sharpen-
ing surface so arranged that the cutter comes between them in the same
manner as when the rollers are used. The moment the knife comes
into position either the upper or lower surface is brought in contact
with it as it moves to and fro; it is then acted on by the other surface
so as to sharpen both sides alike. The stone or other sharpening surface
has also a slow reciprocating motion in the opposite direction to the
knifc, to prevent it from wearing the stone in the same place.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister and José Reixach y Gispert,
in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 27th October 1871.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, SAMUEL 3
CUNLIFFE LISTER, of Manningham, in the Parish of Bradford, in the
County of York, Silk Spinner and Manufacturer, and JOSÉ REIXACH Y
GISPERT, of the same Place, Clerk and Manager for the said Samuel
Cunliffe Lister in his said Business of Silk Spinning and Manufacturing,
send greeting.
3

page_text: WHEREAS Her most. Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Twenty-seventh day of April, in the
year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-one, in the
thirty-fourth year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and
successors, give and grant unto us, the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister and
José Reixach y Gispert, Her special license, that we, the said Samuel
Cunliffe Lister and José Reixach y Gispert, our executors, administrators,
and assigns, or such others as we, the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister and
José Reixach y Gispert, our executors, administrators, and assigns, should
at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all
times thereafter 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 LOOMS FOR WEAVING PILE FABRICS,” upon
the condition (amongst others) that we, the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister
and José Reixach y Gispert, our exccutors or administrators, by an
instrument in writing under our or their hands and seals, or under the
hand and seal of one of us, or them, 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 we, the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister and José
Reixach y Gispert, 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 :—
These improvements relate to looms for weaving two pieces of velvet
or other pile fabric face to face at one operation, the said pieces being
connected together by means of the pile threads, upon severing which
two separate and distinct pieces of file fabric are produced.
The cutting knife or blade employed for severing the pile is mounted
upon a carriage working in a transverse slide, and is drawn backwards
and forwards by means of cords. When the knife comes to rest at one
side of the loom it enters between sharpening rollers, one above and the
other below it. The rollers are mounted so that they can rise and fall.
Either the upper or lower roller is brought into contact with the edge of
the knife, and the knife is at the same time caused to travel slowly

page_text: across it, the roller always giving the same pressure to the edge of the
knife. The other roller is then brought into contact with the knife and
the knife is caused to travel slowly back, by which means the edge of
the knife is perfectly and evenly sharpened.
The rollers are made concave so as to give the knife a circular edge,
and they may be made of leather covered with a composition of
shellac, emery, rottenstone, and tallow mixed, so that they form a
hard surface on the roller, or if desired these rollers can be made of
Turkey or other hard sharpening stones, or they may be made of steel, or
otherwise.
Another improvement consists in having two stones or other sharpen-
ing surface so arranged that the cutter comes between them in the same
manner as when the rollers are used. The moment the knife comes into
position cither the upper or lower surface is brought in contact with it
as it moves to and fro; it is then acted on by the other surface, so as to
sharpen both sides alike. The stone or other sharpening surface has
also a slow reciprocating motion in the opposite direction to the knife to
prevent it from wearing the stone in the same place.
In the Drawings hereunto annexed I have shewn the manner in
which I prefer to carry out my improvements.
Figure 1 shews a roller sharpening apparatus arranged as above
described, together with so much of the other parts of the loom as is
necessary to shew its manner of working. The view is taken from onc
side of the loom.
At Figures 2 arc shewn various views of the parts by which the
to-and-fro traversing movements above described are imparted to the
knife.
A is the crank or driving shaft of the loom, which by means of a
toothed wheel fixed on it drives the picking shaft B as is usual. The
said shaft B has upon it a pinion which drives the cam C. One arm of
the lever D carries a truck or roller which rests on the cam C and
receives motion from it. The other arm of the lever is jointed as shewn
to a vertical stem carrying a frame E, in which are mounted the
sharpening rollers F, F. This frame is capable of rising and falling in
suitable guides. The sharpening rollers are each caused to revolve by a
band driven from the pulley I, which receives motion from the
driving shaft A, as shewn. The knife G is moved to and fro as herein-

page_text: before described, and the cam C is so constructed that when the knife G
is travelling across the rollers F, F, the cam causes the rollers to rise
and fall, so as to give an equal pressure on the knife both when it is on
the hollow part and when it is on the higher part of the said rollers, the
rollers being made hollow, as before stated. A front view of the rollers
and of the frame that carries them is shewn at Figure 1*.
When the point a of the cam C is under the truck or roller of the.
lever D, the upper sharpening roller is in a position to act on the upper
edge of the knife, and the knife commences to travel across it, and
during this movement of the knife the roller descends still further, and
then again rises to give an equal pressure on the edge of the knife.
When the knife has arrived at the opposite end of the roller the point b
is at the place where a was, and as the cam C continues to revolve the
part between the points b and c raises the rollers so as to lift the upper
one away from the knife, and bring the lower one up to it, and then the
part from c to a repeats the rise and fall of the rollers, whilst the knife
is similarly caused to travel back to its original position. By this means
as the rollers F, F, are made hollow at the centre the edge of the knife
is kept to a somewhat similar circular form, and the whole of the cutting
edge is kept sharpened.
с
The manner in which the knife is caused to move to and fro is shewn
at Figures 2.
The picking shaft B by a pinion upon it drives the tappet K, which
tappet gives a sliding motion to the rack Q. The rack causes the
pinion L to revolve, the wheel M. being fixed on its shaft gives motion
to the pinion N, on the shaft of which are two wood pullies fixed one
at each of its ends; each pulley is connected by a band to the knife G,
and as they revolve they cause the knife to travel across the piece from
end to end of the guide rail O, at the end of which rail are the
sharpening rollers F, F, working on the velvet rail P; the tappet K is
so constructed that when the knife comes between the rollers F, F, to be
sharpened the said knife stops at one end of the rollers and then travels
slowly across as the bottom roller sharpens the under part of the knife;
the knife then stops at the opposite end of the rollers F, F, to give time
for the top roller to come in contact with the upper edge of the knife;
the said knife then travels slowly across as the top roller sharpens its
upper side, and by this means the knife is kept equally sharpened all
around the edge. Where the tappet K gives the to-and-fro travelling

page_text: motion to the knife G whilst it is being sharpened is firstly from e toƒ;
the next portion from f to being concentric with the axis the knife
remains at rest whilst it is at the opposite end of the rollers, and the
next portion from g to h causes the knife to travel back from where it
started. The other portions of the cam cause the knife to traverse to
and fro across the loom and to sever the pile. The tappet K is a double
tappet worked by two pullies, as shewn, the pulley m working on the
edge of the tappet K gives the forward motion to the rack Q, and the
pulley n working on the tappet W gives the backward motion to the
said rack Q.
An arrangement for sharpening the knife G by stones in place of by
revolving rollers is shewn at Figures 3. In these Figures the tappet C
gives motion to the lever D and through it to the frame Z carrying the
sharpening stones T, T; the stones are curved to the arc of a circle and
are mounted on axes as shewn. On these axes arc arms carrying
pins x, x, which enter slots S, S, in a slide V, so that a rocking motion
may be given to those axes by raising and lowering the slide. On the
axis of the tappet C is another tappet Y which gives motion to the
lever R, and this lever gives motion to the slide V as herein-after
explained. The knife is caused to travel to and fro across the stones T
in the same way as it was caused to travel across the sharpening rollers
in the arrangement first described. The stones T also like these rollers
are hollowed out at the centre, and are similarly caused to rise and fall
by the tappet C as the knife passes across them, so as always to give
an even pressure on the knife. As the knife commences to travel across
the bottom stone T the said stone is caused by the tappet Y to rock
slowly on its axis. This motion prevents the knife from rendering the
surface of the stone uneven. The top and bottom stones rock in
opposite directions, and thus when the bottom stone is brought up to
the knife it is in a position to be rocked back again whilst the knife
is moved along it.
We would remark that in the arrangements above described in place
of the knife being moved to and fro along the sharpening surfaces or
rollers whilst being sharpened such surfaces or rollers might at this time
be caused to move endwise in place of the knife, but not we believe so ;
advantageously.
Having thus described the nature of our Invention and the manner in

page_text: stood that what we claim as our improvements in looms for weaving
pile fabrics is, the sharpening the knife employed for severing the pile
of the woven double pile fabric by causing the knife to travel along the
surfaces of hollow rollers, stones, or sharpening surfaces, or causing
the rollers, stones, or sharpening surfaces to travel past the knife whilst
the knife or the rollers, stones, or sharpening surfaces are simultaneously
caused to rise and fall as herein described.
We also claim the sharpening the knife by causing it to travel along
stones or sharpening surfaces or the stones or sharpening surfaces to
travel past the knife whilst the stones or sharpening surfaces have also
a slow reciprocating movement at right angles to such line of travel to
prevent their being worn at one place only as herein described.
In witness whereof, wc, the said Samuel Cunliffe Lister and José
Reixach y Gispert, have hereunto set our hands and seals, this
Twenty-fourth day of October, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and seventy-one.
S. C. LISTER. (L.s.)
J. REIXACH.
(L.S.)