CERTAIN NEW MACHINERY ADAPTED TO PREPARING AND SPINNING WOOL, COTTON, AND OTHER FIBROUS SUBSTANCES, AND UNITING SEVERAL THREADS, INTO ONE, AND ALSO CERTAIN COMBINATIONS OF THE SAID NEW MACHINERY WITH OTHER MACHINES, OR WITH VARIOUS PARTS ONLY OF OTHER MACHINES, ALREADY KNOWN AND IN USE
Year: 1820

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JAMES
WHITE, of Manchester, in the County Palatine of Lancaster, Civil Engineer,
send greeting..
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Fourth did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of that part of the United Kingdom of
Great Britain and Ireland called England, bearing date at Westminster, the
Eleventh day of July, in the first year of His reign, give and grant unto me, the
said James White, my 'exors, adñiors, and assigns, His especial licence, full
power, sole privilege and authority, that I, the said James White, my exors,
adiiors, and assigns, 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 NEW MACHINERY
ADAPTED TO PREPARING AND SPINNING WOOL, COTTON, AND OTHER FIBROUS SUBSTANCES,
AND UNITING SEVERAL THREADS, INTO ONE, AND ALSO CERTAIN COMBINATIONS OF THE
SAID NEW MACHINERY WITH OTHER MACHINES, OR WITH VARIOUS PARTS ONLY OF
OTHER MACHINES, ALREADY KNOWN AND IN USE;" in which said Letters Patent
there is contained a proviso that if I, the said James White, shall not particularly
describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, by an instrument in writing under my
hand and seal, and. cause the same to be inrolled in His Majesty's High
Court of Chancery within six calendar months next, and immediately after
the date of the said Letters Patent, that then the said Letters Patent,

page_text: and all liberties and advantages whatsoever thereby granted, shall utterly
cease, determine, and become void, as in and by the same, relation being
thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
James White, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention, and
the manner in which the same is to be performed, are particularly described
and ascertained in and by the Drawings hereunto annexed, and the following
description thereof (that is to say):
--
The chief process employed in the preparation of cotton and other short
filaments for the subsequent operations of carding and spinning is that of
batting or scutching them, so as to seperate in the first degree the fibres
from each other, and divest them in some measure of the foreign substances
with which they are mixed in the bale. The operation of batting (performed
mostly by hand, though sometimes by machinery) is known to be more
favorable to the fibre than the process of scutching, but the latter has greatly
the advantage in respect of quantity. To combine then, better than I
conceive has been yet done, the advantages of both systems, is the object of
the first machine I shall describe as a part of the present Patent. It consists
(Figure 1 and 2) of a shaft A, B, turning in a frame C, D, and connected
at B with a kind of faceplate a, b, of which it is the axis of rotation. This
shaft turns in the hollow centre of a fixed spur wheel d, e, with which geers
an intermediate f, g, running on a stud fixed to the faceplate for the purpose
of driving a third wheel h, i, when the whole system revolves round the
common centre B. This wheel h, i, is precisely equal in diameter and teeth
to one half of the central wheel d, e; and its axis, which runs in a tube k fixed
to the faceplate, carries in front an arm l, m, which reaches almost to the
centre B, when the wheel itself is at E (Figure 2) level with that centre. I say
this arm l, m, reaches almost to that centre, for this system. of wheels f, g,
and h, i, working in the wheel d, e, is repeated at the opposite end of the
faceplate a, b, so as to carry a second arm l', m', like that l, m, reaching like-
wise almost to the centre B when its wheel is in the line E, B, E. To
these arms are fixed one or more batting sticks x, y, z, of any convenient
length, which penetrate the enclosed space in B, m', and alternately strike
at mand m, as the system revolves round the fixed wheel d, e, the sticks
describing two curves from m through e to m, and from m through d to m,
so as to pass each other near the centre B, which the shortness alone of the
arms l, m, and , m', permits them to do, as otherwise they would describe
a straight line across the centre and stop each other at that point. To
complete the machine, there is an endless net or flexible grating of any.

page_text: proper kind, revolving on the rollers I, K, L, and passing slowly from L to I,
the space I, K, m, in which the sticks operate, being inclosed on three
sides by the gratings 1, 2, 3, 4, and also on the fourth side with the exception
of the slit through which the sticks x, y (Fig. 1), enter the said space. The
effect is this, the cotton being fed on the grating K, L, the motion of the
latter carries it slowly into the machine where the batting sticks, by a rapid
motion up and down, strike and divide it, after which it is brought out
under the roller 5 in that soft and partially cleansed state to which this
machine is calculated to reduce it.
I proceed, secondly, to describe my machinery for producing rovings from
the carded filament, and shall premise that my methods do not relate to the
process of the first carding, commonly called breaking. My first engine is
therefore fed from a cloth as usual, and the carded material wrapped several
times round a receiving cylinder, which thus forms the customary aliment of
the finishing engine; or if (as is often done) I should prefer feeding this latter
engine with ribbons, then the first engine would be made to produce the m.
I should remark, nevertheless, that as certain qualities of yarn may be spun
from a filament broken and carded at one passage, what is about to be said
of the second carding engine will in that case apply to the first. Supposing
now the second carding engine to be fed by either of the means above men-
tioned, here follows a method of dividing the filament on its doffing cylinder
into several parts or ribbons without the intervention of any additional
mechanism for that purpose. It consists (see Figure 10 (where A, B,
represents any proper doffing cylinder) of one or more narrow intervals a, b,
deprived of their card wires; or where these have been carefully bruised
down, extending all round the said cylinder, but not circularly, not in the same
plane, to express which, a turner would say "they do not run true." By
these means the places of their contact with the central or furnishing
cylinder of the engine changes continually on the surface of the latter; and
thus, although these intervals effectually divide the sheet of filament on the
doffing cylinder, the main or furnishing cylinder is completely stripped of
the filament it receives on its whole surface from the feeding rollers.
I next proceed to describe a machine intended to produce rovings, although
I consider it also as a spinning machine; and as such shall sometimes use it
under this Patent, as here represented (see Figures 4 and 5). It is destined
to work an immediate connection with a narrow carding engine, and therefore
has only one spindle, but the spindles would of course be more numerous in a
spinning or roving frame intended to work alone or with a wider carding engine.
In every case its most essential property is this (see Figures 4 and 5), that

page_text: propor-
the rollers a, c, e, g, i, l, and those b, d, f, h, k, by which the drawing is effected,
are placed not parallel to each other as they are in all other drawing systems,
but diagonally, or each successive pair at right angles, with those immediately
preceding them. By this disposition, instead of the fasces or bundle of
filament being continually thinned and widened at each successive passage,
those filaments that have been so treated in passing through any given pair of
rollers are immediately. collected and flattened in a new direction at right
angles to the former.. And such is the efficacy of this process, that ten, twelve,
or more pairs of rollers may be used in succession, with a proper draft. between
each, without any danger of dissipating the filaments, or in the least disturbing
their connection end wise. It will be observed that these drawing rollers are
placed perpendicularly over each other, but, that circumstance does not effect
the principle, and is chiefly introduced to save room. As here applied, what-
ever be their position, the ribbon passes directly from the delivering rollers R
of the carding engine to the entrance A of this machine, where, by the
progressive action of the two sets of bevel wheels B, C, and D, E, on the
pinions of the rollers a, b, c, d, e, f, &c., the latter extend the ribbon to any
proper degree, either equally at such passage or in any other desired
tion. The velocities I prefer for the rollers are the arithmetical and geome-
trical progressions. Those in the Figure follow the arithmetical ratio, for if
the first roller a make one revolution, the second 6 makes two, and the ribbon
is doubled in length between them. In like manner the third roller c makes
three turns, and the ribbon is there extended in the proportion of three to
two. So likewise the third passage gives the ratio of four to three; the
fourth, five to four, and &c.; whereas in the geometrical progression, the
draft remains the same between all the pairs of rollers, so that if the first pair
makes one revolution, and the second 1½ (which is expressed by the ratio 3: 2)
then the third pair will make × = revolutions, and the fourth pair
***= revolutions, &c. But though these proportions answer very
well, many intermediate progressions may be used without changing the
principle, and also without varying considerably the effect. The diagonal
pressure in the drawing rollers is what I most insist on, and is, in fact,
the basis of this part of these Inventions. It should here be observed, that
in Figures 4 and 5 the top rollers are not drawn, to keep the Figures more
'distinct, but their position is shewn at r, Figure 6, together with the spring S,
by which their pressure is effected.
Adverting now to the other parts of this machine, P, Figure 4, shews the
pulley, with its strap S, by which it receives motion from the main shaft of the
'carding engine. On the axis of P is fixed a bevel wheel V, giving motion to

page_text: that W, and through its axis X to the spur wheel Y, which turns F the
spindle; where note, that this must be done by geering, as the system requires
a certain quantity of twist for a given length of roving, which any sort of
geering would give as far as the number of turns goes. But I adopt this
"screw-formed geering," because it has alone the property of acting without
commotion or sensible friction, and is thus of indefinite duration. Here, then,
it is incumbent on me to state, that this geering is included in the Patent of
importation granted the Eighth of April, One thousand eight hundred and
seven, to Mr. S. Williams, of London, who, by an authentic document dated
November Twenty-third, One thousand eight hundred and fifteen, has declared
me the Inventor of the machines by him specified and proprietor of his
Patent. And although I am aware that the general subjects of that Patent
will become public property at its expiration, yet, having combined this portion
of them with some new and important operations in roving and spinning,
and with parts of known spinning machines not thus united before, I feel
myself entitled, both in law and equity, to the exclusive use of these new com-
binations. Proceeding, then, with the description, it appears in Figure 5 that
my winding or copping system is not of that ingenious and complex kind used
in what is called the bobbin and fly frame, for copping softly and slowly
a roving not twisted enough to bear a rougher process. My object, on the
contrary, is to twist and cop with great velocities; and I avoid the danger
of breakage by overtwisting the roving, which I wind on the bottom by means
of a drag, sometimes quite similar to those of a common throstle. As, however,
(for reasons that will be seen hereafter), I have here chosen to wind on the
conical surface (m, n), some modification of that drag becomes necessary.
In Figure 5, H is a curve, the ordinates of which, supposed to proceed from
the center) are of such a length, compared with its rotatory motion, as to raise.
the bobbin m, n, o, with velocities inversely proportionate to the diameter of
that part of the cone m, n, on which the winding is taking place, and thus to
lay the unequal spires of roving at equal distances from each other. This
curve H acts (by a roller) on the lever I, which by means of the pullies p, q,
and the cord r, s, gives motion to a second lever K, connected with a carriage
L, which slides up and down in the groove M, N. This lever K produces
two effects. The one is (through the catch t, which takes in the rack u, v),
to depress the carriage one notch of the rack every time the lever makes a
vibration. The second effect is, by means of the curve T, to raise and lower
the bobbin m, n, o, a distance equal to the height of the conical surface m, n;
and in order that this may take place proportionally to the motion of the
lever K, this curve T-is a cycloid, the horizontal part of which, acting behind

page_text: the spindle, supports the bobbin in every position, and forms the drag in
question. But further, to prevent the roving from being unequally strained,
this drag must act nearer to or further from the spindle, according as the
winding takes place on the small or large end of the cone m, n. To obtain
this a certain width is given to the cycloid, and a diagonal prominency left
on it (see the sketch y, z), which makes it support the bobbin nearer to the
spindle when the curve is low than when it is high, and this difference
equalizes the strain on the roving. But even this is not enough, for when
the bobbin is full it is heavier than when it is empty, and the drag must then
be weakened or the roving will be broken. To meet this circumstance the
slide m, n, in which the carriage L descends, is placed obliquely to the
spindle F, leaning backward at the top (see Z, Z, Figure 4), and thus when
the bobbin is low and full, the friction of the drag takes place close to the
spindle, whereas at the top it acts at a certain distance from it, determined by
this obliquily of the slide, which of course is made to coincide in effect with
the gradual filling of the bobbin. It is, however, an important feature of this
Invention, that the roving becomes so strong by the overtwist, that no exquisite
machinery is necessary in order to avoid all the danger, not to say the possi-
bility, of a rupture). N.B.-To correct the anomaly that might attend this
winding operation, from a want of truth in the bobbin m, n, o, I sometimes
place it on a circular plate 1, 2, nicely turned, and connected with a cannon 3,
fitting exactly the spindle F, by which means the cycloid acts under this plate
to elevate the bobbin, which it supports with or without a washer between
them. These, then, are the principles, and this one of the forms, of my
roving machine, as connected with a single carding engine. But it is easy to
conceive that I do not confine myself to this arrangement; on the contrary, I
make these machines for larger engines, or separate roving machines with any
proper number of heads and spindles, and in form either straight or circular.
In a word, by means of my untwisting kreel, hereunder described, and a cor-
responding change in the copping systems, I intend to make my spinning
machines roving machines, and vice versa, so as to spin on both coarse yarns,
on purpose to be respun either in the same or other machines, as may be
found most expedient.
The spinning machine, which is now to be described, I call an eagle, as
analogous to the term throstle, already applied to the principal machine
used for continued spinning. If this name should appear too ambitious, my
apology will be, that since my machine has properties superior to those of
the throstle, I could not give it a meaner name, and certainly the same term
would have served only to confound things that are really different. This

page_text: eagle is, then, a combination of my patent wheels above mentioned with the
drawing systems already known and in use, both in mules and throstles. But
the foundation I now mean to lay for my Patent right is, not the general appli-
cation of these wheels to my roving and spinning machinery, but only to the
motion of their spindles, by which application new and important effects are
introduced into the spinning process. To mention three of these:-There is, first,
an uniformity of twist and of quality, impossible to be obtained from band
movements; secondly, a large saving of power compared with that used to drive
a common throstle or water frame; and, thirdly, a swiftness of motion, at
which bands lose all claim to precision, and which common geering entirely
excludes." To proceed with the description of this eagle: A, D, E, F,
Figures 7 and 8, shew the frame composed of two columns A, D, and two
cross beams E, F, on the latter of which turns, and through the former
of which passes, the main shaft G, G, taking its motion from the wheels
or pullies H. There are besides two rings I, K, to support the spindles,
a roller beam L, L, to carry the rollers, and a kreel ring M, M, for the
rovings. At the bottom of the shaft is fixed the main wheel N, O, and
around it the spindle pinions P, P, P, the greatest part of which are
suppressed in the Drawing to prevent confusion. The spindles, of which
60 are a convenient number) are of the common size and form, and
have flies of the usual kind; above them, and on the beam L, are placed
the rollers or drawing systems R, R, exactly similar to those of good
throstles or mules, but changed in position from a straight line to a
polygon of four, six, or more sides, the form I have preferred being an
octagon. These boxes or heads R, R, receive their motion from each other
by the bevel wheels a, b, c, fixed to the front rollers, those on one half of
the machine being driven by a wheel on the shaft S, and the other by one
on the shaft T. Above the roller beam L is fixed the kreel ring M, on which,
by means of the proper pins or skewers d, e, the rovings are placed either
in cops or on bobbins, and thence (when soft rovings are used) carried over
the smooth conducting ring Q, Q, down to the drawing rollers R, R. But
here lies the most important point of this Invention, as connected with the
roving machine above described. The bobbins V, on this kreel, do not
simply give off the roving as the rollers R draw it, but while the overtwisted
roving is thus drawn from the ends e of the bobbin (by means of the roving
fly f, and the upper conducting ring of which g, g, is a section), the cops
themselves (see Figure 8) are turned backwards by their pinions i, i, i (as
driven by the wheels n, n, and by the geering chain of which k, i, i, n, n, i, i, m
is a portion). These cops, I say, are thus turned backwards just enough

page_text: to destroy the overtwist of the roving, and leave it as soft and extensible as
though it had not been overtwisted at all. There are two or three things
more to be mentioned here; the first is, that the roving fly f is made to
run very lightly in a smooth hole on the top of the pin d, e, on which the
cop or bobbin is placed; and, secondly, that a similar effect is produced
on the roving by crowning this pin with a piece of glass or polished metal
in the form of an oblate spheroid, round which the rovings circulate as
they leave the cop in much the same manner as they do when the fly fis
used; but I sometimes prefer to the use of either detaching the roving from
each bobbin (as formed by the roving machine above described), and putting
it upside down into a kind of skeleton (s, s, Fig. 7), to be also turned by
this untwisting machinery, so as to soften the roving, which will then be
drawn out of the hollow cone v with still less resistance than it suffers either
from the fly or the spheroid just mentioned. I remark then generally that
these four things, the diagonal drawing rollers, the overtwisting roving
machine, the untwisting kreel, and this new combination of my patent geering
for the spindles with the drawing systems of common spinning machines, so
as to form my eagles & roving machines, do constitute the principal basis
of my right to the present Patent.
And I further intend to claim the three first of these Inventions when
applied to roving and spinning machines in their present rectilinear form, as,
for example, the application of my untwisting kreel to common throstles,
and even to mules, which they evidently admit if the untwisting process
be suspended during the putting up, &c.
I likewise claim the right of overtwisting, by chains or other proper geering,
the rovings as now formed, drawn or stretched by roving machines of the
usual constructions, and of copping rovings thus made) either by drags or in
the present known methods, hereby rendering such machine scapable of greater
velocities and less liable to be out of order.
And still further to extend their usefulness, I claim the right of producing
by them or my own machines overtwisted rovings on purpose to be softened,
not on spinning machines with untwisting kreels, but on mills, the sole use
of which is to untwist and recop the roving, and whose form will be perfectly
understood by reference to a common twisting mill or thread mill, of which
it is the converse that is an untwisting mill; and, finally, I intend to use
my new drawing system to produce soft twisted rovings, copped in any of
the known methods to be used on my eagle or on common machines
without the untwisting kreel, as I may think proper. Much stress is laid
by spinners on having the means of stopping seperately each spindle of a

page_text: spinning machine, and the process is not without difficulty when geering is
used, especially when driven with considerable velocity. I therefore add
here one of my methods for producing this effect. In Figure 11 6 is a cylin-
drical box connected with the pinion P, and turning with it on the spindle
s; and c, d, is a cylindrical body exactly fitting the box 6, and surmounted
by a smaller part e, round which a ring r, r, is loosely placed to prevent
danger, for the body c, d, after being fitted, is cut into two parts exactly
alike, and a pin p is carried through them into the spindle, where it fits
tightly. When this spindle is at rest these bodies do not press horizontally
against the rim of the box, but, as soon as, by the friction on the bottom,
the spindle has acquired a certain motion, the centrifugal force of the bodies
c, d, becomes much greater than their weight, and they then attach the
spindle to the box with a force fully sufficient to overcome the drag of the
bobbin, and make the twist mathematically correct. The system of diagonal
pressure in the drawing rollers I consider as of prime importance wheresoever
applied, but the form given above is not the only one it admits; I shall
therefore add one of perhaps greater simplicity, without considering it as a
change of principle. A, B, C, Figure 9, are shafts placed horizontally on
proper stands, as common rollers generally are. They may have motions
'speeded as usual, but, for the present use, I prefer speeding them as above
stated. These shafts are furnished with conical bosses a, c, d, sloped to
45°, & fluted on their surface, the cones of the contiguous shafts being
sloped in opposite directions. The shafts A, B, C, and their cones, are
here seen from above, but D, E, is an elevation of the same objects in
which the two front bosses are chiefly seen. All these bosses or cones
have spheries conical top rollers, as 5, 6, running loose on the vertical pins
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, on which they turn horizontally, but, being cones of 45°
inclination, press fairly on the bosses a, c, d, first mentioned, and are carried
round by them. The pins 1, 2, 3, &c. are fixed to plates, such as f, g, to
keep the top rollers in their places and secure their proper action, whether
caused by their own weight or any pressure from above. If then a bundle
of filament enter this system at t (see the Plan), it will pass under the sloping
sides of the top rollers 2, 4, and 6, to u, as shewn by the dotted lines it, u,.
while in the elevation D, E, the line Z, Z, and the dotted line Z, Z, shew
that the filament will be pressed diagonally, or in opposite directions, at
every new passage, which is the real object of this mechanism, added, however,
to this that we have here a possibility of increasing to any degree the
number of shafts A, B, C, while avoiding the complication of machinery
which the same effect required in Figures 4 and 5. Another important
application of my eagle is to the process of making thread or sowing silk or

page_text: cotton, an application that is anticipated in the title of my Patent by the
words "and of uniting several threads into one." The usual operation
performed on a machine made like a throstle consists in bringing several
threads together from the kreel, and drawing them through water by means
of a proper set of rollers, which deliver them united to the spindle, where
they are corded and copped in the same manner as in the process of spinning.
But there is a known imperfection in sewing thread or cotton thus made,
arising from the rise of cords or bands in twisting. The bands slip, but
slip unequally, whence the twist is not the same when the bobbin is full
as when it is empty, and, therefore, the thread is not corded alike througout.
To use a rope maker's term, the twist of the strand does not always bear
the same relation to that of the rope, and the cabling is incomplete, but
in the use of my eagle things are not so. The spindles, having constantly
the same motion, give always the same twist, and thus the first and second
twists coincide perfectly, whether the bobbins be full or empty. I say therefore
that placing the water boxes on the roller beam as they are placed on common
thread machines, and taking two or more threads from the kreel through the
water, or over any substance wetted by it, and leading them thence between
proper rollers to the spindles, this eagle becomes a complete thread machine,
having a new and important property, that of uniting and cording fibrous
substances already spun with an ease, a swiftness, and a precision hitherto
unknown, and, by the use of bands, impossible.
In witness whereof, I, the said James White, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Third day of January, in the year of our Lord
1 icht hundred and teanty on