IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR TRAINING OR GROWING HOPS AND OTHER PLANTS, WHICH IMPROVEMENTS MAY ALSO BE APPLIED TO LINE POSTS AND OTHER POSTS OR SUPPORTS FOR VARIOUS PURPOSES
Year: 1867

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by John Grout and Edwin Mathews
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with their Petition, on
the 10th December 1867.
We, JOHN GROUT, of the City of Hereford, Ironmonger, and EDWIN
MATHEWS, also of the City of Hereford, Agent, do hereby declare the nature
of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR TRAINING OR
GROWING HOPS AND OTHER PLANTS, WHICH IMPROVEMENTS MAY ALSO BE APPLIED
TO LINE POSTS AND OTHER POSTS OR SUPPORTS FOR VARIOUS PURPOSES," to be as
follows:-
Our improvements have for their object principally the ready raising and
lowering of the horizontal wires or lines to which the vertical wires or lines
employed in training or growing hops and other plants are affixed, so that the
said horizontal wires or lines, and with them the said vertical wires or lines
may be readily raised and supported at the required height for the training or
growing of the hops or plants, and be readily lowered to such a level that the
hops or plants may be conveniently picked.
The said improvements, with the modifications herein-after described, may
also be applied to line and other posts or supports to which articles are
suspended, and which it may be convenient to be able to raise and lower.
Our improvements have for their object further the reduction of the number
of hop or other poles and cross pieces required in each row.
In applying our improvements to the training or growing of hops we fix to
the poles at the end of each row a nearly rectangular frame. The said frame

page_text: is situated in a vertical plane; its upper side being parallel with and bearing
against the cross piece at the top of the pole, and its lower side being fixed to
the pole at somewhat more than half its height. Near the top of each of the
vertical sides of the frames is a nearly semicircular bend, the said bends being
turned inwards, that is, the bends on the frame at one end of the row face or
are turned towards the bends in the frame at the other end of the row. The
horisontal wires to which the tops of the vertical wires are connected terminate
in rings, which rings embrace and slide upon the nearly vertical sides of the
frames, and when the rings on the horizontal wires are raised on the frames
and are brought to the semicircular bends the said rings full or snap into the
said bends and the wires become fixed, that is, are no longer capable of
sliding down the frames. We prefer to use a frame of the kind described
with the pole at each end of each row, the intermediate poles having the
ordinary cross pieces, into notches in which the wires can be dropped. In
order to lower the horizontal wires for the purpose of picking the hops the
said wires are lifted out of the notches in the cross pieces. of the intermediate
poles by means of a rod having a hook at its top. By means of the said
hooked rod the rings terminating the horizontal wires can be lifted out of the
semicircular bends in the frames of the end poles when the said rings slide
down the sides of the frames to the bottoms thereof, carrying with them the
vertical wires, and the hops are lowered within convenient reach for picking
The horisontal wires are raised and fixed in their places by means of the
booked rod described. In order to be able to tighten and slacken the
horizontal wires the frames may be fixed at their lower ends to the poles by
means of a joint, and their upper ends be thus capable of being drawn out or
separated horizontally. In this case a horizontal rack jointed to the frame
is passed through a slot in the top of the pole, the teeth of the salil rack
engaging with a tooth in the said slot. By means of the hooked roil described
the tops of the frames may be be drawn out, the rack preserving the tension of
the wires. By the same hooked rod the rack can be lifted and disengaged
from the tooth on the pole when it is wished to sincken the wires: Instead of
making the ring terminations of the horizontal wires slide on the frames
described the horisontal wires may be fixed to the ordinary cross pieces and
the said cross pieces be made capable of sliding up and down the frames:
In order to reduce the number of poles and cross pieces required in encl
row we adopt the following arrangement:-We omit in each row every
alternate pole, the poles in one row being opposite the places where the poles
are omitted in the next row. We stretch across the several rows transverse
horizontal wires secured at their ends to the outer horizontal wires' of the end

page_text: These transverse horizontal wires are also fixed to the poles of the
alternate rows. Where they cross the intermediate rows, and at the point
where ordinarily a pole is placed, we fix to the said transverse horizontal
wires hooked suspenders, by means of which the horizontal wires of the rows
are supported in nearly the same manner as by the ordinary cross pieces fixed
to the poles.
In applying our Invention to line and other posts or supports we prefer to
connect with the rings terminating the horizontal wires or lines light props
or supports, the lower ends of which when the rings and wires or lines are
raised rest on the bottoms of the wire frames and support the rings in their
raised positions. We also add wires or lines at about half way up the posts.
These terminate in rings which slide on a horizontal loop.
ment the lower lines of clothes can be pushed out of the way when one of the
upper lines is about to be lowered.
By this arrange-