IMPROVEMENTS IN APPA- RATUS OR MACHINERY FOR DAMPING AND STEAMING FABRICS, PART OF WHICH IMPROVEMENTS ARE APPLICABLE FOR DISTRIBUTING FLUIDS FOR OTHER PURPOSES
Year: 1862

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Peel Gaulton and Major
Booth at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with their Petition,
on the 8th May 1862.
We, WILLIAM PEEL GAULTON, Engineer, and MAJOR BOOTH, Calenderer
and Finisher, both of the City of Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPA-
RATUS OR MACHINERY FOR DAMPING AND STEAMING FABRICS, PART OF WHICH
IMPROVEMENTS ARE APPLICABLE FOR DISTRIBUTING FLUIDS FOR OTHER PURPOSES,"
to e as follows:-
Hitherto in damping fabrics previously to finishing them a cylindrical brush
has been used which rotates in a trough containing water which is taken up
by the bristles of the brush and thrown upon the passing fabric by centrifugal
force; we find that the brush requires much power, and to be frequently
renewed at considerable expense, besides having other disadvantages which
our improvements obviate. Our improvements consists in the use in place of a
rotating brush of a series of jets each of which is formed like the flat flame gas
burner, that is, by drilling two small holes in the end of a short tube (or in any
vessel containing fluid) at such angle that the escaping jets of fluid will strike
against each other and spread in a finely divided stream of pyramidal form.
These jets are fixed or formed in or communicate with a pipe placed at right
angles to the direction in which the fabric passes and the water or fluid is
supplied to the pipe from a cistern fixed at a sufficient height and giving a
constant pressure, which cistern may be filled by a pump or by any other

page_text: convenient means. We employ moveable boards or obstructions so as to cut
off all or any portion of the stream of water or fluid delivered by the jets, so
that the quantity of water or fluid thrown upon the fabrics may be properly
regulated. In place of jets above described on the principle of the flat flame gas
burner we employ a roller or cylinder having a series of grooves cut in its surface
at right angles to its axis, such grooves covering about one-fourth of the
circumference of the roller or cylinder at diametrically opposite sides, and each
groove commencing at the surface of the roller or cylinder and gradually
sinking below it, say to a depth of one-sixteenth of an inch. This roller or
cylinder is mounted upon its axis in a trough supplied with water or other
fluid at a pressure. Two plates or doctors pass from end to end and close against
each side of the roller or cylinder which prevent the water or other fluid from
escaping past the sides as long as the plain or ungrooved parts of the roller or
cylinder are opposite the plates or doctors, but when the roller or cylinder is
turned so that the grooves come opposite the edges of the plates or doctors
then water or other fluid will pass through the grooves, varying in quantity
accordingly as the edges of the plates or doctors are opposite the shallow or deep
part of the grooves, and thus by turning the roller or cylinder the quantity of
water or other fluid discharged can be regulated or shut off as required.
Steam for steaming fabrics may be used with the apparatus described, as well
as water or other fluid, and the said apparatus, particularly the jets, which will
distribute fluids finely divided or in the form of spray, may be applied to
various other purposes.