THE METHOD OF MAKING A MACHINE FOR CUTTING OR SHEARING THE NAP OR WOOL PROM ALL KINDS OF BROAD AND NARROW CLOATHS
Year: 1811

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JAMES
MALLORY, of the State of New York, one of the United States, now residing.
in the City of London, Hatter, send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Seventh day of August,
in the fifty-first year of His reign, give and grant unto me, the said James
Mallory, my exors, adñors, and assigns, especial licence, full power, sole
privilege and authority, that I, the said James Mallory, my exors, adiñiors,
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, the Invention, communicated to me by a certain
foreigner residing abroad, of "THE METHOD OF MAKING A MACHINE FOR CUTTING
OR SHEARING THE NAP OR WOOL PROM ALL KINDS OF BROAD AND NARROW CLOATHS;"
in which said Letters Patent there is contained a proviso, obliging me, the
said James Mallory, by an instrument in writing under my hand and seal, to
cause a particular description of the nature of my said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, to be enrolled in His Majesty's High
Court of Chancery within two calendar months after the date of the said
recited Letters Patent, as in and by the same, relation being thereunto had,
may more fully and at large appear.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
James Mallory, do hereby declare that the method of making and using the
said machine is particularly described and ascertained as follows, that is to say,
the Drawings hereunto annexed do denote the said machine viewed in different
directions.
Fig. 1 is a section, which, to avoid confusion, exhibits only the principle
parts of the machine as viewed from one side. Fig. 2 represents the machine
and frame, and such other parts as could conveniently be shewn when viewed
in the same direction as Fig. 1. Fig. 3 in like manner represents such parts
of the said machine as could distinctly be shewn by a section or view, of the
nature of a ground plan. Figs. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 are explanatory Drawings,
which will herein-after be described. The same letters of the alphabet in each
of the said Drawings do denote the same things, and I would premise that
the component parts of the said machine are herein-after described as being
made of materials which by preference were chosen for that purpose, but the
substitution of others equally effective will be sufficiently obvious to any
competent mechanic without farther enumeration.
A, A, A, &c. denote an iron frame for the general support of the machinery;
B, a wooden beam or roller upon which the piece of cloth is rolled from which
the nap or wool is intended to be cut; C, C, C, &c., a piece of cloth placed
in the machine ready for shearing; D is a bar of iron over the upper edge of
which the cloth is to pass, and this edge is not only made perfectly straight,
with regard to its longitudinal direction, but also smoothed and rounded of a
little with regard to its transverse section, so as to allow the cloth to be drawn
freely over it; each end of the bar D is made to pass through the respective
sides of the frame, as represented in Fig. 2, and by means of the adjusting
screws a, a, may be raised or lowered until the upper edge of the bar with the
cloth upon it is brought to the position required; E and e are two wooden
rollers covered with woollen cloth glued upon their surfaces; the cloth is to
be shorn is drawn through the machine by the revolution of these rollers,
between whose woollen surfaces it is compressed, and this compression is
encreased or diminished, as may be required, by a screw at each end of the
roller e, one of which is seen at F in Fig. 2. G, G, H, H, denote a cast-iron
frame, upon which is affixed one of the steel blades I, used for cutting the nap
or wool from the cloth, the said frame with the steel blade upon it is capable
of being moved round its axis G, G, which is supported upon the points of
two screws d, d, as seen in the plan, Fig. 3, so that it may be turned up into
the position represented by the dotted lines h in the section Fig. 1. This
frame consists of two pieces G, G, and H, H, held to each other by the

page_text: binding screws b, b; there are two adjusting screws, one of which is seen
at J, Fig. 1. For regulating the distance of the edge of the steel blade
I form the edge of the bar D according to thickness of the cloth to be
shorn. When these adjusting screws are used the two binding screws b, b,
must be slackened, and after the adjustment is completed again tightned.
K, in Fig. 1, and is one of two screws, placed in a horizontal part of the
iron frame A, A, &c. These screws support that part of the iron frame II, II,
to which the steel blade I is affixed, and may be occasionally employed to raise
or lower it to a proper height. L, L, &c., as seen in Figure 1, 2, & 4, is a cast-
iron frame, supported at the top upon the points of two screws f, f, so that the
lower part of the frame is at liberty to swing backward and forward; M is the
other steel blade, used for cutting or shearing the nap or wool from the cloth,
terminating below in an edge or otherwise in a burnishing face, and is placed
in a clamp formed upon the bottom of the frame L, L, as is clearly represented
in the Drawings, Fig. 1 and 4. It is here, however, to be observed, that the
blade M must not be held tight in the clamp, but must be at liberty to move
freely up and down, whenever a proper degree of pressure is applied to it, in
either direction; the relative position of the two blades in the transverse section
will be obvious from the Drawing, Fig. 1, and their relative position in the
longitudinal direction of their edges will be understood by Fig. 7, where the
dotted lines represent the fixed blade I, I, and the black line the moveable
one M, crossing each other at a very accute angle, somewhat similar to a pair of
common shears. In order that the nap or wool may be effectually cut or
shorn, the edge of the upper blade is borne or pressed down against that of the
lower one by weights or springs, the latter of which have been used as the
most convenient, and are represented at g, g, &c. in Fig. 1 and 4. One of
these springs are shewn on a larger scale in Fig. 6, by reference to which
I shall more particularly describe the method of applying them. M is the
steel blade, as above described; L, the clamp for holding the blade;
i, i, i, Fig. 4, and i, in Fig. 6, are pins, which pass through the clamp and blade
to prevent the blade from dropping out. The holes in the blade, as at i, i,
Fig. 8, through which the said pins pass, are made sufficiently long to allow
the blade to move up and down. to the extent required. K is a small pin,
passing through the spiral or helical spring G, and also through a hole the
back of the clamp, so that its lower end rests upon the upper edge of the steel
blade M; the upper end of the said pin passesses through a hole in the bent
piece of iron m, m, which is affixed by screws to the side of the clamp at n.
Upon the middle part of the pin there is a screw nut O, which, by being
turned up or down, regulates the pressure of the spring upon the blade. But

page_text: in order to prevent the edge of the blade M from being pressed down below
that of the blade I, one end of the blade M slides up, an inclined plane P,
which is made of steel and fixed to the end of the frame H, the highest part
of the inclined plane being even with the edge of the blade I; it thereby raises
the blade M until its edge passes over that of I. It will be seen by Fig. 7
that the inclined plane must be fixed at that end of the blades where the
contact of their edges first takes place...
I shall next describe the machinery for putting the whole in motion; is
represented in Fig. 2 and 3. P is an iron rod, connecting the lower part
of the frame L, L, &c. with a crank at,Q; S, the spindle or axis of the
crank T, a pulley fixed, upon the spindle .S; U; a pulley or band wheel,
communicating motion by the strap V. to the pulley T and spindle S; the
pulley or band wheel U is turned by, a handle or winchi W, upon the end
of its axis or spindle X. Y is a fly upon the spindle X for regulating
thic motion of the wheel and pinion 9, 1. The spindle S,.with the endless
screw t and wheel v, are employed to give the roller E a slow motion, which
is communicated by friction to e. :
Also the method of using the machine is now to be described. In the
first place, the piece of cloth from which the nap or wool is intended to be
cut must be put upon the roller B then the frame I being raised, the end
of the cloth is laid over the bar D and introduced between the roller E
and e, after which the frame. I is again let down to its former position.
Care must be now taken that the upper edge of the bar D, with the cloth
upon it, may be so adjusted to the blade I, that the moveable blade M may
cut of the nap without injuring the cloth; the machine is then set to work,
and the clamp, with the upper blade M, acquires a quick, alternating, or
swinging motion, backward or forward; thus the cloth is shorn as it is
gradually drawn over the edge of the bar D, and after passing between
the roller E and e is deposited upon the floor. As the cloth should be drawn
tight and smooth over the edge of the bar D, a sufficient degree of friction, by
a brake or any other of the well-known methods, must be applied to the
roller B, in order to produce the requisite.tension, by preventing the roller from
turning with too slight a pull of the cloth. The cloth is also spread out or
extended laterally by being drawn over a 'grove, or notched piece of wood
or iron, as represented at w in Fig. 1 and 2, and more particularly shewn by
Fig. 9. The tension upon the cloth is also farther encreased by a thin blade
of iron fastened to the side of the bar D a little below its edge at 2, as
seen in Fig. 6.
It remains for me to state, that the method of making, the said machine is

page_text: sometimes varied, (that is to say,) instead of attaching the clamp with the
moveable blade M to a swinging frame, a rectilineal motion backward
and forward is given to them by making the ends of the clamp to slide in,
grooved or otherwise. The position of blades is also varied, as represented
in Fig. 5, when the clamp and blade M are made to move in a perpendicular
direction instead of a horizontal one, either by slides or on a frame; and some-
times a number of clamps and moveable blades are attached to a revolving
cylinder, and by this means pass in a continued succession over the fixed
blade I. These variations of the method will require a somewhat different
modification of the other parts of the machine, which, however, is so obvious,
from the description already given, as to require no further detail.
In witness whereof, I, the said James Mallory, have hereunto set my hand
and scal, this Seventh day of October, One thousand eight hundred