A MACHINE FOR CUTTING STRAW FOR FODDER FOR CATTLE
Year: 1800

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
SAWDON, of the City of Lincoln, Wire Worker and Corn Machine Maker,
send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third, by His
Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Twenty-third day of
July, in the forty-second year of His reign, did give and grant unto me,
the said Thomas Sawdon, His especial licence that I, the said Thomas
Sawdon, 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 "A MACHINE FOR CUTTING STRAW
FOR FODDER FOR CATTLE;" in which said Letters Patent there is contained
a proviso obliging me, the said Thomas Sawdon, 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 used, to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of
Chancery within one calendar month after the date of the said recited Letters
Patent, as in and by the same Letters Patent (relation being thereto had)
may more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Thomas Sawdon, do hereby declare that my said Invention is described in
the Plans or Drawings contained in the margin hereof, and the following
explanation. thereof, that is to say :-
Front view. The letters A, A, A, represent a wheel of four feet diameter,
by which the machine is turned; a, the handle of the wheel; B, B, B, the
knives, of which either two or three are fixed upon an iron side axle, and cut
against a plate of polished steel; b, b, two sides of the plate of polished steel

page_text: against which the knives cut; there is a similar one joins them at the bottom,
which is omitted in the Drawing to shew the iron roller c; C, a roller of wood
inlaid with ribs of iron, to draw the bay or straw from the box to the knives,
and which acts against another fluted roller c, of cast iron, on the under side;
D, the mouth of the spout, down which the hay or straw runs after it is cut.
Left-hand side view.-E, the side axle; F, the pinion which works the face
wheel G, from which a small axle goes to the opposite side of the machine,
and on which there is a small pinion that works the three wheels T, U, W,
described in the right-side view; H, an open left for the axle of the wheel W
(which turns the roller C) to rise or fall according to the quantity of hay or
straw in the box; I, an open iron fixed to the end of the axle of the top
roller C, which is connected with a similar one on the opposite side by the
cross piece K; L, the hook joining the cross piece with the lever M. The
lever is three feet in length, and at the end of it a half hundred weight N is
suspended to press the top roller upon the hay or straw upon bottom roller,
so that it may be cut clean and in equal lengths; O, the axle on which the
wheel A is fixed; P, P, the spout or conductor for the hay or straw from the
knives when cut; Q, the box or trough in which the straw is laid.
Right-hand side view.-R, R, R, R, R, the frame of the machine; S, the
pinion on the axle of the face wheel G, which pinion turns the wheels T and
U; the wheel T turns the bottom roller c, and the wheel U turns the wheel W,
which turns the top roller C; X, the hook by which the lever is fastened
to the frame.
In witness whereof, I have hereto set my hand and seal, this Seven-
teenth day of August, in the year of our Lord One thousand eight
hundred and two