IMPROVEMENTS IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF SEWING MACHINES
Year: 1860

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Alfred Vincent Newton at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 8th
November 1860.-A communication from abroad by William Cleve-
land Hicks, of Boston, in the United States of America.
I, ALFRED VINCENT NEWTON, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery Lane,
in the County of Middlesex, Mechanical Draughtsman, do hereby the nature
of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF SEWING
MACHINES," to be as follows:-
This Invention relates to certain improvements in the details of sewing
machines, whereby their action will be materially improved. To this end it is
proposed to introduce improved tension apparatus, whereby a large amount of
slack thread may be thrown off to form the slack loop through which the.
shuttle passes, thus allowing, among other advantages, of large-sized shuttles
being conveniently used. The vertical needle thread, as it passes from the
usual thread retainer to the needle, is led through an eye in a crank arm that
is secured by a clamping screw to a short axle that lies a little in the rear of
the vertical needle bar, and has its bearings in the bracket arm which carries
the needle and presser bars. On this axle is mounted a pinion, which gears
into a rack on the needle bar. As, therefore, this bar rises and falls the crank
arm will receive an axial motion. By this movement of the crank arm slack
thread will be delivered to the needle at the proper moment, and it will also be

page_text: taken up again before the needle bar has reached its highest position, or in
time to allow the needle to tighten the stitch last made; or in lieu of thus
controlling the slack the thread may be led through an inclined slot cut in a
bracket piece attached to the vertical needle bar before it passes down the eye
of the needle. If now this slotted bracket piece be made to work in a guide
(formed with an inclined face) on the needle bar guide box, the slot will, on
the rise of the needle bar, lift the thread, and bring it over a shoulder on the
upper end of the guide of the slotted bracket. On the descent of the needle
bar the thread to form the slack will still remain on this shoulder, but when
the needle has entered the cloth to be sewn, the thread by the wedge-like
action of the slot will be pushed off its bearing point, and the slack will thus
instantly be made ready for forming the slack loop below the cloth. The rise
of the needle front out of the work and the take up of the slack will, in this
modification, also be simultaneous.
Another part of the Invention relates to the feed wheel, the chief object
being to raise and lower it with facility to suit various thicknesses of work. To
this end, the wheel is mounted in its bearing so as to allow of its receiving a
vertical movement, and upon its axle is mounted an arm with a pin hole bored]
in it. Through the bearing a hole is made opposite the pin hole of the arm
to form the socket for the fulcrum of a hand lever. From this fulcrum pro-
jects an excentric pin which, when the lever is in place, enters the pin hole in
the arm.
The simple depression or elevation of this lever will therefore raise
or lower the feed wheel in its bearing to. any desired extent within the limits
of the excentric. For rotating the wheel, a clamping driver is used; this
consists of a loose segment piece pierced with a square hole, and fitting into a
ring groove in the face of the wheel. Projecting into the square is a flat-sided
pin, carried by a lever, which is jointed loosely to a slotted lever that rocks on
the axle of the feed wheel as its fulcrum. This slotted lever is secured by an
adjustable clamping nut to a second slotted lever, which rocks on a fulcrum
pin, carried by a bracket on the under side of the table of the machine, and
which is fitted at its forward end with a pin for taking into the groove of a
face cam keyed to the driving shaft. The rotation therefore of this cam will
rock the levers, and at each repetition of this motion the segment piece, which
is caused to bite against the sides of the ring groove in which it lies by the
pressure of a spring, will move forward and drive round the wheel a portion of
a revolution. To maintain the wheel in position during the return motion of
this driver a second segment piece is provided, the same being carried by a
fixed arm, and made to bite the wheel by the pressure of a spring. As an

page_text: improvement on the presser it is proposed to secure the foot to the extremity
of the presser bar by a hinge joint.
as usual to present no obstruction to
is fitted with an antifriction roller.
structed specially for sewing such work as the legs of Wellington boots for
example, and known as cylinder machines (from the form of the bracket arm,
which carries the presser and vertical needles), it is proposed to use two
pressers, which are to be placed side by side, and operated alternately in con-
junction with a reciprocating feeder, which has no rising or falling motion.
By this means the mechanism for operating the feeder will be rendered very
simple without detriment to the feed motion.
The toe of the presser is either turned up
the forward movement of the work, or it
In that class of machines, which is con-