IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR SHAPING PLASTIC MATERIALS
Year: 1870

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Fullarton Murray and
Thomas Duncan McFarlane at the Office of the Commissioners of
Patents, with their Petition; on the 15th October 1870.
We, WILLIAM FULLARTON MURRAY, Potter, and THOMAS DUNCAN
MCFARLANE, Machinist, both of Glasgow, in the County of Lanark,
North Britain, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for
"IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR SHAPING PLASTIC MATERIALS," to be as
follows, that is to say :-
This Invention has principally for its object the adaptation of apparatus
for shaping plastic materials into certain comparatively difficult forms, so
as to dispense to a certain extent with the skilled labor hitherto required,
and so as to produce the articles desired in a rapid and economical
manner.
Earthenware bottles are of the class of articles for which the improved
apparatus is more particularly designed, and it may be modified to suit
various similar forms in which the mouth or opening is more or less
contracted as compared with the interior of the article. Some of the

page_text: and other forms.
The improved apparatus as adapted for shaping bottles comprises a
mould of an internal configuration corresponding to the external shape
of the bottom and lower cylindrical portion of the bottle. This mould
may consist of one piece when it is intended that the bottle shall be
liberated by its own contraction in drying, or it may be made in two or
more parts arranged to be easily separated for the removal of each bottle
as soon as formed, and it is mounted on a potter's wheel or equivalent
apparatus by which it is made to rotate about a vertical axis. A lump
of the clay or plastic material out of which the bottle is to be formed is
put into the mould, and an internal rib or scraper which does not rotate,
but which is carried on a slide working in vertical guides, is moved
down into the mould. On reaching the proper depth this rib is moved
angularly on a pin connecting it to the slide, so that its bottom end
moves outwards from the centre. The slide and rib are then raised a
distance corresponding to the cylindrical body of the bottle, after which
the rib is gradually turned inwards again, the rising motion being con-
tinued, and is finally withdrawn. The angular movement of the rib is
effected by the action of a stationary pin in a suitably shaped groove
formed in the upper part of the arm or lever, the lower end of which
constitutes the rib or scraper, the vertical movement of the slide causing
different parts of the groove to bear in succession on the pin. The slide
may be moved by hand by means of a lever or by means of a cam.
Whilst the internal rib is shaping the sides of the bottle, and causing
the clay to spread up the sides of the mould, one, two, or more external
scrapers are made to advance inwards just at the top of the mould to
cause the rising clay to assume the proper external form for the lower
part of the neck. After the withdrawal of the slide and rib, or internal
shaper herein-before referred to, a finishing internal neck shaper comes
into action, this shaper being a suitably bent metal rod or wire rendered
somewhat elastic in any convenient way, and fixed on a spindle in
such a way that it can be withdrawn from the bottle by turning the
spindle. This shaper works in concert with external scrapers, either
those already mentioned or a finishing set substituted for them. In some
cases the mould may be wholly or partially dispensed with, the sides
being shaped by means of internal and external ribs, scrapers, or knobs

page_text: acting together and suitably shaped and guided for producing the desired
effect.
One machine or framing may be fitted with two or more sets of the
parts for the purpose of forming two or more articles simultaneously,
5 and the several sets of parts may be actuated by a single set of cams or
equivalent parts.