Treating Flax and other Fibrous Materials.
Year: 1887

page_text: Date of Application, 19th Sept., 1887
Complete Left, 19th June, 1888
Complete Accepted, 20th July, 1888
Treating Flax and other Fibrous Materials.
We, JOHN M'GRATH of Laragh, County Monaghan, Ireland, Engineer, and EDWARD
MANISTY of Dundalk, County Louth, Civil Engineer do hereby declare the nature of
this invention to be as follows:-
Our invention relates to apparatus arranged to act continuously for scutching,
hackling or similarly treating flax and other fibrous materials.
For this purpose, we arrange continuously travelling chains or cords in such a
manner that the fibres continuously fed across and between two pairs of these are by
relative lateral movements of the chains or cords bent into loops and overlapped so
that nearly half of the length of fibre is firmly grasped while somewhat more than half
the length is left hanging free.
In this condition, the continuous row of fibres is led along a guide inclined down-
wards towards the middle of the machine and again upwards, above a pair of revolving
scutching drums. The fibres hanging from the inclined guide pass between these
drums, becoming scutched by them throughout the length that is free from the ends
upwards until they reach the lowest part of the inclined guide; and then, as they
ascend the opposite incline, they are again acted on throughout their length by the
revolving scutches; so as to be cleared from the woody fragments resulting from the
first scutching.
When the fibres reach the top of the incline, the chains or cords by reverse lateral
movements release them so that they can be removed and can be fed again to the
machine in such a position that the parts already scutched are grasped while the
parts that were formerly grasped are left hanging free to be scutched in their turn.
The scutching drums are preferably made taper with their larger ends at the feeding
end of the machine so that the scutches which first act on the fibres move with
greater rapidity than those which act last and which serve chiefly to brush or clear off
the woody fragments. The revolving drums may carry beaters or tools suitable for
backling or similar operations on the fibrous material.
D
11
100
1007
ABEL & IMRAY,
Agents for the Applicants.

page_text: Improvements in Apparatus for Scutching, Hackling, or similarly
Treating Flax and other Fibrous Materials.
We, JOHN M'GRATH of Laragh County Monaghan, Ireland Engineer, and EDWARD
MANISTY of Dundalk County Louth, Civil Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of
this invention and in what manner the same is to be performed to be particularly
described and ascertained in and by the following statement:-
Our invention relates to apparatus for scutching, hackling or similarly treating
flax and other fibrous materials in a continuous manner, and embraces means of auto-
matically taking hold of the material by travelling chains or cords as it is fed
continuously and thus firmly grasping nearly half the length of the stems while the
other half or more hangs freely downwards-causing the material thus grasped to
travel along an inclined guide while the free parts are acted on throughout their
length by revolving scutches-and finally releasing the parts that were grasped so
that they in their turn can be scutched while the parts already scutched are similarly
grasped and moved.
The accompanying drawings represent so much of a scutching or hackling machine
as is necessary to explain our invention.
Fig. 1 is a side view, Fig. 3 is an end view and Fig. 2 is a plan of the machine.
The other figures drawn to an enlarged scale are, Fig. 4 a part side view and
Fig. 5 a part plan shewing the arrangement of the chains at the entering end of the
nclined guide.
Fig. 6 is a part transverse section at Z of Fig. 5.
Fig. 7 is a part transverse section at Z; Fig. 8 is a part transverse section at Z²,
and Fig. 9 is a part transverse section at Z³.
In bearings in a suitable framing are journalled the shafts of two scutching drums H
which are driven at considerable speed in opposite directions as indicated by the
arrows. These drums may be cylindrical or of equal diameter throughout their
length, but we prefer to make them taper as shewn, so that at the entering or right
hand end, where the scutches act first on the fibrous material breaking the woody
substance of the stems, they have greater speed than they have at the leaving end,
where they act chiefly for brushing or clearing off the woody fragments. In the upper
part of the framing are mounted two pairs of chain wheels, one pair A below and a
little to the one side of the other pair B. These are driven in opposite directions as
indicated by the arrows a b, at a relatively slow speed, that is to say, for flax, for
example, the scutch drums HI should revolve from 30 to 40 times faster than the
chain wheels A, B, but this proportion may be varied according to the nature of the
material operated upon. By the chain wheels A B, four endless chains 1, 2, 3 and 4,
are caused to travel down an inclined carrier rail E under a guide pulley F, up an
inclined rail E around chain wheels A B at the left hand end of the machine, two
of the chains, namely those from the wheels A A¹, being led by guide pullies a¹ a²

page_text: and a tension pulley a³ obliquely away and back in a horizontal plane, and the other
two chains from B B being led under a tension pulley at the top of the machine.
A star wheel D is so arranged, as shewn more clearly in Figs. 4 and 5, that its teeth
or rays penetrate between two of the chains 2 and 3 just beyond a point where these
chains cross each other at different levels and before the four chains reach the
beginning of the inclined rail E.
This star wheel is free to revolve being driven by the friction of the chains that
bear against its sides. A little above the front edge of the carrier rail E and parallel
to it, as shewn in Fig. 9, is fixed a skid rail C leaving between its lower edge and
the upper face of the rail E a narrow space not wide enough to allow any of the
chains to pass through it. The grooved circumference of the wheels A B, the star
whoel D, the intermediate guide pulley F, and the other wheels A B are so arranged
that the chains in in travelling take positions relatively to one another such that flax
or other fibrous material fed at O, Fig. 1, between the two pairs of chains, that is to
say above the chains 1 and 3 belonging to the wheels A, and below the chains 2 and 4
belonging to the wheel B, is grasped by the chains as will be understood by reference
to Figs. 6, 7, 8 and 9. First as shewn in Fig. 6, the chains 1 and 3 coming above
2 and 4, bend the fibres into two loops, an upward and a downward loop. Then, as
shewn in Fig. 7, the chains 3 and 2 passing the one towards the left the other towards
the right, bend the loops the one over the other. Further, as shewn in Fig. 8, the
chains 2 and 3 having come into the same horizontal plane with the loops of fibre
engaged on them pass on to the rail E, and while they are kept apart by the star
wheel D they draw the triple strand formed of the overlapped loops of the fibres
between them under the edge of the skid rail C as shewn in Fig. 9. While nearly
half the length of the fibrous material is thus grasped, there hangs from between the
chains 2 and 4 the remaining length of fibrous material free, which, as the chains
move along the incline E downwards is caught between the scutch drums H and acted
on by their scutches or beaters first at the lower end and then at parts gradually
higher and higher until the lowest part of the incline is reached. Nearly the whole
length of free fibres being thus scutched, it is again acted on as the chains ascend
the slope E. At the left hand end of the machine the chains are made to alter their
relative positions in an inverted order so as to release the fibres from their entangle-
ment, and the fibres having one part, about half of their length scutched are delivered
from between the chain wheels A' B. By feeding the fibrous stems in an inverted
position into the machine again at its right hand end or into another similar machine,
so that the scutched part of their length is grasped by the chains, while the part
hitherto unscutched hangs free, the scutching of the whole length can be completed.
A convenient arrangement is to place two machines side by side and at the delivery
end of the first to pass the chains of the second round guide pullics at such a level
that they engage the freely hanging lower parts of the partly scutched stems while
the upper ends are being released from the chains of the first machine. The second
set of chains then ascending, the stems fall over into an inverted position and are
carried through the second machine in the direction opposite to that in which
they passed through the first machine the part previously unscutched being now
scutched.
The scutches or beaters on the drums H may have plain edges, or edges waved,
serrated or indented according to the character of the material on which they have to
operate.
Throughout half the length of the drums the beaters may be of one pattern for
breaking, and throughout the other half they may be of a different pattern suited for
brushing off the woody fragments from the fibres.
Although we have described chains for forming and holding the loops of fibrous
material, cords or other flexible bands or straps might be used; practically for flax and
similar materials chains are found to be most serviceable.
We have not shewn in the drawings means of driving the scutching drums H or
the chain wheels A B, as the gearing for that purpose forms no part of our invention.
They may be driven independently from any convenient motor or they may be

page_text: connected by any suitable gear to give them the relative speeds approximately that we
have mentioned above.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of this invention
and in what manner the same is to be performed we declare that what we claim in
respect of machines for scutching hackling or similarly treating flax or other fibrous
materials is —
1. In combination with two oppositely revolving scutching drums a guide situated
above and in the plane between the drums and inclined first downwards and then
upwards, and chains or their equivalents travelling along the guide and holding a
row of fibrous stems with their free ends hanging down between the drums, substan-
tially as described.
2. For holding the material while it is operated on, the combination of four
continuously travelling chains or their equivalents and their driving and guide wheels
or pullies with the stationary guide, substantially as herein described.
3. In combination with the guide inclined first downwards then upwards along
which the grasped part of the fibrous material is led, a pair of scutching drums
tapered from a larger diameter at the entering end to a smaller diameter at the
leaving end, substantially as and for the purpose herein set forth.
Dated this 19th day of June 1888.
ABEL & IMRAY,
Agents for the Applicants.