IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF HEALDS, AND IN COMBINATION AND APPLICATION TO LOOMS
Year: 1881

page_text: THEIR
LETTERS PATENT to William Edward Gedge, of No. 11, Wellington Street,
Strand, London, in the County of Middlesex, Patent Agent, for an Invention
of "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF HEALDS, AND IN
COMBINATION AND APPLICATION TO LOOMS." A communication from abroad
by Nicolas Chaize and Jacques Chaize, Merchants, chez Monsieur Delorine,
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William Edward Gedge at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents on the 22nd June 1881.
WILLIAM EDWARD GEDGE, of No. 11, Wellington Street, Strand, London, in the
County of Middlesex, Patent Agent. "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE
OF HEALDS, AND IN THEIR COMBINATION AND APPLICATION TO LOOMS." A
communication from abroad by Nicolas Chaize and Jacques Chaize, Merchants,
chez Monsieur Delorme, No. 14, Rue St. Louis, St. Etienne (Loire), France.
This Invention relates to improvements in the manufacture of healds, twisted
and plated to the loom, and in combining or connecting them together.
The healds with which weavers' looms are furnished for working the warp
threads which they support, and which pass in their eye, aro usually made by hand
with three pieces of thread, one of which forming the eye is tied by its two ends
in the form of a small crown or ring, in which are held each of the two other.
larger pieces forming the body of the heald.
These healds are then collected by hand, and at the same time tied or knotted
upon a wooden rod or bar at their upper part, and upon another at their lower
part. The setting up of these rods or bars on the looms determines the lifting of
the threads of the warp.
The object of this Invention is to manufacture these healds mechanically in a
continuous manner without cutting, without knots, without sewing, with threads
which, sometimes twisted, sometimes braided at the proper parts upon the loom
arranged for this purpose, constitute the heald, the cord or body not changing its
direction, there being no weak point, and everything being done away with which
CDC21

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent filed
by the said William Edward Gedge in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
17th December 1881.
WILLIAM EDWARD GEDGE, of No. 11, Wellington Street, Strand, London, in the
County of Middlesex, Patent Agent. "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE
OF HEALDS, AND IN THEIR COMBINATION AND APPLICATION TO LOOMS." A
communication from abroad by Nicolas Chaize and Jacques Chaize, Merchants,
chez Monsieur Delorme, No. 14, Rue St. Louis, St Etienne (Loire), France.
This Invention relates to improvements in the manufacture of healds twisted
and plated in the loom, and in combining or connecting them together.
The healds with which weavers' looms are furnished for working the warp
threads which they support, and which pass in their eye, are usually made by hand
with three pieces of thread, one of which, forming the oye, is tied by its two ends
in the form of a small crown or ring, in which are held each of the two other
larger pieces forming the body of the heald.
These healds are then collected by hand, and at the same time tied or knotted
upon a wooden rod or bar at their upper part, and upon another at their lower
part. The setting up of these rods or bars on the looms determines the lifting of
the threads of the warp.
The object of this Invention is to manufacture these healds mechanically in a
continuous manner without cutting, without knots, without elbowing or bending
with threads which, sometimes twisted, sometimes braided at the proper parts upon
the loom arranged for this purpose constitute the heald, the cord or body not
changing its direction, there being no weak point, and everything being done away
with which might injure the strength of the heald or the working of the textile
warp. Further, instead of collecting these healds one by one, and tying or knotting
them to the wooden bars or rods, I collect them mechanically without cutting, in
such a manner that all that is required is to thread these wooden rods at once in
the piece of collected healds.
To attain this result I use, for the manufacture of the healds, parts of the loom
for manufacturing braid and similar articles, and for the combining, collecting, or
putting together of these healds those of the ribbon loom, but which receive for
this special manufacture novel arrangements and mechanical adjuncts, of which the
following is a description, reference being had to the accompanying Sheet of
Drawing, upon which
Figures 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, relate to mechanism used in the manufacture of these
improved healds; Figures 7 and 8 represent the mechanism applied upon the batten
of a ribbon loom, and which permits the mechanical assemblage or collection of
these healds for their application, as shown in Fig. 9, upon ordinary wooden bars
or rods.
Figure 1 gives half size two models or patterns of healds of different sections
of the continuous piece of manufactured healds.
The piece a, composed of a more or less considerable quantity of healds, is
manufactured by the aid of two circular and tangential platforms b, b¹, turning in
inverse direction, and each carrying three bobbins or spindles 1, 2, 3, placed in
three of the six notchos made around them, one empty notch being left between
them. These two platforms are double, that is to say, repeated at b³, bs, as in
ordinary looms of this kind.
Each of these bobbins carrying a thread, it follows that, as in braiding looms,
sewing silk looms and others, the three threads twist as the platform which carries
them rotates, and that the six threads of the two platforms form for making tho
heald two independent cords or branches, c, c¹ (see Fig. 1").

page_text: By means of the alternate shifting of these bobbins from one platform to another,
the six threads cross one another, and the two branches thus become intimately
joined by a braiding stitch or plait. It will be understood that if this tying point
of the two branches is made at d, d, above and below the middle part of the heald,
preserved in two branches to form the eye e, this latter is obtained by the natural
effect of the working of the threads.
This alternate changing of the spindles or bobbins from one platform to the
other is effected by the aid of a pivoting piece ƒ (see Fig. 5, section at c, d) placed
before the tangential point or point of contact of the two platforms, and which
plays the part of a railway switch. It may carry its point either on the side of
the right hand platform or towards that on the left, and thus force the bobbin
which arrives at the point of contact of the two platforms to pass from the one to
the other; for the notch occupied by the bobbin of the one always coincides at this
point with an empty notch of the other.
By this means there is therefore, as in braiding or plaiting and other looms,
exchange of spindles; but that which principally constitutes this Invention is the
mechanical arrangement hereinafter described, which permits regulating the moment
and the length of time when the plaiting or tying point of the threads is to take
place, that is to say, consequently to regulate the working of the transmission or
shifting of the spindles, and thus to obtain as many joinings or ties of the plaited
threads as may be desired for a single or even several eyes.
This
The working of the pivoting piece or directing point or switch is due to this
new mechanism, driven like the platforms from the main shaft of the loom.
mechanism is composed of a horizontal wheel g, which is a main feature of the
mechanism and which has forty teeth. It travels forward one tooth at a time by
the aid of a cam h¹ placed on the vertical shaft h.
This wheel represents the length of the heald divided (hypothetically) into forty
equal parts, each of the teeth corresponding to the rotation of four turns of the
platforms b, b. Upon this wheel is a raised crown or flange g', which, when the
wheel is working, rubs against a small friction roller i placed under a balance lever
or rocking piece j, which falls when this crown offers an empty space, into which
the roller falls of itself. The fall of this balance lever determines the variations of
the directing instrument by the aid of intermediaries, such as a second balance
lever K and a sliding piece m.
In fact the lever j in falling (see particularly Figures 2 and 3) also causes tho
fall of the lever K to which it is united by the connection n. This latter balance
or pivoting lever being pushed (see Figs. 5 and 6) by the cam o moves forward the
sliding piece m, which by a wire 2 actuates the pivoting piece f, which resumes its
primitive position by the aid of the spring ".
By making an opening in this projecting crown in front of one or other of the
teeth the exact point on the heald where the plait or joining stitch is to be formed
is fixed, and it will be understood that henceforth the faculty is given of making
this stitch or union so as to form the eye of the heald, as well as at any other
precise point, such as towards the top or bottom of this heald, to form stop or
sheath for the threading of the wooden bars or rods. Thus two eyes a, a, may be
made at top and bottom of each continuous heald in such a manner that they may
be collected or arranged together by the aid of a simple cord y, y', passed through
these eyes. The twisting of the threads may be strained by ordinary means when
the eye is made to induce it to open.
The collection or combination of the healds is effected with the mechanism of a
ribbon loom, and with a batten arranged for this purpose.
I use as weft the piece of continuous heald carried on a thick bobbins placed
in a large shuttle; but there is no weaving except to the right and left of the
piece, as there is no warp excepting by a fow threads t, t, forming selvage, and
passing in two small weaving reeds u, u¹.
To ensure the healds being collected or put together with the eyes perfectly in
line (which is indispensable) I have recourse to two means combined.

page_text: The first consists in having rendered the two small reeds u, u¹, one, that is to
say, combined in an approaching and retiring movement by the aid of a screw v
threaded right in one direction and left in the other, and working in a nut carried
by each of these reeds. By this means the distance apart of the warp threads is
regulated in a precise and mathematical manner.
The second consists in the use of two swinging or rocking reeds, 2, 2', carried on
the front of the batten, which by the aid of a turning rod are raised upright,
turning in contrary directions and at the desired moment to separate the healds by
their teeth, which rest upon the two stops or plaiting tie and thus compel the eyes
to maintain a single right line during the operation.
Having now described and ascertained the nature of the Invention communicated
to mo as aforesaid, and in what manner the same is or may be performed,
I claim as secured to me by the hereinbefore in part recited Letters Patent,-
Firstly. The heald itself in its constitution or make, inasmuch that it is
manufactured in one piece without knots and without elbow or bend by the
natural effect of the working on the loom of the six threads of which it is
composed.
Secondly. The mechanism permitting the conversion at the required moment of
the torsion or twisting of the six threads of the two branches of the heald into a
plaiting point which ties them together mainly by the particular arrangement of
wheel g, substantially as herein before described.
Thirdly. The mechanism permitting the assemblage or collection of the healds
with their eyes in an exact line upon an ordinary ribbon loom, by the regulation
of the spacing of the warp aided by the simultaneous mobility of the combs or
reeds; then by the application upon the batten of toothed balance or pivoting levers
pressing at the desired moments upon the tying points of the eyes, and also the
means of assembling the healds by a cord passed at top and bottom through an
eye formed for this purpose, the whole substantially as hereinbefore specified.
In witness whereof, I, the said William Edward Gedge, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Seventeenth day of December, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and eighty one.