IMPROVEMENTS IN LOOMS FOR WEAVING
Year: 1864

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Thomas Allan at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 30th March
1864.
I, THOMAS ALLAN, of Preston Place, in the Township of Horton, in the
Parish of Bradford, in the County of York, Mechanic, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN LOOMS FOR WEAVING," to be
as follows:-
My Invention has for its object the weaving of fabrics known as twills,
lenos, figured fabrics, crape bottoms, floating twills, satins, also silk stripe,
twilled satins, or fabrics figured and checked in the same manner, also
baratheas, linings, overs, and any pattern requiring no more than sixteen ends
by a method simpler than those in ordinary use, and one which may be
applied to any ordinary plain or circular box loom. For this purpose placing
an excentric near one end of the usual crank shaft of the loom, I connect the
same by means of a suitable rod and lever with a crank fixed in a convenient
position over the loom rail. To the extreme end of a second crank shaft I
attach a link or lever which actuates horizontally a bracket placed in front of the
loom rail, such bracket being kept steady by means of convenient guide rods.
A second bracket affixed to the loom rail, and at right angles to the first-
named bracket, and having a row of holes through the top and bottom,
receives wires, the number of which depends upon the particular figure or
pattern it is desired to weave, and consequently upon the number of healds
requisite. The wires are bent in a V shape, but one leg is made much longer

page_text: than the other, the shorter one in fact acting chiefly as a guide to steady the
former, which receives a horizontal motion in a manner herein-after described.
Immediately above the afore-named wires, the longer legs of which are placed
horizontally and parallel with one another, is fixed a card roller, having rows
of pins or projections capable of easy removal, or a plain cylinder is used to
carry a continuous or endless chain of "cards," such "cards" being retained
in a sufficient degree of tension by a second carrying roller. It may here be
named that motion is imparted to the "cards" by means of a ratchet on the
"card cylinder axis, operated upon by a catch upon the moving bracket
before named. Looped flexible connections of twine or other suitable material
being "passed through the V corners of the wire through the holes of a
sustaining bracket and over grooved, pulleys to the healds which they are
intended to actuate, and to which they are secured.
15
The operation of the machine is as follows:-The crank shaft of the loom
being set in motion a horizontal reciprocating motion is imparted by means
of the excentric levers and second crank to the moving bracket before named.
A vertical pin resting in studs, and within a spring having a long flat head, is
also carried by the said moving bracket. Upon this pin being carried to the
extreme ends of the longer legs of the V wires (which are curved over so as
to catch the flat head before named when depressed), the pegs or stops in the
"cards" having been previously arranged according to the pattern required
depress the requisite number of wires, and cause the same to catch the flat
head, and thus by the return stroke of the bracket to elevate the healds
required; the moving bracket again returning in consequence of the flat head
of the pin not being at right angles to the vertical pin to which it is affixed;
and also by virtue of the spring properties the V shape gives the wires on
compression, the pressure of the pegs or stops being removed from those
wires operated upon by the previous stroke they are released, other wires
then, and consequently other healds, are put in motion as before, the process
being repeated, the result being that fabrics of the classes above named are
woven by reason of the "shed" being kept open at the required periods
dependent upon the pattern or figure required.