IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR CUTTING UP LOAF SUGAR
Year: 1875

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Henry May Burton, of Ipswich, in the County
of Suffolk, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR
CUTTING UP LOAF SUGAR."
Sealed the 29th June 1875, and dated the 15th April 1875.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Henry May Burton
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition,
on the 15th April 1875.
I, HENRY MAY BURTON, of Ipswich, in the County of Suffolk, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN
APPARATUS FOR CUTTING UP LOAF SUGAR," to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object to construct apparatus by which
sugar loaves may quickly be cut up into lumps without producing
waste. For this purpose the loaf to be cut is placed into a trough or
holder which can be moved to and fro by a lever to carry the loaf up to
and away from a circular revolving saw, by which the loaf may be cut
into slices of any desired thickness. Each time that a slice is cut off

page_text: from the loaf by the saw the trough or holder is drawn back, and the
loaf is moved endwise in it to bring the loaf up to a fixed stop; the
trough or holder is then again moved forward, whereby another slice is
cut off from the loaf. The slices as they are cut off roll downwards
along a channel which conducts them to a pair of cutting rollers,
having at intervals around their circumferences cutting knives or blades
by which the slices are divided into strips. The slices drop one by one
between the rollers from the end of the channel, and the strips produced
drop on to an inclined shoot which has partitions formed along its upper
surface to cause the strips to lie lengthwise upon it.
In order also to ensure that the strips shall lie correctly in the grooves
of the shoot a revolving roller with pegs standing out from it is placed
above the lower part of the shoot, so that if any of the strips are lying
above the grooves it may move back such strips and cause them to drop
into one or other of the grooves.
To ensure also that the strips shall descend freely down the inclined
shoot, a jogging motion may be imparted to it by a revolving cam.
From the end of the shoot the strips are delivered to a second pair of
cutting rollers which reduce them into pieces of the sizes required.
Below the circular saw and the pairs of cutting rollers are placed
shoots to convey the dust to suitable receptacles.
In order also to carry off all dust from the channel which conducts
away the slices as they are cut off by the revolving saw, the upward
draught produced in the channel by the revolving of the saw is made
use of, the channel being prolonged in front of the saw, and also led to a
suitable receptacle.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said Henry May Burton in the Great Scal Patent
Office on the 15th October 1875.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, HENRY
MAY BURTON, of Ipswich, in the County of Suffolk, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Fifteenth day of April, in the year

page_text: of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-five, in the
thirty-eighth year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and suc-
cessors, give and grant unto me, the said Henry May Burton, Her
special license that I, the said Henry May Burton, my executors,
5 administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Henry May
Burton, my executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any time
agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all times thereafter
during the term thercin expressed, should and lawfully might make,
use, exercise, and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for
"IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR CUTTING UP LOAF SUGAR," upon the
condition (amongst others) that I, the said Henry May Burton, my
executors or administrators, by an instrument in writing under my, or
their, or one of their hands and scals, should particularly describe and
ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the
same was to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the Great
Scal Patent Office within six calendar months next and immediately
after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Henry May Burton, do hereby
O declare the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the
same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained
in and by the following statement thereof, that is to say :-
This Invention has for its object to construct apparatus by which
sugar loaves or tetlers, or stoved sugar in whatever shape prodused may
quickly be cut up into lumps without producing waste, whilst at the
same time a larger amount of the brilliancy of the sugar is maintained
than when cutting up sugar by other methods. For this purpose the
loaf to be cut is placed into a trough or cradle which can be moved to
and fro by a lever or otherwise to carry the loaf up to and away from a
circular revolving saw by which the loaf may be cut into slices of any
desired thickness. Each time that a slice is cut off from the loaf by the
saw the trough or holder is drawn back, and the loaf is moved endwise
in it to bring the loaf up to a fixed stop; the trough or holder is then
again moved forward, whereby another slice is cut off from the loaf.
The slices as they are cut off roll downward along a channel which
conducts them to a pair of cutting rollers, having at intervals around
their circumferences cutting knives or blades by which the slices are

page_text: divided into strips. The slices drop one by one between the rollers from
the end of the channel, and the strips produced drop on to an inclined
shoot which has partitions formed along its upper surface to cause the
strips to lie lengthwise upon it.
In order also to ensure that the strips shall lie correctly in the grooves
of the shoot a revolving roller with pegs standing out from it is placed
above the lower part of the shoot, so that if any of the strips are lying
above the grooves it may move back such strips and cause them to drop
into one or other of the grooves.
To ensure also that the strips shall descend froely down the inclined
shoot, a jogging motion may be imparted to it by a revolving cam.
From the end of the shoot the strips are delivered to a second pair of
cutting rollers which reduce them into pieces of the sizes required.
Below the circular saw and the pairs of cutting rollers are placed shoots
to convey the dust to suitable receptacles.
In order also to carry off all dust from the channel which conducts
away the slices as they are cut off by the revolving saw, the upward
draught produced in the channel by the revolving of the saw is mado
use of, the channel being prolonged in front of the saw and also led to
a suitable receptacle.
In order that my Invention may be fully understood and readily
carried into effect, I have in the Drawings hereunto annexed shown
various views of apparatus constructed as above described.
Figure 1 is a longitudinal vertical section, and Figures 2 and 3,
transverse sections of the apparatus ; Figure 4 shows a horizontal section
of the same. The other Figures show some of the parts separately.
A is the carriage or cradle into which the loaf to be cut up is placed.
On the under side of the cradle are the guides B, B, which enter grooves,
and under the guides are small rollers; the cradle can be slid to and fro
along the grooves by means of a handle A' upon it, or other arrange-
ments may be adopted for moving the carriage to and fro; C is the
revolving circular saw by which slices are cut off from the loaf, as above
described. As the slices are cut off they roll down the inclined
channel D, and at its lower end drop through an opening D' immediately
below which are the cutting rollers E, having steel knives E¹ projecting

page_text: from their periphery, as shown, the knives of the two cutting rollers come
opposite to but do not touch one another, and are arranged so that the
distance between them varies, say from three eighths to five eighths of
an inch. The rollers divide the slice into strips, and the strips fall on to
the inclined shoot F; this shoot is suspended at its upper end and rests on
the revolving cam G, so that as the cam revolves a jogging motion may be
given to the shoot. Upon the upper surface of the shoot are longitudinal
ribs F¹ between which the slices have to lie. These ribs are each of them
a little further apart from each other at the lower end than the upper, so
as to ensure a constant freedom to the strips in descending.
If any of the slices as they descend the shoot rest upon the upper
surface of the ribs they are arrested by the spikes of the revolving
spiked roller L until they drop into one or other of the channels between
the ribs and are then free to descend. F² is a grating at the upper end
of the shoot through which any dust produced by the cutting up of the
slices into strips is free to fall, and is conducted through the shoot F³
into any suitablo receptable, or this grating may be omitted and the
shoot be made with a solid floor. The lower end of the shoot F is
curved downwards, as shown, so that the strips as they pass from the
shoot drop vertically to a second pair of cutting rollers which sever the
strips transversely into lumps, and the lumps as they fall from the
rollers are delivered by the inclined grating or shoot H into any suitable
receptacle, whilst any dust is free to pass through the grating into a
separate receptacle, as shown at Figure 2.
The manner of transmitting motion from the axis of the saw to the
cutting rollers and other revolving parts of the apparatus is shown by
the Drawings, so that it is unnecessary to give a detailed description of
it. K is a shoot by which the dust produced by the revolving saw is
conducted into any suitable receptacle.
Having thus described the nature of my Invention and the manner
of performing the same, I would have it understood that I claim, the
combined arrangement of apparatus for cutting up loaves of sugar, sub-
stantially as herein-before described, and especially the moveable cradle
or carriage upon which the loaf is carried whilst being cut by the saw,
the inclined channel down which the slices roll as they are cut off by
the saw to pass to cutting rollers, and the shoot with longitudinal grooves
or channels for presenting the strips passing from the first pair of cutting

page_text: rollers vertically to the second pair; the presenting the strips vertically
to the second pair of cutting rollers is of great advantage.
In witness whereof, I, the said Henry May Burton, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Ninth day of October, in the
year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-
five.