Improvements in or relating to Hosiery and Knitted Fabrics.
Year: 1897

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in or relating to Hosiery and Knitted Fabrics.
I, GEORGE PADMORE, Junior, of Thomas Street, Northampton, in the County
of Northampton, Boot and Shoe Manufacturer, do hereby declare the nature of
this invention to be as follows:-
-
The improved fabric may be made on any knitting machine having a rotary
or reversible motion necessary in this invention which relates to parts and not to
the whole of any article.
Taking a sock to the heels and toes of which I may desire to apply this inven-
tion and using for example a circular knitting machine of Griswold type, I place
in that part of the cylinder used in making heels and toes, two different needles
each making the same size and shape of loop and place them alternately in the
needle grooves.
I use two threads preferably of equal size which I place in two distinct guides
and use two distinct springs etc. to take up the threads in reversing motion.
The needles pass over the rising or clearing cam and clear the loops already made
in the usual manner. The drawing cam is. in two or more movable parts one
part at the required distance drawing the needles for the loop from one guide and
the other part drawing the needles for the loop from the other guide, the threads
from each guide passing across the needle not fed by that guide and passing
to the back of the fabric, increasing the thickness to this extent. The same
process is repeated on the machine being reversed so that each cam has at least
four surfaces drawing needles to form loops.
The heel needles are raised out of action by degrees and put into action again
as is usual in this class of machine. When the heel or toe is completed with
the new thickened fabric, the drawing surfaces of the cams are brought into
position by means of a lever so that both classes of needles can be fed in the usual
way and make ordinary fabric. Lever is actuated by movable stops at required
distances.
The guide for feeding one set of needles has a slot within which the thread
reverses. at each reversal of the machine and does not feed from one point as is
usual; this is a novel manner of feeding, the guides being placed above the
usual guide and feeding at such a point as is desired by length of slot. When
the heel is made this guide is unthreaded. The thread for feeding one set of
needles is placed in a movable guide whereby it can be acted upon by stops or
cams so as to place the guide right for feeding.
Although I have described the above method other ways may be employed on
different machines; the needles may be bearded or latch needles.
The needles may be fed at different heights and long and short needles or long
foot and short foot needles, or long latch and short latch needles made be used.
"
The threads used may be of any required size and a novel effect may be made
in heels and toes etc. by using different colours or sorts of threads.

page_text: The parts to which the invention is applied may be large or small in length
or width as desired and may be applied to rib, plain or tuck fabric.
The extra thickness may be imparted by laying in between the needles a
thread and not forming it into loops. The needles can be arranged as desired,
alternately or in any combination.
The invention is applicable to hose, half hose, socks, gloves, shirts, pants,
vests, Cardigan jackets and other goods made of knitted fabric.
The loops formed by both sets of needles are all completed at one point. The
invention is particularly applicable to machines for making seamless hosiery.
Dated this 22nd day of October 1897.
BOULT & WADE,
Agents for the Applicant.
Improvements in or relating to Hosiery and Knitted Fabrics.
I, GEORGE PADMORE, Junior, of Thomas Street, Northampton, in the County
of Northampton, Boot & Shoe Manufacturer, 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: -
The improved fabric may be made on any knitting machine either circular or
flat provided that such machine is made to reverse or reciprocate in the manner
hereinafter explained, so as to produce a reinforced "patch" upon parts of an
article as distinct from the duplication or other increase of the thickness of the
.whole article.
The novel feature of the improved knitted fabric or knitted article according
to this invention is that upon it a thickened or re-inforced "patch" is produced
with the aid of an extra knitted thread, not used as a mere addition to the thick-
ness of the ordinary or ground thread as hitherto but which is itself looped with
loops which are not made by the same needles as those which are simultaneously
employed in the production of the loops in the ground fabric; moreover this
extra thread is so knitted into the fabric that it is reversed at the opposite
extremities of the "patch," that is to say, turned back upon itself or zig-zag
in the fabric or article.
For example, in a flat fabric the extra thread would traverse it from right to
left for instance and then turn back from left to right, and then from right to
left again; in the toe of a sock or similar circular article the extra thread would
travel round the circumference to a certain point turned back upon itself, return-
ing round the circumference in the opposite direction at almost the same point,
then descending slightly and turning back upon itself once more and so on,
the circumferential travel being reduced by successive withdrawals of needles
from action in a manner well understood.
Taking a sock to the heels and toes of which I may desire to apply this inven-
tion, and using for example, a circular knitting machine of the Griswold type,
I place in that part of the cylinder used in making heels and toes, two different
needles, preferably a long foot" and a "short foot," each making the same size
and shape of loop, and place them alternately in the needle grooves.
I use two threads, preferably of equal size, which I place in two distinct
guides and use two distinct springs etc. to take up the thread in reversing motion.
The needles pass over the rising or clearing cam and clear the loops already made
in the usual manner. The drawing cam is compound, that is to say is in two
or more movable parts, one part at the required distance drawing the short foot

page_text: needles for the loop from one guide and the other part drawing the long foot
needles for the loop from the other guide, the threads from each guide passing
across the needles not fed by that guide and passing to the back of the fabric,
increasing the thickness to this extent. The same process is repeated on the
machine being reversed, so that each cam has at least four surfaces drawing
needles to form loops, being double-ended with at least two surfaces at each end.
Or alternatively a single clearing cam can be placed midway between a halved com-
pound cam, that is to say, one half of the compound cam operates with one side
of the clearing cam and the other half with the opposite side of the clearing
cam.
The heel needles are raised out of action by degrees and put into action again
as is usual in this class of machine. When the heel or toe is completed with the
new thickened fabric, the drawing surfaces of the cams are brought into position
by means of a lever so that both classes of needles can be fed in the usual way
and make ordinary fabric. The lever is actuated by hand or by movable stops
at required distances.
The guide does not feed from one point as is usual, the extra guide being
placed above the usual guide at any required height to feed one set of needles,
the usual guide feeding the ordinary needles.
Although I have described the above method other ways may be employed on
different machines; the needles may be bearded or latched needles.
The needles may be fed at different heights and long and short needles or long-
foot and short-foot needles or long latch and short latch needles may be used.
The threads used may be of any required size and a novel effect may be made
in heels and toes etc. by using different colours or sorts of threads.
The parts to which the invention is applied may be large or small in length or
width as desired and may be applied to rib, plain, or tuck fabric.
The needles can be arranged as desired, alternately or in any combination.
The invention is applicable to hose, half hose, socks, gloves, shirts, pants,
vests, Cardigan jackets, and other goods made of knitted fabric.
The loops formed by both sets of needles are all completed at one point. The
invention is particularly applicable to machines for making seamless hosiery.
In the accompanying drawings
Fig. 1 illustrates diagrammatically a portion of a knitted article having a
thickened or reinforced portion or patch" according to this invention.
"
Fig. 2 is a perspective view of a segment of the rotating cam-ring of a knitting
machine with an improved drawing cam according to this invention provided
upon it.
Fig. 3 is a view similar to Fig. 2 except that parts of the drawing cam are
shown in the positions they occupy after adjustment to operate the needles in the
production of the thickened portion of a fabric such as is illustrated in Fig. 1,
and
Fig. 4 is an elevation of that side of the cam-ring segment which is not exposed
in Figs. 2 & 3.
Fig. 5 shows diagrammatically the arrangement of halved compound cam
and single clearing cam hereinbefore referred to.
Like letters indicate like parts throughout the drawings.
With reference first to Fig. 1 it will be seen that the body of the fabric is com-
posed of ordinary knitting A, which has however, a central thickened "
patch "B
of a length and breadth b. A knitted fabric thickened in this manner in patches
by a zigzaged or reversed thread B¹ and not thickened over the whole surface is
(6
novel.
:-
The thickening is produced:-
In part by causing the ordinary threads A¹ to miss, within the limits of the
patch" B, every alternate loop of the ordinary series preceding them, so that
within this "patch" the loops A2 in those threads are twice as far apart as in the
body A of the fabric, and

page_text: In part by an extra part B¹ (shown in solid black lines in the drawing), intro-
duced to form knitted loops B2 intermediate of the wide spaced loops A³ occurring
in the ordinary thread in the thickened "patch". of the fabric only. The loops
of each thread in the thickened portion engage with the loops of the nearest
adjacent thread in the manner indicated in the drawing, the thread B' engag
ing adjacent threads B', and the thread A¹ in its wide-looped portions engaging
adjacent wide-looped portions of the same thread; the result of the introduction
of the extra thread and the concurrent modification of the spacing of the loops
of the ordinary thread is the production of a "patch" such as B, in which, as may
be clearly seen from the drawing, there is a double line of thread along any such
line as XY instead of what approximates to a single line as along the liner y
in the unthickened part of the fabric. The reversals of the thread B' occur at
the parts R as shown.
The manner in which the operation of alternate needles must be timed to effect
a change in the spacing and arrangement of the loops A³ B² such as is above
indicated, is obvious to any person familiar with the art of machine knitting,
but it has hitherto been impracticable to make a fabric strengthened or thickened
in a "patch" in the manner described, because of the absence from knitting
machines of the usual types of a reversible or double drawing-cam of the kind
exemplified in Figs. 2, 3 & 5, in which the rotating cam ring C is provided with
a double-ended compound drawing cam 1 which has at each end a sliding
portion D or D2 superposed upon the body of the cam. The edge D³ of the
body portion D and the edges I of the movable portions D¹ 12 will cause, when
the movable parts D1 D2 are in the position in which they are shown in Figure 2,
all feet of the needles E F, whether they have long fect E like the needles E,
or short feet F1, like the needles F, (Fig. 2) to follow the common path indicated
by the chain line 00 in Fig. 2. But when the sliding portions D¹ 12 are drawn
back from the edge 13 as shown in Figure 3, only the long footed
needles E will descend when the feet E¹ come against the edge D³
of the body of the cam D, the short footed needles F being missed by the edge D³
and remaining up until caught by the edge D of the retired sliding portions,
whereupon they in turn will descend. The short footed needles remaining up
momentarily whilst the long footed needles descend cause the loops engaged by
the short footed needles to be operated so that the widely-spoked loops A3 B2 of
Fig. 1 are produced alternately in a manner which will be well understood by
those skilled in the art to which this invention relates.
It will be seen that the body portion of the cam B has a central portion with
edges D5 which are situated at a higher level than the edge 13 so as to form a
continuous surface with the edges D* of the sliding portions D1 D2 when the latter
are retired into the position they are shown as occupying in Fig. 3. When the
sliding portions D1 D2 are in the position in which they are shown in Fig. 2
the short footed needles F are free for an instant after clearing the lower end of the
edge D', and until they are struck by the edge D³. This momentary check to
the motion of the short footed needles is of no importance in the working of the
machine, and arises only because of the necessity that the edges I should be in
advance of the edges D5 with the parts in the positions in which they are shown
in Fig. 2 in order to form a continuous surface with the edges D5 when the
parts D D are shifted into the positions in which they are shown as occupying
in Figure 3. There is a small projection D on the portions D1 D2 arranged to
overlap as shown in order that the needles may not be checked in passing from
the edge I on to the edge 15, as they might be if the division between the lower
edge of the parts D¹ D2 and the body of the cam were continued out in a straight
line to the drawing surface on which the feet of the short footed needles travel.
The ordinary clearing cams G G¹ are shown in the drawings, the cam G in full
lines and the cam G¹ in chain lines, it being understood that when the rotating
cam-ring C travels in the direction of the full lined arrows in Figures 2 and 3
the clearing cam G and the edges D³ Dª D³ on the end of the compound cam

page_text: farthest from that clearing cam operate the needles, whilst when the cam-ring
runs in the direction indicated by the dotted arrows the edges D3 D4 D5 that end
of the cam D which is nearest the cam G becomes operative, the clearing cam G
being then drawn out of action and the companion cam G¹ at the opposite end of
the drawing cam coming into play.
The mechanism for shifting the clearing cams G G¹ alternately forms no part
of the present invention, and any convenient means may be employed for shifting
the movable parts D1 D2 of the compound double-ended drawing-cam D, a con-
venient construction being shown in Fig. 4, in which a lever H pivotted to the
exterior of the cam-ring is provided with a pin H' extending through a slot C¹
into the back of the sliding portion 11 (Fig. 3) of the cam, so that by moving the
lever H upon its pivot, the sliding portion D¹ can be adjusted upon the body D
of the cam as required; a similar lever J engages by means of a pin J¹ with the
companion portion 12 (Fig. 3) of the compound drawing cam.
Any convenient means may be employed to retain the levers H J in the position
in which they are adjusted, against the tendency of the working thrusts to dis-
place them; in the example illustrated the upper ends of the levers travel between
light guides K secured to the ring and frictionally gripping the levers H J
between them.
In Fig. 5 a single clearing cam G is seen midway between the halves D7 D³
of a divided compound cam. One side G2 of the clearing cam co-operating with
the drawing surfaces, of the half 17 and the other side G³ co-operating with the
half 18.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of the said
invention and in what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that what
I claim is:-
-
1. A knitted fabric or article bearing a thickened or reinforced "patch" pro-
duced by a thread turned back upon itself.
2. A knitted seamless article bearing a thickened or reinforced "patch" pro-
duced by a thread turned back upon itself.
3. A knitted fabric or article bearing a thickened or reinforced "patch" sub-
stantially of the structure herein before described.
4. In a knitting machine a double ended compound drawing cam for the pur-
pose described.
5. In a knitting machine the combination with a double ended compound draw-
ing cam of two movable clearing cams one for each end of the drawing cam.
6. In a knitting machine the combination with a single clearing cam of a
halved compound drawing cam substantially as described.
7. A knitted fabric or article with a knitted "patch" upon it substantially as
described and illustrated in Figure 1 of the accompanying drawings.
8. In a knitting machine the double ended compound drawing cam substantially
as and for the purpose described and illustrated in Figures 2, 3 and 5 of the
accompanying drawings.