IMPROVEMENTS IN THE METHOD OF DRIVING AND FEEDING COTTON GINS, AND OF CONVEYING AWAY THE GINNED COTTON AND SEEDS THEREFROM
Year: 1863

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Evan Leigh and Frederick Allen Leigh, of the City
of Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, Mechanical Engineers, for
the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE METHOD OF DRIVING AND FEEDING
COTTON GINS, AND OF CONVEYING AWAY THE GINNED COTTON AND SEEDS
THEREFROM."
Sealed the 10th May 1864, and dated the 16th November 1863.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Evan Leigh and Frederick
Allen Leigh at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with their
Petition, on the 16th November 1863.
We, EVAN LEIGH and FREDERICK ALLEN LEIGH, of the City of Manchester,
in the County of Lancaster, Mechanical Engineers, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE METHOD OF DRIVING
AND FEEDING COTTON GINE, AND OF CONVEYING AWAY THE GINNED COTTON AND SEEDS
THEREFROM," to be as follows:-
This Invention consists in the use of a powerful fan or fans in ginning
factories, so arranged as to exhaust large wire gauze or perforated dust
cylinders, and through then a trough or troughs placed, by preference, under
the gins. Into these troughs the ginned cotton is drawn through a mouth-
piece and thence against the dust cages by the current of air. These cages
revolve round and deliver the cotton free from dust in the packing room.
We prefer the use of Archimedean screws to clear the seeds away from the

page_text: gins and drop them upon a slanting sieve or riddle, to which motion may be
given or not, which separates any unginned cotton from the seed.
Our method of driving by horse or bullock power consists of a travelling
platform constructed of ron bars with wood lags coupled together with a
bushed chain, so as to form an endless belt, which works over shafts having
notched pullies. The pivots of these shafts run on friction bowls fixed on
studs or other shafts in the framing, and have on the ends the driving pullies.
This travelling platform may also be made of wood lags and a broad flexible
belt of leather or other material.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Evan Leigh and Frederick Allen Leigh in the Great Seal
Patent Office on the 14th May 1864.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, EVAN
LEIGH and FREDERICK ALLEN LEIGH, of the City of Manchester, in the
County of Lancaster, Mechanical Engineers, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Sixteenth day of November, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, in the twenty-seventh year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto us, the
said Evan Leigh and Frederick Allen Leigh, Her special license that we
the said Evan Leigh and Frederick Allen Leigh, our executors, adminis-
trators, and assigns, or such others as we, the said Evan Leigh and Frederick
Allen Leigh, our 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 therein 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
THE METHOD OF DRIVING AND FEEDING COTTON GINS, AND OF CONVEYING AWAY THE
GINNED COTTON AND SEEDS THEREFROM," upon the condition (amongst others)
that we, the said Evan Leigh and Frederick Allen Leigh, our executors or
administrators, by an instrument in writing under our, or their, or one of
their hands and seals, 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 Seal Patent Office
within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said
Letters Patent.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that we, the said Evan Leigh and Frederick Allen
Leigh, do hereby declare the nature of our said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascer-
tained in and by the following statement (that is to say):-
This Invention consists in the employment in ginning factories of one or
more powerful fans, so arranged as to exhaust large wire gauze or perforated
dust cages or cylinders, and through them one or more troughs placed, by
preference, under the gins. Into these troughs the ginned cotton is drawn
through a mouth-piece and thence against the dust cages by the current of air.
These cages are caused to revolve and deliver the cotton, free from dust, into
the packing room.
We prefer the use of Archimedean screws to clear the seeds away from
the gins and drop them upon a slanting sieve or riddle for separating the
unginned cotton from the seeds, the sieve or riddle being either stationary or
having motion imparted to it.
This Invention will be clearly understood by referring to the figures and
letters on the accompanying Sheet of Drawing, in which the figure is a
transverse section of a ginning factory provided with one of our improved
methods of feeding the cotton to the gins and conveying away the ginned
cotton and seeds therefrom.
These cages are enclosed in
In ginning factories driven by power we convey the ginned cotton
away by a pneumatic trough placed under each row of gins, as shewn
at a, a.
These troughs are exhausted by connecting them by one or more
pneumatic tubes a¹ to one or more powerful fans b, acting upon two re-
volving, perforated, or wire net cages c, c, similar to the dust cages used
in scutching machines in cotton factories.
iron casings, so that they can only draw air in one front to which the end
of the trough or troughs are attached, and as the cages revolve in the
direction of the arrows they bring the cotton out of the gins in a thick layer
free from dust, and deliver it into the packing room d. The fan or fans b
may be placed in any convenient place, so that the air pipes leading to them
are so arranged as to exhaust the dust cages from within.
the seeds away from ginning factories by another trough in
Archimedean screw, as shewn at e; and when the seeds reach their destination
they are poured upon an inclined grid down which they roll, which grid acts as
a riddle or sieve, and deposits at its lower end any unginned cotton and allows
the bare seeds to fall through.
We also convey
which works an
In the first instance the unginned cotton is raised to the floorf and entered

page_text: into the spouts g, which have at the bottom openings h and slabs i, through
which openings the operative pulls the cotton and supplies it to the gins.
Our method of driving the gins by horse or bullock power consists of
employing a travelling platform constructed of iron bars with wood lags
coupled together with a bushed chain, so as to form an endless belt, which
works over shafts having notched pulleys. The pivots of these shafts run
on friction bowls working on studs or fixed to shafts which revolve in the
framing, and to one of the shafts of the notched pulleys is attached the
pulleys which drive the gins. This travelling platform may also be made of
wood.lags and a broad flexible belt of leather or other material.
Having now described the nature and particulars of our said Invention, and
the manner in which the same is to be performed, we desire it to be under-
stood that we claim,―
First, the employment in ginning factories of one or more powerful fans for
exhausting dust cages, or cylinders and troughs, for the purpose of drawing the
cotton from the gins and depositing it in the packing room.
Secondly, the employment of one or more Archimedean screws for conveying
the seeds to any desired place.
...Thirdly, the improved mode of applying horse or bullock power for working
the gins, as all such improvements are herein described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Frederick Allen Leigh, for and on behalf
of myself and the said Evan Leigh, have hereunto set my hand and
seal, this Thirteenth day of May, in the year of our Lord One thousand
eight hundred and sixty-four.
FREDERICK ALLEN LEIGH. (L.S.)
Signed, sealed, and delivered by the
within-named Frederick Allen Leigh,
in the presence of
E. J. HUGHES,
Patent Agent,
Manchester.