IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS APPLICABLE TO MACHINES FOR CUTTING HAY, STRAW, AND SUCH LIKE SUBSTANCES
Year: 1865

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Richard Robert Riches and Charles
James Watts at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with their
Petition, on the 3rd April 1865.
We, RICHARD ROBERT RICHES and CHARLES JAMES WATTS, both of Norwich,
in the County of Norfolk, Engineers, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS APPLICABLE TO MACHINES FOR CUTTING
HAY, STRAW, AND SUCH LIKE SUBSTANCES," to be as follows:-
Our Invention relates in the first place to the knives or cutters, and the
mode of mounting them. One form of knife or cutter intended to be used as
a cutting edge of a V-form, or the lines of such cutting edge may be curvilinear
instead of straight, and the knife or knives is or are mounted on a drum or
carrier, the axis of which is at right angles to the line of direction in which
the material to be operated upon is fed through the mouth of the machine,
the edge of the drum or knife carrier being thus presented to the mouth of
the machine knives with straight instead of angular cutting edges may also be
used on a drum or carrier, mounted in the manner stated, and such knives may
be fixed on the periphery of the drum or carrier. either parallel with the axis
of the same or obliquely thereto. The mouth of the machine is curved to suit
the curvature of the knife or knives. The drum or knife carrier may also be
mounted with its axis at right angles to the line of direction above stated when
knives with the angular cutting edges referred to are used.
Our Invention relates, secondly, to the feeding apparatus and consists in the
use of a suitably formed cam fixed on the axis of the drum or knife carrier,

page_text: which cam is caused by its revolution to act alternately on two friction rollers
which are mounted in a slotted connecting rod, the other end of which rod is
connected to a pall attached to a slotted lever working loosely on the axis of
one of the feeding rollers on which a toothed wheel is fixed. The extent of
movement of the pall over the toothed wheel is regulated by shifting the end
of the rod connected to the pall nearer to or further from the axis of the
feeding roller, and the pall is double so as to admit of its being turned over
in order to work the ratchet wheel in the opposite direction when required.
Our Invention consists, in the third place, in the adaptation and application
of a spring to one of the feeding rollers, or to the pressure plate for the purpose
of regulating the pressure on the material under operation as required. For
this purpose the spring may be applied to the bearing of the lower roller and
be compressed between the bearing and a bottom plate by means of screws and
a metal strap passed over the axis of the top roller, or it may be otherwise
applied.
And our Invention consists, lastly, in the adaptation and application of a
rotary screen of perforated wood or metal over machines of the kind referred
to, in order that long screenings may fall from the screen into the box of the
machine, and be cut over again without the necessity of hand labour. The
screens have perforations of different sizes in order to effect the required
separation of the parts of the material intended to fall into the machine from
those which are to escape from the screen.