Cotton Weaving and Designing / 6th Edition

by John T. Taylor

“In order to avoid stopping the motion of the loom when any one of the four weft threads break, twice or three times as many shuttles as are required for constant use are to be lodged in suitable receptacles or shuttle boxes, which are so arranged that the breaking of a weft thread will cause a change of shuttles, and a substitution of spare shuttles, which have been provided and placed in the said receptacles ready for such changing; for instance, the breaking or failure of a weft thread from either of the two shuttles, which work on the same reed as one pair, will cause the pair to be removed, and a pair of spare shuttles to be brought into their place instantaneously, without any act of the person who attends the loom, and who will therefore have no occasion to stop the motion thereof when a weft thread breaks or runs off, but will only have to take care to keep the loom at all times provided with a sufficient number of spare shuttles ready filled and inserted into their proper places in the receptacles, leaving it to the machinery of the loom to remove those shuttles which have been working, and to substitute others the instant that a change becomes necessary in consequence of the breakage or failure of weft thread. But if, by neglect of the attendant, the loom is not so provided with a pair of spare shuttles ready filled and placed in preparation for changing as aforesaid by the machinery on the breakage or failure of any weft thread, then the loom will stop its own motion, wherefore the weaving cannot be continued unless all the four webs have their several wefts duly inserted in a proper manner for working cloth.” From this description it is of interest to note that what probably constituted the first automatic loom was of the shuttle-changing type, to which nearly all subsequent inventors in this particular field have chiefly devoted their attention.

It was not until an interval of nearly seven years had elapsed after Reid and Johnson’s patent that a patent was granted to Charles Parker, of Darlington, for the second invention of an automatic weft-replenishing device, which, like its predecessor, was also one of the shuttle-changing type. This device, along with other improvements in power-looms, is described and illustrated in the specification dated 22nd October, 1840, No. 8664, in which the fourth claim made by the patentee is in respect of “means of changing the shuttle when the weft is broken or the shuttle is empty of weft” without the necessity of stopping the loom for that purpose.

The next and third patent for an automatic weft-replenishing device, which, like the two previous devices, was a shuttle-changer, was that granted to an agent, William Newton, to whom the invention was communicated from a foreign country not named in the specification which is dated 28th April, 1852, No. 14,092. This document states that the invention relates to improvements in looms for weaving plain, figured, or fancy fabrics, and that it consists in the employment of several shuttles arranged in the loom in such a manner that if the weft failed, or the shuttle missed or flew out of the shuttle-box, a second shuttle would always be in readiness to take its place, without it being necessary to stop the loom in order to replace it with a fresh shuttle. In carrying out the improvement, several shuttles where placed one above the other in a box, or in guides fixed immediately above the shuttle-race or box, and held in their place by means of a stud, plate, or catch, which, when required, was removed so as to allow a second shuttle to enter the shuttle-box in place of the spent shuttle, which, by the same motion, was pushed out. In the event of a shuttle flying out or missing the shuttle-box, the same mechanism caused a fresh shuttle to supply its place. The special mechanism which affected the changing of shuttles was put into operation by means of a weft-stopping device which detected the absence of weft whenever this failed to pass along the shuttle-race in front of the reed.

After an interval of five years from the granting of the previous patent, Patrick McFarlane, of Perth, patented an automatic weft-replenishing device which marks a distinctly new departure from the previous inventions for the same object, and one, moreover, which has the distinction of constituting the prototype of cop-or bobbin-changing devices, of which type a modification has been so successfully adopted in the construction of Northrop automatic looms. McFarlane’s invention is described in the Patent Specification dated 13th April, 1857, No. 1046, which states that “the first part of the invention consists in means or arrangements by which a loom is made to supply its shuttle or shuttles with fresh weft when the weft last placed in the shuttle or shuttles has become broken or exhausted.” The cop or bobbin of weft was placed in a case which fitted inside the shuttle in which it was held securely during weaving, but from which it could be easily ejected and replaced by another weft-case containing a fresh supply of weft whilst the loom continued weaving. Any practicable number of these weft-cases were conveniently stored and retained in a suitable receptacle or hopper, so that the successive weft-cases could take the place of those removed, as they were each in turn inserted in the shuttle. The chamber containing the reserve supply of weft-cases was attached to the framing of the loom opposite the shuttle-box or boxes, so that when the absence of weft was detected by the weft-fork, this put into operation the weft-changing mechanism which forced a weft-case from the hopper into the shuttle, and thereby displaced the previous weft-case which fell into a box or basket.

An interval of only three years elapsed before the next patent was granted for a weft-replenishing device patented by Thomas Ingram, of Bradford, for which the specification is dated 4th April, 1860, No. 861. In this specification, the patentee describes a device which combines the elements of both a shuttle-changing and also a cop-or bobbin-changing loom. The invention relates to mechanism for effecting a continuous action in looms without stopping them to change the bobbins or cops, or for an additional supply of weft, whether that is all used up or only broken. This was effected by forming an opening or aperture in the front, back, top or bottom of the shuttle-box “large enough to admit a shuttle, or a case containing a spool or spools of weft, to pass through to be inserted within the box.” Also, “when the weft is broken or used up, or a change of weft is required, the shuttle, or the case within the shuttle containing the weft, is immediately expelled through one of the openings in the shuttle-box, and supplied through another of the openings with another shuttle or a case containing a further supply of weft.” The patentee states later that he is aware of a patent for a previous device “to exchange the cop of weft by means of a portable case, whilst the loom was in action,” and does not claim that device as a part of his own invention; but what he claims “is the combination and the general arrangement of apparatus or mechanism for producing or effecting continuous action in looms for weaving.”

A device of a different character from any of those previously described was one that formed the subject of a communication from Julius Boeddinghaus, of Elberfeld, Prussia, to an agent, William Brookes, and is described in the specification dated 14th November, 1860, No. 2787. The function of this device was merely that of ejecting the shuttle automatically when the weft failed; but the replenishing of weft required to be performed by hand in the usual manner. The ejecting of the shuttle was effected by causing it to shoot downward through an opening in the base of the shuttle-box at one end of the slay, and on the occurrence of which the loom would stop.

A patent for the next device which, although not strictly belonging to the present category of inventions, is, nevertheless, closely allied to them, was that granted to John Leeming, Bradford, and described in the specification dated 5th February, 1861, No. 301. The specific object of this device was to effect changes of weft of different kinds or colours for the production of check fabrics. Weft-cases, as introduced by Patrick McFarlane in 1857, were employed to contain the weft, and the weft-cases were exchanged automatically in the same shuttle according to a prearranged scheme of decoration, but not on the failure of weft, in which event the loom would stop as usual. The device was, therefore, a checking motion to effect changes of different kinds of weft by changing cops or bobbins, instead of employing a number of separate chambers, each containing a shuttle with a different kind of weft, and bringing these in line with the race-board, as required. In this respect, therefore, the present device may be regarded as the first recorded attempt to adapt the automatic weft-replenishing element to perform the function of a checking motion.

The next following patent for a weft-replenishing device was that granted to three Crawfords and Robert Templeton, of Beith, Ayr, and described in the specification dated 17th February, 1862, No. 419. This invention, which is of the shuttle-changing type, introduces two distinctly novel departures from any previous invention of the same class, namely, the employment of a six-chambered revolving shuttle-box to bring fresh shuttles into working position, and also what corresponds to a weft-feeling motion to effect the replenishing of weft before the supply in use is quite depleted. The chambers of the multiple shuttle-box are charged with reserve shuttles contained in a hopper. At each change of shuttles the boxes revolved on their common axis for one-sixth of a revolution to receive a fresh shuttle in readiness for the next change. On arriving at the bottom of its circuit, the discarded shuttle fell out of its chamber into a receptacle. The weft-feeling motion operated the weft-changing mechanism when the weft was nearly depleted. This was effected by constructing the weft pirns or bobbins with a longitudinal slot to receive a curved blade-spring fitting inside the shuttle so that it entered the slot in the bobbin and passed underneath the weft. On the weft becoming exhausted to a certain fixed point on the bobbin, the blade-spring was automatically released, on which it projected through a slot formed in the shuttle side. Thus, on the shuttle arriving in its chamber of the rotary boxes, the blade-spring came into contact with a part of the weft-changing mechanism which was thereby put into operation to change the shuttles.

The foregoing brief descriptions of the first eight patented devices for the automatic replenishing of weft in looms will serve to indicate the general character which those devices assumed down to February, 1862. Although since that date to the present time the number of patents for devices of that class of inventions number many hundreds, yet it is significant that none of these later devices differ in any essential element from those of earlier inventions. The table on [page 209] gives a list of weft-replenishing devices for which Letters Patent have been granted, down to 1894, with the date and number of specification, the names of patentees, and type of device.