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SEWING 1 MACHINES

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Originally appearing in Volume V24, Page 745 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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SEWING 1 See also:

MACHINES . The sewing See also:machine, as is the See also:case with most See also:mechanical inventions, is the result of the efforts of many persons, although it would appear that the most meritorious of these worked in See also:ignorance of the labours and successes of others in the same See also:field. Many of the See also:early attempts to sew by machinery went on the lines of imitating See also:ordinary See also:hand-sewing, and all such inventions proved failures. The method of hand-sewing is of See also:necessity slow and intermittent, seeing that only a definite length of See also:thread is used, which passes its full extent through the See also:cloth at every stitch, thus causing the working See also:arm, human or otherwise, to travel a See also:great length for every stitch made, and demanding frequent renewals of thread. The See also:foundation of machine-sewing was laid by the invention of a See also:double-pointed See also:needle, with the See also:eye in the centre, patented by See also:Charles F. Weisenthal in 1755, with the See also:object of avoiding the necessity for inverting the needle in sewing or embroidering. Many of the features of ?the sewing machine are distinctly specified in a patent secured in See also:England by See also:Thomas See also:Saint in 1790, in which he, inter alia, described a machine for stitching, quilting, or sewing. Saint's machine, which appears to have been intended principally for See also:leather See also:work, was fitted with an See also:awl which, working vertically, pierced a hole for the thread. A spindle and See also:projection laid the thread over this hole, and a descending forked needle pressed a See also:loop of thread through it. The loop was caught on the under See also:side by a reciprocating See also:hook; a feed moved the work forward the extent of one stitch; and a second loop was formed by the same motions as the first. It, however, descended within the first, which was thrown off by the hook as it caught the second, and being thus secured and tightened up an ordinary See also:tambour or See also:chain stitch was formed. Had Saint See also:hit on the See also:idea of the eye-pointed needle his machine would have been a See also:complete anticipation of the See also:modern chain-stitch machine.

The inventor who first devised a real working machine was a poor tailor, See also:

Barthelemy Thimmonier, of St See also:Etienne, who obtained letters patent in See also:France in 1830. In Thimmonier's apparatus the needle was crocheted, and descending through the cloth it brought up with it a loop of thread which it carried through the previously made loop, and thus it formed a chain on the upper See also:surface of the fabric. Though the machine was rather clumsy, made principally of See also:wood, as many as eighty were being worked in See also:Paris in 1841, making See also:army clothing, when an ignorant and furious See also:crowd wrecked the See also:establishment and nearly murdered the unfortunate inventor. Thimmonier, how-ever, was not discouraged, for in 1845 he twice patented improvements on it, and in 1848 he obtained both in England and the See also:United See also:Kingdom See also:patents for further improvements. The machine was then made entirely of See also:metal, and vastly improved on the first See also:model. But the troubles of 1848 blasted the prospects of the resolute inventor. His patent rights for Great See also:Britain were sold; a machine shown in the Great See also:Exhibition of 1851 attracted no See also:attention, and he died in 1857 unfriended and unrewarded. The most important ideas of an eye-pointed needle and a double thread or See also:lock-stitch are strictly of See also:American origin, and that See also:combination was first conceived by See also:Walter See also:Hunt of New See also:York about 1832-1834. Hunt reaped nothing of the enormous pecuniary See also:reward which has been shared among the introducers of, the sewing machine, and it is therefore all the more necessary that his great merit as an inventor should be insisted on. He constructed a machine having a vibrating arm, at the extremity of which he fixed a curved needle with an eye near its point._ By this needle a loop of thread was formed under the cloth to be sewn, and through that loop a thread carried in an oscillating See also:shuttle was passed, thus making the lock-stitch of all ordinary two-thread machines. Hunt's invention was See also:purchased by a blacksmith named See also:Arrowsmith, and a See also:good See also:deal was done towards improving its mechanical details, but no patent was sought, nor was any serious See also:attempt made to draw attention to the invention. After the success of machines 1 " Sew,',. for stitching with a needle, is a word See also:common to Indo- See also:European See also:languages; cf.

See also:

Lat. suere, Gr. sa0o € v, sarrbeW, Sansk. siv.based on his two devices was fully established, Hunt in 1853 applied for a patent; but his claim was disallowed on the ground of See also:abandonment. The most important feature in Hunt's invention—the eye-pointed needle—was first patented in the United Kingdom by See also:Newton and Archbold in 1841, in connexion with See also:glove-stitching. Apparently unconscious of the invention of Walter Hunt, See also:Elias See also:Howe, a native of See also:Spencer, See also:Mass., directed his attention to machine-sewing about the See also:year 1843. In 1844 he completed a rough model, and in 1846 he patented his sewing machine (fig. 1). Howe was thus the first to patent a lock-stitch machine, but his invention had the two essential features—the curved eye-pointed needle and the under-thread shuttle—which were invented by Walter Hunt twelve years previously. Howe's invention was sold in England to See also:William F. Thomas of Cheapside, See also:London, a corset manufacturer, for £250. Thomas secured in See also:December 1846 the See also:English patent in his own name, and engaged Howe on weekly See also:wages to adapt the machine for his manufacturing purposes. The career of the inventor in London was unsuccessful; and, having pawned his American patent rights in England, he returned in See also:April 1849 in poverty to See also:America. There in the meantime the sewing machine was beginning to excite public curiosity, and various persons were making machines which Howe found to See also:trench on his patent rights. The most prominent of the manufacturers, if not of inventors, ultimately appeared in See also:Isaac See also:Merritt See also:Singer (1811-1875), who in 1851 secured a patent for his machine (fig.

2). Howe now became alert to vindicate his rights, and, after regaining See also:

possession of his pawned patent, he instituted suits against the infringers. An enormous amount of litigation ensued, in which Singer figured as a most obstinate See also:defendant, but ultimately all makers became tributary to Elias Howe. It is calculated that Howe received in the See also:form of royalties on ma-chines made up to the See also:period of the expiry of his extended patent (See also:September 1867—he died in the next See also:month) a sum of not less than two millions of dollars. The practicability of machine-sewing being demonstrated, inventions of considerable originality and merit followed in See also:quick See also:succession. One of the most ingenious of all the inventors —who worked also without knowledge of previous efforts—was Mr See also:Allan B. See also:Wilson. In 1849 he devised the rotary hook and bobbin combination, forming the See also:special feature of the See also:Wheeler & Wilson machine. Wilson obtained a patent for his machine, which included the important and effective four-See also:motion feed for moving the work after every stitch, in See also:November 1850. In See also:February 1851 William O. Grover, a tailor, of See also:Boston, patented his double chain-stitch See also:action, which formed the basis of the Grover & See also:Baker machine. In 1856 See also:James A.

E. See also:

Gibbs (1829-1902), a See also:Virginia See also:farmer, devised the chain-stitch machine, improved subsequently by J. Willcox and now known as the Wilcox & Gibbs. These together—all American inventions—form the types of the various machines now in common use. Thousands of patents have been issued in the United States and See also:Europe, covering improvements in the sewing machine; but, although its efficiency and usefulness have been greatly increased by numerous accessories and attachments, the See also:main principles of the various machines have not been affected thereby. In machine sewing three varieties of stitch are made—(1) the See also:simple chain or tambour stitch, (2) the double chain stitch and (3) the lock stitch. In the first variety the machine See also:works with a single thread; the other forms use two, an upper and an under thread. The structure of the chain stitch is shown in fig. 3. The needle first descends through the cloth, then as it begins to ascend the See also:friction of the thread against the fabric is sufficient to form a small loop into which the point of a hook operating under the cloth See also:plate enters, expanding and holding the loop while the needle rises to its full height. The feed then moves the fabric forward one stitch length, the hook with its loop is also projected so that when next the needle descends its loop is formed within the previous loop. The hook then releases loop No.

1, seizes and expands loop No. 2, and in so doing draws up the previous loop into a stitch, chain-like on the under side but See also:

plain on the upper surface of the fabric. The seam so made is See also:firm and elastic, but easily undone, for if at any point a thread is broken the whole of the sewing can be readily run out backwards by pulling the thread, just as in crochet work. To a certain extent this imperfection in the chain-stitch machine is overcome in the Wilcox & Gibbs machine, in which each loop, by means of a rotating hook, is See also:twisted See also:half a revolution after it has passed through its predecessor. The somewhat complicated course of the threads in the double chain stitch of the Grover & Baker machine is shown in fig. 4. 4.-Double from an ordinary bobbin and was threaded through a circular needle of See also:peculiar form. The machine was wasteful of thread, and the sewing formed a knotted See also:ridge on the under side of the fabric. The lock stitch is that made by all ordinary two-thread sewing machines, and is a stitch peculiar to machine sewing. Its structure is, as shown in fig. 5, very simple, and when by proper tension the threads interlock within the work it shows the same on both sides and is very secure. When, however,the tension on the upper thread is weak, the under thread runs along the surface as at b, held more or less tightly by the upper loops.

It will be seen that to make the lock stitch the under thread has to be passed quite through the loop of the upper thread. That is done in two See also:

principal ways. By the first See also:plan a small metal shuttle, holding within it a bobbin of thread, is - carried backward and forward under the cloth plate, and at each forward See also:movement passes through the upper thread loop formed by each succeeding stroke of the needle. Such is the principle devised by Hunt, introduced by Howe, and improved by Singer and many others. The second principal method of forming the lock stitch consists in seizing the loop of the upper thread by a rotating hook, expanding the loop and passing it around a stationary bobbin within which is See also:wound the under thread. The method is the invention of A. B. Wilson, and is known generally as the Wheeler & Wilson principle. The rotary hook seen at b, fig. 6, is so bevelled and notched that it opens and expands the upper thread loop, causing it quite to enclose the bobbin of under thread, after which it throws it off and the so-formed lock stitch is pulled up and tightened either by an See also:independent take-up motion as in later machines, or by the expansion of the next loop as in the older forms. The bobbin A, lenticular in form, and its case B, fig. 6, See also:fit easily into a circular depression within the hook, against which they are held by the bobbin holder a, fig.

6. Intermediate between the shuttle and the rotary-hook machines is the oscillating-shuttle machine introduced by the Singer Co. The shuttle is hook-formed, not unlike the Wilson hook, and it carries within it a capacious circular bobbin of thread h. fig. 7. This shuttleis driven by an oscillating See also:

driver db within an See also:annular raceway a a, and, instead of revolving completely like the Wilson hook, it oscillates only in an arc of 15o°, so far as serves to catch and clear the upper thread. The oscillating-shuttle and rotary-hook machines work with great smoothness and rapidity. Sewing machines are now made in hundreds of varieties for special kinds of work. Some, for example, are capable of performing the _ (Wheeler & Wilson Machine). most complicated operations in ornamental stitching, a See also:horizontal right and See also:left motion, in addition to the ordinary See also:vertical motions, being for this purpose often imparted to the needle See also:bar; others will sew See also:button-holes at the See also:rate of 8 or it) a See also:minute; while others again will sew on the buttons, making the required number of stitches, stopping automatically with the needle at its highest point, and cutting the threads off See also:close to the underside of the work. In some cases two or more needles are fitted, producing parallel rows of stitches; with a machine having 12 needles a single operation may make as many as 24,000 stitches a minute. Special forms of machine are designed to meet the requirements of the glove-See also:sewer, the See also:umbrella-maker, &c. In sewing carpets the great See also:weight of the material makes feeding difficult, and therefore machines have been invented that move along the See also:carpet, which itself remains stationary.

The earlier forms were hand-worked ; the two lengths of carpet were stretched across the See also:

room, and the machine travelled along the seam, followed by the operator, who turned it by means of a hand-See also:crank. One of these machines was capable of doing the work of eight or ten hand-sewers. With later forms, operated by See also:electricity or other See also:power and See also:running along a track, the carpet is stretched and sewed so rapidly that one power machine does the work of eight or ten hand machines. The introduction of sewing machines has revolutionized the See also:boot and See also:shoe See also:industry, and books are stitched by machine, the Brehmer See also:wire-sewing machine and See also:Smyth thread-sewing machine being prominent representatives of this class.

End of Article: SEWING 1 MACHINES

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