March i, 1904.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



201 



THE MANUFACTURE OF WOOL AND KNIT BOOTS. 



THERE is no make of footwear more comfortable or bet- 

 ter adapted for the use of the farmer, lumberman, and 

 other workers exposed to the severe cold of a northern 

 winter, than the uncouth knit or felt boot, with foot 

 encased in stout rubber "perfection" 

 shoe. The reason is that the porous 

 light weight wool structure not only 

 affords warmth by the nonconduct- 

 ing effect of the included air, but 

 also permits enough ventilation to 

 keep the feet dry. 



These goods are manufactured by 

 the Mishawaka Woolen Manufactur- 

 ing Co., under the patents of the late 

 Messrs. Beiger and Eberhart, former 

 president and superintendent re- 

 spectively of the company. The 

 mills of the company are situated 

 at Mishawaka, Indiana, on the St. 

 Joe river, and are operated by water 

 and steam power. The plant is mod- 

 ern in every respect and has been 

 undergoing constant en- 

 largement for the past ^ 



six years. The present 

 dailjroutput is 6500 paiis 

 of boots, besides socks 

 and a general line of 

 heavy rubber footwear. Coon Tail Knit Boot with Snow Exci 1 01 1 



The processes employed in the manufacture of the woolen 

 portion of these combination goods are particularly interesting. 

 The grade of wool especially adapted to this class of goods is 

 that known as carpet wool, of long coarse fiber. The bulk of 

 it comes from the great wool centers of southern Russia, 

 Bokhara, and the Oriental countries. The rough wool is very 

 dirty and is first of all sorted for quality and colors, then sub 

 jected to a process of scouring to cleanse it. It is subsequently 

 dried and dusted by fans and 



passed through a machine known 

 as a "batch picker," in which 



weighed amounts of the various 



grades and colors are intimately 



blended or mixed. This opera- 

 tion corresponds to compound- 

 ing in rubber work, and is done 



with a similar object in view — 



i. <?., to obtain a stock of definite 



cost and color suited to the goods 



to be made. From the batch 



picker the wool passes to the 



carding machines, where the 



fibers are combed out or laid in 



the same general direction. For 



the knit goods the 



next step is spinning 



the yarns, and for the 



felt goods the forma- 

 tion of a "bat" or 



wadding-like sheet 



b ilt in plies on a fig 2. 



Special machine. Application of Snow Excluding Device. 



/. The Knit Boot. 



Beginning with the yarn, the first process in making the knit 

 boot is the knitting of a mammoth sock in two parts. The 

 great size is necessary in the sock to obtain the weight of ma- 

 terial necessary to permit the subsequent fulling and shrinking 

 operations. The foot portion of the sock is knit on a small 

 circular hand power machine, because its variable width and 

 turning the heel is not as simple as the straight leg part. The 

 latter is knit on a power machine run at high speed. Both foot 

 and leg are knit with three yarns to give weight and bulk to 

 the goods. 



A peculiar knit boot called the " coon tail " (Fig. 1) is pro- 

 vided with a snow excluding device, and the leg is stripped 

 somewhat after the style of a raccoon's tail. The snow excluder 

 consists of a double ankle portion which lays down over the 

 rubber shoe and effectually keeps the snow out of it (Fig. 2). 

 In order to make the boot in this way the foot is simply knit 



FIG. 3. 

 Relative Size of Knit Boots Before and After Shrinkage. 



into the leg at a point several inches above the beginning of 

 the straight tubular section which forms the leg, instead of at 

 the beginning as in the ordinary form of boot. The cross coon- 

 tail stripes are put into the leg by alternately shifting on and 

 off the knitting needles, while the machine is in motion, the 

 yarns of the body color and the darker yarns of the stripes. 



The illustration (Fig. 3) gives an idea of the comparative 

 sizes of the knit boot as first knit and as finished. After the 

 knit boot comes from the knitting machine, its subsequent 

 treatment is the same as that for a felt boot once formed in the 

 rough. At this point the mode of making the start of the felt 

 boot will be taken up and this will be followed by the consid- 

 eration in detail of the finishing process in manufacture for 

 both knit and felt. 



