PATENTS RELATING TO THE MANUFACTURE OF ARTIFICIAL COMB 



FOUNDATION. 



Fifteen patents have been issued for the manufacture of artificial comb 

 and comb foundation. Arranged chronologically follows a brief de- 

 scription of them : 



No. 32258, ISSUED MAY 7, 18(51. 

 This being the first one on record it is given almost in full. 



SAMUKL WAGNER. ARTIFICIAL HONEYCOMB. 



Specification forming part of Letters Patent, No. 1254. Whole No. 32258, dated May 7, 



1861. 



To all whom it may concern : 



Be it known that I, Samuel Wagner, of York, in the county of York, and State of 

 Pennsylvania, have invented a new and useful article of manufacture ; and I do hereby 

 declare that the following, taken in connection with the drawings which accompany 

 and form part of this specification, is a description of my invention so full and exact 

 as to enable those skilled iu the art to practice it. 



My new manufacture consists in a substitute for the central division or foundation 

 of the comb built by bees, either with or without" the whole, or any portion of the 

 walls forming the hexagonal cells projecting from the division, which substitute is 

 artificially and suitably formed upon both sides or faces, and of any suitable material 

 which is susceptible of receiving the desired and necessary configuration. 



A mold is prepared, similarly to those used in the production of printers' type, in 

 which solids are cast which will accurately fill the interior of a newly-formed cell of 

 a natural comb of the kind of which it is desired to form the central division. Num- 

 bers of type or solids being produced they are "locked together" into a "form" like 

 printers' type, and facsimiles of the assemblage are produced by either of the well- 

 known processes of stereotyping or electrotyping. 



Two of these stereotypes or electrotypes are made to act, by means of a press or 

 otherwise, upon the opposite sides or faces of an interposed sheet of suitable material, 

 which action gives the sheet the configuration desired. It is best to obtain in this 

 division or foundation sheet a uniform degree of tenuity, which can only be done by 

 closely imitating the natural waxen comb, which is effected by so placing the dies 

 that the apices formed at the juncture of the three rhomboidal facets of each hexagon 

 shall be exactly opposite the juncture of the sides of three facets of adjacent hexagons 

 forming the reverse side. The angles of the rhomboidal facets should be as nearly as 

 possible 109 and 71, and the dies should not be permitted to approach each other so 

 nearly as to reduce the thickness of the interposed material much less than the one- 

 hundredth part of an inch. Should it bo deemed desirable to form the hexagonal 

 Avails of the cells, or any portion of them, the type or solids should be formed with a 

 band or projection around them of about the one two-hundredth part of an inch in 

 thickness, and some taper may be given to the type from the baud toward the rhom- 

 boidal facets. If the walls of the cells are to be extended to any considerable distance 

 from the central web or division provision should be made for the admission of air into 



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