INGENUITY AND LUXURY 



THE POWER-LOOM PERFECTED 



Cart wright's first loom, which according to his own 

 letter quoted above was a very crude affair, neverthe- 

 less contained the essential principles of the modern 

 power-loom. In his specifications for his patents he 

 describes these essential features as follows, "The 

 shuttle, instead of being thrown by hand, is thrown 

 either by a spring, the vibration of a pendulum, the 

 stroke of a hammer, or by the application of one of 

 the mechanical powers, according to the nature of 

 the work and the distance the shuttle is required to 

 be thrown, and, lastly, the web winds up gradually 

 as it is woven." Then follow other details which con- 

 stitute the complete process of manufacturing cloth. 

 The power for running this machine was imparted 

 to a roller by means of a crank and handle. 



His first machines, as we have seen, were defective 

 in certain things, and Cartwright set about perfecting 

 and completing every feature and combating mechan- 

 ically every difficulty that might arise in the process 

 of weaving. His visits to the places where practical 

 weaving was being done had shown him the defects 

 and possible weakness of his machine, and furnished 

 him with many new ideas. The result was that by 

 1786 he had perfected plans for an absolutely auto- 

 matic power-loom, almost as complete in every detail 

 as the most perfect loom of to-day. This machine 

 not only provided for automatically handling the 

 shuttle, but for "warping, beaming, sizing, taking-up 

 motion for cloth, letting-off motion for warp, stopping 



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