294 CARPET MANUFACTURE IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES. 



manufacture are conducted under one management. The wool is taken 

 as it comes from the bale and the finished product turned out ready for 

 shipment. 



These mills sell their goods direct to distributers without the inter- 

 vention of commission merchants. Most of their production is con- 

 sumed in the home market, or else goes to the British Colonies. 



They use raw wool of almost every grade, particularly the low grades, 

 including the by-product of the cloth-mills (as noils, waste, etc.), to- 

 gether with tow and perhaps other materials, varying as to the 

 quality of the goods turned out. A brief summary of the process by 

 which the felt carpeting is made may be of interest. Much of the 

 wool used by this company is bought washed, and goes from the bale 

 at once to the willeying machine, where it is opened out and the fibers 

 separated. This process is continued by another machine, termed a 

 " teaser." From the teaser the wool is taken to the cards. 



The card-cylinders are* made sufficiently long and are set in the 

 machine at right angles to their length, so that the desired width of the 

 future piece is accommodated within the length of the cylinder, and when 

 the material passes from the face of the cylinder it has already assumed 

 the requisite dimension of breadth. Length and thickness remain for 

 further operations. 



To these card-cylinders the wool from the teasiug-machine is fed 

 through the medium of a trough, which automatically weighs and trans- 

 fers the wool to the cylinders, distributing the material duly along the 

 carding surface as it does so. The weight of the fabric is thus regu- 

 lated, due allowance, no doubt, being made for waste and any other 

 incident. 



from the first set of cards the material passes to a parallel set, 

 whence it is taken in a thin sheet from the face of the last card-cylinder 

 and is transferred to an arrangement in the nature of a reel, which is in 

 width equal to the length the card-cylinder face, and revolves in the 

 same direction as the cards. The filmy web from the cards is wound 

 upon this reel (called an " accumulator") to the extent of sundry turns, 

 and being then cut from the accumulator it gives a fluffy length com- 

 prising several folds, which is eventually to go to the making of a piece 

 of felt carpeting. This length is then wound into a roll of not immod- 

 erate tightness, in shape somewhat like a roll of bagging, and it is 

 then termed a bat. 



The bats are next placed on a machine, where the web is still further 

 thickened by the super imposition of one layer upon another in a very 

 ingeniously combined direct and indirect acting fashion, which it may 

 be attempted to describe. 



The machine is of the same width as the preceding ones; that is to 

 say, sufficiently wide to take the fabric flat. 



It has a direct action swinging screen hung above and across its 

 length, wherefrom one web is laid down upon another, while the latter 



