BENDING M CI1 I NEM% It be taken as a proof of advance in matters mechani cal when bent construction is substituted for cut, as, for example, in the making of crank shafts, in bent-wood furniture, and in machines for making shafts and poles from bent wood. The shaft and pole bending machine shown is for bending double and single bent express shafts and poles, and carriage shafts and poles; forming the heel end of express or carriage shafts and poles, and the body and tip end of shafts complete at the same time. The principle involved is the bending of the material over iron forms which are heated with live or exhaust steam, drying and seasoning the material while under process of bending. Green stock is bent and seasoned at the same time. The machines are furnished in sections. That shown in the cut, has two sections coin plete for bending shafts in 10-pair lots, or 18 poles at once: and they can he filled four times per day. The forms are cast with cored chambers at the points of bending, with 2-in.-pipe connections, through which steam is received and discharged to heat, the forms. Body-forms tire mounted upon rollers with a horizontal at
tachment for betiding shafts of different lengths. and are supplied with adjustable top forms to produce any desired bend on shaft ends. When used for bending poles the rollers under the body-forms are removed and the forms lowered 11 in., allowing the body of the poles when bent down upon the form to rest upon the top of the ribs, which are used only for giving the side bend to shafts. In operation, the forms are well heated before bending, and the mate rial to be Lent is covered with a steel strap which is stretched over the surface of the portion to be bent (by a hand-clamp, as shown by the second shaft in the engraving), to prevent the material being broken while bending. A loop is fitted to the end of each strap, which hooks over a lug cast to the form, and the materia-1 is then bent down over the forms and locked by the hand-lever, as shown in the cut, For bending double bends, the loop is held to the lug upon the outside form.