TYPESETTING 'MACHINES. Of the various styles of machines for setting and for distributing type, several have proven of considerable value in the printing of magazines, weekly papers. and books, but until quite recently no apparatus has been found equal to the special requirements of large newspaper offices. A machine, combining in one structure the functions of setting and distributing. appears to be the desideratum, and several journals are DOW successfully using a machine which admirably suits their purpose.
The Thorne Typesetting Arehine, of which there are a large number in use. has been lately remodeled and improved, and is now considered to be a practically perfect newspaper machine, combining the features of typesetting and the automatic distribution of the type. after it has been used, back into the machine for repeated use. A general description of the machine, which is shown in the accompanying illustration. is as follows : As will be seen on reference to the general view, Fig. 1, the two principal features of the Thorne type setting and distributing machine are a keyboard, and two vertical cylinders, having the same axis, the upper cylinder resting upon a collar on the lower one. Both cylinders are cut with a number of vertical grooves, of such form as to receive the type, which is to be first distrib uted, and then reset. There are ninety of these vertical grooves in each of the cylinders, sufficient to contain all letters, and all kinds of characters that are wanted for ordinary pur poses. The keyboard carries a number of keys corresponding to that of the grooves, and when the machine is in operation, whatever key is depressed, the letter corresponding to it is ejected front its proper groove in the lower cylinder upon a circular and revolvin• table, which has the same axis as the cylinder, but is of larger diameter. Of course, quite a num ber of types may thus be ejected from the grooves in each revolution of the disk, and all are brought round in their proper order to a jioint of delivery, where they are conveyed by a traveling band into a. guile, and are forced into a parallel position with each other and proper
alignment by a striker as they travel in the guide, and they are also gradually turned upward by a twisted portion of the slide ; that is to say, so as to present the face of the letters upward.
The types thus set are discharged in lines into a galley, and by an attendant, provided with a case containing " spaces," are " justified ; " that is to say, the spaces between words are increased equally until the last worth or, if a syllable, with its required hyphen, in each line reaches the end of the line. Proof corrections are, of course, done in the ordinary way.
The control of the types is effected by forming on the side of each character recesses something like the wards of a key, the arrangement, of course, being different for each char acter. The upper ends of the grooves in the lower cylinder are provided with projections corresponding to these grooves on the types, so that no type will fall into any groove other• than that for which it is intended. This arrangement applies only to the lower cylinder, which does not revolve. The grooves in the upper or distributing cylinder are large enough to receive all the types, indifferently, that arc fed into them. The work of distribution is effected as follows : A suitable attachment to the side of the upper cylinder enables the op erator to place the galley containing- the type to be distributed in contact with the'cylinder, and by a very simple device, line after line of type is fed into the cylinder until, if desired, every groove is nearly filled, and the tipper cylinder is caused to revolve upon the lower one, with which it is in contact. As the columns of mixed type pass over the heads of the differently shaped grooves of the lower cylinder, letter by letter falls into its proper groove as soon as the nicks in the types find their corresponding wards.