The warp, having received its " gears," as the healds and reed are called, when attached, is ready for the loom to which it is carried by the overlooker, or "tackler," or " tuner," as he is called in different parts of the country.
Weaving.—The loom is a machine which is as characteristic of manufacturing as the mule is of spinning, and claims an equal if not greater antiquity. It is not, however, necessary to trace the descent of the present comparatively perfect loom from remote times. The present epoch of mechanical invention was inaugurated by the invention of the picking-stick, or peg, of the elder Kay, of Bury, in 1738. Until his time, the shuttle was passed from hand to hand, through the open warp, by the weaver, which system, when the cloth was wide, required two weavers to each loom. Hay ingeniously added a box to each end of the slay or lathe, for the reception of the shuttle, furnishing each with a horizontal spindle, and placing a piece of wood cut into a convenient form, and pierced with a hole, upon the spindle, to " pick " or push the shuttle across the warp : hence its name " picker." A cord was attached to each of these pickers, and to a stick or peg placed equidistant from the pickers. By the horizontal movement of this lever, the weaver was enabled to jerk the shuttle the warp, which he opened by means of treadles—levers worked by the feet —placed under the loom, whilst, with his left hand, he moved the slay backwards and forwards, to bring home the thread of weft left by the passage of the shuttle. The effect of this invention was to enable the weaver to quadruple his production. Kay's son subsequently invented the " drop-box " for tho loom, which was to place, at one or both ends of the slay, more than one shuttle box, lying horizontally upon each other. This enabled the weaver to use wefts of several colours, the boxes being raised or lowered by means of a finger-lever, so as to deliver the colour of yarn required to make the pattern. By this appliance, checked goods could be woven with almost the same facility as plain cloth.
These inventions gave a great impulse to the cotton and other textile industries. Weft-yarns, scarce before, now became fourfold more so, and the scarcity was not obviated until the inventions of Hargreaves, Arkwright, and Crompton, had been brought into general use, half a century later.
As before observed, anxiety about the ability to consume the product of these improvements in spinning, suggested the power-loom, which, during the lapse of another half century, was brought to a considerable degree of perfection. There would be no more interesting chapter in the history of invention than one descriptive of the genesis and development of the automatio loom, but it is not admissible here. The machine must be described as it now exists.
Fig. 566 shows in detail the working parts of a plain loom, and, as this is the foundation on which others are constructed, its description will suffice for all, except in the parts that are added to secure modified results. The frame-work a, roughly speaking, describes the figure of a cube, within which, and attached to the sides thereof, are the working parts. The shaft, carrying the balance-wheel b, extends through the centre of the frame, and projeeta about 12-18 in. beyond, for the reception of the driving-pulleys, one fast, the other loose. A brake-wheel is usually carried upon this part. The shaft has its bearings in the sides of the frame. Just within the frame, at each side, this shaft is cranked, and by means of arms, is attaohed to the slay or lathe c, which oscillates upon the " slay swords" h, on the centre i, called the swing- or rocking-rail. The slay c has many parts. Its upper surface from end to end forms the shuttle-race—the ground over which the shuttle passes backward and forward between the shuttle-boxes f. The reed occupies the space d, its frame fitting into grooves at the top and bottom, where it is retained in position by the " slay-cap " e. The shuttle box is formed by the side f and a board at the back, and the end plate which closes its extremity. The " fiy-apindle " g has one end inserted in the spindle-stud near d, the other passing through the end plate into a socket on the top end of the spring, which is secured by a screw-bolt to the slay c.