FINISHING FROCESSIM—Woollen cloths as they come from the loom are far from being a merchantable article in the ordinary accepla tion of tho term. The processes to go through before the soft, lustrous, and beautiful finish of the fabrics with which we are familiar is obtained are numerous and almost as important as those that have been already described. They consist of the following : fulling ; tentering; 1st raising ; lat cropping or cutting ; 2nd raising ; 2nd cutting ; pressing; steam boiling, em.; 3rd raising; 3rd cutting ; burling and fine drawing ; brushing and steaming; 2nd pressing ; steaming.
At thia point, it will be well to summarize the requisites of a good cloth, or rather the conditiona necessary to produce one. First, good sorting of the wool, which gives an even thread and prevents waste ; thorough cleansing, essential to the production of good colours, and satisfactory working in every stage. After this, the wool should be well dyed, teazed, scrib bled, carded, and slubbed, and carefully spun and wowtn. The preparatory processes before milling should be properly' gone through, the milling well executed, and the fabrics afterwards thoroughly washed in order to remove all trscea of grease, oil, or soap that may remain. The detaila of all these processea require attending to carefully and conscientiously. Any negligence is sure to result in blemishes, and these cannot be eliminated or rendered permanently invisible in the after stages. It takea much more trouble and labour to hide a defect than to keep it out.
After milling and scouring or washing, the cloth should be "cuttled," or folded up closely and laid on the ahed floor for a few days. This improves the condition. When it has to remain in the "balk" state, or have its progress arrested some time at this atage, it should be straightened on the tenter-frame and dried, but care must be exercised in seeing that it is not overstretched, either in width or length.
First raising of the nap.—Woollen fabrics rarely abow the interlacing of the threada ao in most other textures. These are effectually hidden by milling in the first instance. and subse quently by the raising of the nap. " Raising" is an interesting process, and consists of scratching up the surface fibres of the wool upon the face or front of the cloth. Formerly it was done by hand, thu fabric being thrown over a frame, in the front of which stood the workman with his hand teazle-frame, with which he scratched the surface whilst a companion on the opposile side raised that portion. This process was a very laborious one, and has to a great extent been superseded
by the introduction of the " raising-gig." The teazle, Fig. 1460, is the ripe burr or head of a thistle-like plant called Dipsacus fullorum, which is cultivated in several parts of this country (Wiltshire, Essex, Yorkshire), and in many parts of France. Those of Yorkshire are most highly esteemed, and command the highest price. As will be seen Elena the illustration, the head is cone-shaped and formed of or covered by a great number of booked points, all curved in one direction downward. These hooks are strong but pliable, slightly elastic, and very smooth, rendering the heads highly suitable for employment in this process. The teazles are cut from the plant with a stem 2-3 in. long, and inserted in an oblong frame called the teazle-rod, with the books pointing towards the base, and two teazles in height. When hand-raising is the system employed, these frames are small, such as ean be easily wielded by hand, and are furnished with a handle. For the " raising-gig," Fig. 1461, as the teazling machine is called, the frame is about 4 in. in width, and of a length to extend acros.s the gig-cylinder.
After the cloth has been evenly stretched and dried in the tentering-frame, it should be thoroughly wetted on the face or front side with soft clear water, and then folded and left to lie in that state for a day or two. This damping is now performed very efficiently by mechanical means. Fig. 1462 repre,sents a " dewing-machine" used for this purpose, which is of recent intro duction. It is constructed to take the ordinary width of a raw or unmilled cloth, but can be made wider or narrower to suit special purposes. It is an ingenious invention, as the following brief description will show. A cistern a containing water is arranged in the middle of its height, and extends across the breadth of the machine. Through the length of this trough, and inamersed the water, is laid a pipe, into which a number of nozzles are vertically inserted, these being supplied with taps to close them when required. Behind the machine, a patent blower or fan b is arranged with a wind-pipe, up which the blast is conveyed to a second horizontal pipe d, that, like the former, is supplied with nozzles, but in this case they are inserted so as to project in a lateral directiou to the tip of the water musks. The arrangement is clearly shown in the enlarged view of these parts given at e. At f is a trough in which the waste water is received.