US17254A - Rotary shingle-cutter - Google Patents

Description

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

VILLIAM BEVARD, OF ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI.

ROTARY SHINGLE-CUTTER.

Specification of Letters Patent No. 17,254, dated May 12, 1857.

To all whom 2'15 may concern.'

Be it known that I, 7WILLIAM Bavaro, of the city of St. Louis and State of Missouri, have invented a new and useful Improvement on Shingle-Machines; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description of the same, reference being had to the annexed drawing, making a part of this specification, in which-- Figure l shows a plan, Fig. Q a` front and Fig. 3 a side elevation.

My invention is-an improvement on the rotating shingle machine, and consists in modifying the form of the knife so as to cause it to cut the shingle from the point to the butt without checking it, and of providing the machine with an automatic feeding apparatus, to be adjusted with the feet of the operato-r, so as to leave his hands at liberty-to prepare the succeeding block, by which it lnay be operated with greater safety; as the hands of the operator will not be endangered by the knives, and with greater rapidity, because the machine can be constantly supplied with material.

To enable others to make and use my invention, I will proceed to describe the construction and operation of an ordinary rotating shingle machine, with the improvement attached. r

A A is the frame of the machine.

B is the cutting wheel.

C is a shaft upon which it is fixed, and D D are pulleys to which the power is applied.

E and F are knives fixed against the cutting wheel, over slots cut diagonally through it as shown by the dotted lines at G, Fig. 1.

Against the frame of the machine, I fix the horizontal table H and in it I cut a right angular slot, which serves as a guide to the gripping bar I as shown at s and 10Fig. 1.

Between the frame legs A A I fix the shaft J, so as to vibrate on its own axis, and in it I insert the gripping bar I so as to vibrate freely on a line with the face of the cutting wheel, and in this same shaft I also fix the levers K and L on opposite sides with each other, and on the lever T I hang the weight M as shown. In each of the legs A A I fix a pin, Q Q and on each. of them I place a sheave. I then secure two cards to the bar I and lead one over each sheave, and secure the end of one to the lever N, and the end of the other to the weight O, as shown.

P is an oblique table upon which the block or bolt is placed to be operated upon by the knives.

Now .suppose the block to be placed as shown by the red lines at It. The operator arranges it in the required position then places hisfoot on the lever N which brings the bar I to a vertical position, and opposite the slot S in the table H. The weight M on the lever L, then forces the gripper T against the block, which holds it against the face of the wheel, while the knives cut it in shingles, thus leaving the operator free to'prepare another block, while the preceding one is ruiming through the machine ;-H which being done, he places his foot on the lever K and throws the bar I to the slot u into which it is drawn by the act-ion of the weight O, to the position shown on the drawings. The table is thus left clear for the operator to adjust another block,-as before and so on, keeping the machine constantly supplied.

The knives E and F are set with their edges, on lines radiating from the center to the periphery of the wheel, and their cutting planes are set at different angles with its face so that one knife shall cut the shingle with the butt from one end of the block, and the other shall cut it with the butt from the opposite end, so that each revolution of the wheel will out a parallel strip from the block, equal in thickness to two shingles, as shown at Fig. Now

according to the condition of the knives and the posit-ion of the block R, each knife will strike the end of the block nearest the center of the wheel, first, and in doing so, the one will cut the butt, and the other the point, of the shingle from that end, and I find by experiment, that when both knives are made parallel, as shown at E the shingle that is cut with the butt first willrnot be checked, but the one cut with the point first will be, and the reason of this is, because the knife in advancing increases the thickness of the shingle by cutting across the grain of the wood, from the point to the butt. And as the knife acts diagonally across the block, the heel precedes the point, and acts as a wedge, between the block, and the point of the shingle, against the grain of the wood, thus causing a t-endency to split, and as soon as the knife cuts the butt from the block this splitting tendency takes eect, and checks the shingle as fast as the knife advances.

The above object-ions always occur, When the point of the shingle is cut first., with a straight edge knife. But I find by experiment, that I can overcome this objection by using a curved knife in the place of a straight one, for cutting the shingle from the point toward the butt.7 The advantage of this is, that the point of the shingle is cut entirely off, before the knife strikes the butt, so that` the splitting tendency induced by the knife, is equalized across the entire Width of the shingle, before the butt is cut, and the knife then advancing With a rapidly increasing velocity toward the butt pares off the shingle With a drawing out, so as to leave it smooth and sound. The red lines at Fig. 2 illustrate the principle.

I claim as my invention- The combination of the above described automatic feeding apparatus, With the rotating shingle machine, above described, and also the curved knife, as shown at F for the purpose specified, when combined as above described.

WILLIAM BEVARD. Vitnesses AMos Bnoaniuxx, MATTHIAS STIGERS.

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