US2349233A - System and apparatus for hemming - Google Patents

Description

R. E. ANNIS May 23, 1944.

SYSTEM AND APPAfiATUS FOR HEMMING SHEETS OF FIBROUS MATERIAL Filed Jan. 2'7, 1941 3 Sheets-Sheet 1 lnvenTor. Ross E.Ann byifiws is if R; E. ANNIS SYSTEM AND APPARATUS FOR HEMMING SHEETS OF FIBROUS MATERIAL May 23, 1944.

Filed Jan. 27, 1941 3 Sheets-Sheet 2 Inv enTor. Ross E. Annis Any.

y ,1 R. E. ANNIS 2,349,233

SYSTEM AND. APPARATUS FOR HEMMING SHEETS OF FI BROUS MATERIAL Filed Jan. 27, 1941 3 Sheets-Sheet 3 invenTo r. Ross E. Annis WW Wif M ATTys.

Patented May 23, 1944 2,349,233 SYSTEM AND APPARATUS FOR HEMTMING SHEETS OF FIBROUS MATERIAL.

Ross E.. Annis, North Sudbury, Mass, assignor to Underwood Machinery Company, a corporation of Massachusetts Application January 27, 1941, Serial No. 376,119

9 Claims.

This invention relates to systems for hemming and finishing sheets for rapid commercial production.

The principal object of the invention is to provide a system for producing a wide hem on one end ofthe sheet and a narrow hem on the other end of the sheet, closing the ends of the hems in a minimum time, with a minimum amount of labor, and a minimum manipulation of the sheets which would otherwise require repressing of the sheets before finally folding them for packaging and shipment.

In usual methods of finishing sheets sections of a suitable calendered web of cloth are torn transversely at predetermined intervals corresponding to the desired length of the sheets, then folded to suitable sizes for packaging. A pile of the folded sheets is then taken to an operator having a wide hem stitching machine, the sheets unfolded and the Wide hem formed upon one end of the sheet. The sheets are then refolded by the operator and piled. Such piles are then transferred to anotheroperator having a narrow hem stitching machine who unfolds the sheets, forms the narrow hem upon the opposite end of the sheet, and repiles the hemmed sheets. The hemmed sheets thus piled are then taken to a third operator having a machine for closing the ends of the hem. The machine for thus closing the ends of the hem is sometimes a zigzag stitching machine, or maybe a special end-hemming machine. The third operator thereupon unfolds the sheets, closes all the hems, and refolds the sheets. Theunfolding and refolding of the sheets and the manipulationthereof during the hemming operations ruffiesor wrinkles the sheets to such an extent that the hemmed sheets require folding and pressing of the folded sheets before they are in condition for packaging in boxes for storage and shipment.

' It has been found in practice that the operator who closes the ends of the sheets is able to complete the closing of the hems. of all the sheets in substantially half the length of time required by the respective operators to produce the wide hems or the, narrow hems upon the sheet, or in other words the operator who closes the ends of thehems can close them substantially as rapidly as two wide hem. operators and two narrow hem operators can produce the respective hems upon the sheet.

The object of the present invention is to providexa system comprising a plurality of series of traveling carriers having arms upon each of which a. sheetmay be. draped centrally either in extended position or preferably when folded longitudinally midway of the width of the sheet with the end portions of the sheet having the torn edges hanging down. in parallelism and thereby presented to the operators of the hemming machines in such manner that the respective Wide and narrow hems may be formed without undesirable wrinkling of the sheets and in which part of the loaded carriers may be moved to one of two stations having means for folding and stitching a hem of predetermined width, then moved to another station having means for stitching and folding a hem of different width and all of thecarriers bearing fully hemmed sheets thereafter moved to a single station having means for closing the ends of the hems of all of the sheets, and thereupon moving the carriers to a single doffing station at which the sheets may be removed from the-carrier.

A further feature of the invention consists in providing at the doffing station suitable tables upon which the sheets may be unfolded for inspection, then refolded and placed upon a traveling endless carrier from which the folded sheets may be delivered to a packaging station having means for pressing the folded sheets into final condition for packaging.

A further'object of the invention is to provide suitable apparatus by which the system thus described may be produced.

These and other objects and features of the invention will more fully appear from the following description of the system and a preferred type of apparatus used in connection therewith.

vIn the drawings:

Fig. 1 illustrates diagrammatically two parallel continuous, systems for hemming sheets in the manner aforesaid located upon opposite sides of a single conveyer for transporting piles of unfinished sheets tothe loading station and for delivering the finished. and inspected sheets from the dofilng station to a station for pressing and packaging the sheets;

Fig. '2 is a side elevation of a turntable supporting an uneven number. of rotatable sheetcarrying reels having radial arms over which a central portion of a sheet or a sheet folded mid- Way of its length is draped in such a manner that the portions having the torn edges hang downwardly in parallelism;

Fig. 3 is an enlarged detail view, partially in vertical section illustrating a preferred construction by which the reels are mounted upon the turntable;

of the construction illus- Duplicate sheet-hemming systems embodying the invention are illustrated in Fig. 1 as arranged in parallelism on opposite sides of a preferably endless conveyer l upon which piles of unhemmed sheets are carried to loading stations and upon which the hemmed and folded sheets are delivered to a pressing and packaging station 2. Inasmuch as the mechanisms of the respective systems desirably are identical a description of one will serve for both. Each system comprises a series of three narrowly associated turntables located in alinement and each turntable is provided with an odd number of sheet-carrying reels,'preferably seven in number, with operating stations located adjacent to the circular path of each set of reels, with operating stations located adjacent to the respective reels when the turntable is arrested to permit the respective manipulations or operations required to load the sheets upon the carriers to form and stitch the wide spectively, to close the ends of the hems and to doff the hemmed sheets, inspect-them and place them upon the conveyer for delivery;

Inasmuch as each of the turntables and the carriers, which are mounted upon them, may be of identical construction a description of a single turntable and its carriers will be suflicient for all.

Any suitable turntable may be employed for.

supporting the reels. In the preferred constructionillustrated herein the turntable, which is in the form of 'a circular rotatable skeletonized frame structure, is t mounted upon a vertical column 3 having a rigid base 4 which'is suitably secured'to the floor of the room and also desirably i fixedly secured at its upper end to the ceiling of the room, or other suitable rigid overhead structure. a

The column 3 has rigidly mounted upon it at a suitable distance from the floor a, collar having at its upperend a horizontal flange 5 upon which a, roller bearing or other antifriction hearing- 1 is mounted for supporting the rotatable turntable.

The turntable comprises a hub preferably in the form of a tubular sleeve 8 which is concentricallymounted upon the upper portion of the column 3 and is provided adjacent its upper and lower ends with radial antifriction bearings 9. The lower end of the hub has rigidly secured to it a disk I U which engages the antifriction bearing 1. The sleeve 8 has secured to its lower end portion above the collar ID a circular plate or disk H to which aseries of equally spaced radial arms l2 are welded, and the outer ends of the radial arms are secured to a preferably circular angle bar I3 thereby forming a rigid spider-like construction.

Suitable tension rods l4 are adjustably connected at their lower ends to the radial arms i2 and at their upper ends to a collar l5'whi-ch is rigidly secured to the top of the sleeve 8.

A series of preferably seven reels are suitably mounted in equally spaced relation upon the the normal radial position;

and narrow hems rereel and is screw threaded at its upper end to receive a nut 2| which engages a ball or other peripheral portion of the turntable. In the particular construction illustrated in detail in Figs. 3 and 4 each reel is suspended from a bracket l6 which is mounted upon the circular angle bar ring l3. The bracket I6 is provided with a vertical bore, preferably having therein a bushing H which fits upon a rotatable shaft [8 for supporting the reel. The shaftl8 is provided at its lower endwith an enlarged flat head l9 adapted to engage the under face of the hub 20 of the antifriction bearing 22 interposed between it and the upperend of the bracket l6.

,Aflat'circular plate 23, which is integral with the hub, extends horizontally outwardly therefrom and is provided near its periphery with preferably several equally spaced radially bored downwardly extending bosses 24 in which suitable supports for the sheets are mounted. In the construction illustrated in Fig. 1 the supports for the sheets are in the form of radially extending cylindrical bars 25 the inner ends of which extend into and are secured in the bosses 24. The bars 25 have rotatably mounted upon them cylindrical sleeves 26, preferably of fibrous material, over which the sheets 21 may be draped, with the portions having the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly in parallelism. Suitable disks 28 presenting non-corrosive surfaces are mounted upon the inner and outer ends of. the bars 25 and serve to engage the selvage edges of the sheets and to prevent the sheets 'from displacement longitudinally of the bars.

A modified form of reel construction is illus-' trated in Figs. 5 and 6 in which the sheet-supporting arms are pivotally mounted upon the rotatable plate adjacent its periphery and adapted to have a limited swinging movement about their axes to permit more convenient manipulation of the sheet by the operator when stitching the hems. In the ,construction illustrated in Figs. 5 and 6 the circular plate 23 or other suitable arm-supporting member is provided with a pcripheral annular boss 28 which may-be integral with the disk 23 or a ring welded or otherwise secured to the upper surface thereof. The boss 28 is provided with a series of equally spaced re-entrant recesses 29 each having a vertical wall 30 in a radial plane with respect to the axis of rotation of thecircular plate 23 and another wall 3| which diverges from the wall 30 as illustrated. The circular plate 23 is provided with a vertical bore 32 at the apex of the vertical walls SI and 32 and preferably the plate is provided with downwardly extending bosses 33 in axial alinement with the bores 32. The bores 32 extend vertically downwardly through the plate 23 and the bosses 33 toprovide a long bearing for the cylindrical end 34 of the sheet-supporting arms 35. The arms 35 are provided with preferably sleeves of fibrous material 26 and disks 28 presenting non-corrosive surfaces to selvage edges of the sheet, as above described.

Any suitable number of supporting arms may be mounted upon the circular plate of the reel, as above described. As illustrated in Fig. 1 each of the seven reels is provided with sixteen radial sheet-supporting arms but it is found in practice that as many as thirty-six arms may be employed. A sheet-manipulating or operating station is located adjacent to the circumference of each reel when in operating position as graphically illustrated in Fig. 1. In the system illustrated engage the in Fig; 1 adjacent turntables are arranged for rotation in reverse directions thereby enabling the reels of adjacent turntables to be presented to a single loading station L and to a single dofilng station D, so that the reels of two adjacent turntables can be simultaneously loaded and simultaneously defied.

It has been stated heretofore that a singlev operator of a machine for closing the ends, of the hem can close the hems as rapidly as, the wide and narrow hems can be stitched by a plurality, preferably two wide hem operators and. a plurality, preferably two simultaneously working narrow hem operators, and the loading, dofiing, and stitching stations are so arranged that each reel may be presented to one wide hemming operator, to hem one-half of the sheet upon a reel, and thereupon to another wide hem operator to hem the other half of the sheet upon said reel, and thereafter similarly presented successively to two operators to produce the narrow hem upon the sheets of the reel, and finally the hemmed sheets thereafter carried to a single operator for closing the ends of all the sheets, and

thence successively to the doffing and loading stations upon each two revolutions of the turntable.

Desirable positions of the wide hem operators, the narrow hem operators, the hem-closing operator, the doffing and loading stations, are illustrated in Fig. l of the drawings, the station of the wide hem operator being designated by the letters WH, the narrow hem operators by the letters NH, the doffing station by the letter D, and the loading station by the letter L.

Inasmuch as piles of folded unhemmed sheets are brought to the loading stations by the conveyer I, and the hemmed sheets removed at the dofiing station are inspected and folded, and piles of the folded sheets placed upon the conveyer I for delivery to the pressing and packaging station 2, suitable tables are provided to receive the piles of sheets removed from the conveyer I, and suitable tables are provided at the loading station upon which the sheets may be placed and from which the sheets may be successively removed by the loader and draped upon the sheet-supporting arms of the reels. These loading tables are identified in Fig. l by the letters LT.

In order to avoid pressing and packaging of improperly hemmed sheets or defective sheets, inspection is made of each sheet after it is doffed from the reel. For this purpose comparatively large tables are provided at the dofling static-n upon which the finished sheets may be spread,

inspected, and then folded. These inspection tables are identified in Fig. 1 by the letter I and preferably smaller tables T are provided adjacent the inspection tables upon which the folded sheets may be piled before they are placed upon the conveyer for transportation to the pressing and packaging station 2.

In order that the reels may be presented simu taneously to two operators for wide hemming the sheets, then to two operators for narrow hemming the sheets, then to a single operator for closing the ends of the hems, and a single operator for loading the sheets, and a single operator for dofling the sheets, spacing of the operators around the circular path of the reels is such that each reel will he presented to the same operator upon two complete revolutions of the turntable.

In the operation of the system each reel is presented successively to alternating stations in an order which may be described as follows:

A reel a is first presented to the loading station and a sheet draped upon each of the sheet-carrying arms. The turntable is then rotated sufficiently to carry the loaded reel to the station a at which wide hems are stitched upon onehalf of the sheets. The turntable is then rotated to present the reel to another Wide-hemming station a upon which wide hems are stitched upon the remainder of the sheets. The turntable is then rotated to move the sheets thus wide hemmed to the station a of a narrow hem operator and one-half of the narrow hem stitched. The turntable is then rotated to carry the reel (1 to another narrow hemming station a at which the remainder of the narrow hems are stitched. The turntable is then rotated to carry the reel having the fully hemmed sheets to the hemclosing station a where all of the hems are closed by this operator. The turntable is again rotated to carry the reel having the finished sheets to a cloning station a where the sheets are successively removed from the reels, spread upon the inspection table I, inspected, and folded and piled upon the table T and the piles of finished sheets thereafter placed upon the conveyer I which transfers the finished and inspected sheets to the pressing and packaging station 2.

The turntable is then rotated to carry the reel to the loading station where all the arms of the reel are loaded with sheets as before and the reel again thereafter intermittently rotated through the same cycle of two revolutions.

In usual practice the loader takes a sheet from the pile, partially unfolds it except for the median longitudinal fold, then drapes the sheet over av carrier on the reel with the portions having the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly in parallelism. When the sheet reaches the stitching station the rotatable sleeve 26 on the carrier arms permits the sheet to be drown downwardly to the stitching machine in such a manner that a complete wide hem, or a complete narrow hem, may be stitched without removing the sheet from the carrier. As a consequence no substantial wrinkling of the sheet occurs during the stitching operations, so that when the sheet is removed from the carrier by the dofier, it can be easily thrown over the inspection table, one side of the sheet inspected, the sheet then reversed, and the other side inspected, and again folded without wrinkling or rumpling the sheet, so that when the sheet finally reaches the pressing and packaging station it is merely necessary to place the sheet, or a pile of sheets, successively in folded form in a pressing machine to press the folds tightly together in proper condition to be placed in cartons for shipment or storage.

Inasmuch as the turntable is supported upon antifriction bearings, it can be easily rotated by an operator and arrested in such manner that the several reels will be positioned at the operating and sheet-manipulating stations. In order properly to arrest the reels accurately at the respective stations, manually or automatically operable locking means may be provided for arresting and retaining the carriers in proper relation to the operating stations while the sheets are being hemmed by the several operators. Any suitable means may be provided for accomplishing this purpose, such, for example, as a locking latch or bolt suitably supported upon the column adapted to engage a complementary socket in the hub plate H of the reel. An illustrative locking device, which is shown in Fig. 2 of the drawings, comprises a bracket 36 which is secured to the column 3 upon which is mounted a vertical solenoid 31 having a core 38 adapted detachably to engage a socket or stop 39 on the hub plate I I of the reel. Desirably a spring 40 normally supports the core in looking position relatively to a hole or stop 39 on the plate H so that the reel will be locked when the bolt and stop are engaged. An electric circuit. extends from the solenoid to a suitable source of electric power (not shown) and to a switch 42 which is mounted upon the table of one of the operators in convenient reach of the hand of the operator so that when the operator closes the switch the solenoid will be energized to withdraw the core from engagement with the socket or stop upon the hub plate.

Desirably two series of turntables and their reels are arranged symmetrically upon opposite sides of the conveyer, as illustrated in Fig. 1. By such an arrangement the doffer at the station D of one series of turntables, and the doifer at the station DI at the same station of the other series, will be able to cooperate in inspecting and folding the sheets. Similarly two doffers at each of the stations DD and DIDI, between two adjacent turntables of each series, may cooperate to inspect the sheets removed from the reels of both adjacent turntables, inspect and fold them and pile them upon the table T from which the piles can be transferred to the conveyer I.

By reason of the present system the time required for completely hemming and finishing the sheets for packaging may be completed in a minimum time with a minimum number of operators.

The system has a still further advantage that if one of the wide hemmers, or one of the narrow hemmers, is a more rapid operator than the companion hemmer doing the same work, such operator will be able to hem more than one-half of the sheets while a reel is located at her stand, and the remaining sheets will be hemmed by the slower operator when the reel reaches her station, so that the time required for completely hemming the sheets of any reel will be the average time required by the two operators.

It will be understood that while the invention has been described with reference to the hemming of sheets, such as bed sheets, it may also be employed for stitching or hemming other articles which require a series of operations in which one operator can perform her duty in a fraction of the time required by each of two or more other operators, or where the operators may be required to remove the articles temporarily from the carriers, and when the operation is completed to restore them to the carriers.

It will also be understood that where the turntables of the present invention are described as carrying seven reels, the same system may be employed with a greater or lesser number of reels and operators, for example, if the turntable is provided with five reels two wide hem stitchers and two narrow hem stitchers may be employed with a single end-hem closing stitcher in which case dofling and loading will both be accomplished at a single station, in which case two revolutions of the carrier will present the reels at the respective stations in the same sequence. Furthermore, if the turntable be provided with nine reels, each reel may be presented to three wide hemming stations, to three narrow hemming stations, to a single hem-closing station, a single loading station, and a single dofling station upon each two revolutions of the turntable.

It will be understood that the particular apparatusabove described for use in a system of hemming sheets is illustrative and not restrictive and that any type of apparatus may be employed which comprises a plurality of series of travel? ing carriers for supporting the sheet centrally with the portions thereof having unhemmed edges hanging downwardly in parallelism, and with means for so mounting the traveling carriers that all may be moved to a single loading station, a part of the carriers when loaded then moved to a plurality of stations having means for form ing the wide hem upon the sheet, then moving the respective carriers bearing the wide hemmed sheets to a similar number of stations for forming the narrow hems, then moving all of the carriers to a single station for closing the ends of the hem, and then moving the carriers to a single dofiing station, and finally returning the carriers to the loading station.

It will also be understood that While the invention is described herein for hemming sheets of fibrous material, such as bed sheets, it may also be employed in flexible sheets of non-fibrous material, such as sheets formed of plastic material, or of threads of plastic material, such as nylon, Cellophane, etc., within the meaning and scope of the following claims.

Having thus described the invention, what is claimed as new, and desired to be secured by Letters Patent, is:

1. Apparatus for hemming sheets of fibrous material comprising a series of narrowly associated rotatable turntables each having means for supporting in circular series and in substantially equally spaced relation an uneven number of reels, reels mounted on said carrier each having a series of radial sheet-supporting arms over each of which the sheet may be draped with the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly in parallelism, sheet-manipulating stations located around said turntable in circumferential spacing corresponding to the spacing of said reels including a single loading station for the reels of adjacent turntables, a plurality of stations associated with each turntable having means for stitching a wide hem, a like plurality of stations associated with each turntable having means for stitching a narrow hem, a single station associated with each turntable having means for closing the ends of the hems of all of the sheets, and a single dofiing station for the reels of each successive pair of adjacent turntables, the respective sheet-manipulating stations being so positioned relatively to its turntable that a reel will be positioned once at each station during two successive revolutions of the turntable and means for arresting rotation of the respective turntables with the respective reels positioned at every alternate station in succession.

2. Apparatus for hemming sheets of fibrous material comprising a series of narrowly associated rotatable turntables each having means for supporting in circular series and in substantially equally spaced relation seven reels mounted on said carrier each having a series of radial sheet-supporting arms over each of which the sheet may be draped with the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly in parallelism, seven sheetmanipulating stations located around said turntable in circumferential spacing corresponding to the spacing of said reels including a single loading station for the reels of adjacent turntables, two stations associated with each turntable having meansfor stitching a wide hem, two stations associated with each turntable having means for stitching a narrow hem, -,a single st-ation associated'with eachturntable having means for closing the :ends :of the hems of .all of the sheets, a single :dofilng station for each pair of turntables, means for arresting the rotation of said turntable at alternate stations, whereby each reel will be arrested once at each station during two successive revolutions of the turntable, the loading and dofiing stations respectively being so positioned that a single operator can load all of the reels carried by adjacent turntables and a single operator can doil all of the finished sheets from the reels of adjacent turntables.

3. Apparatus for hemming sheets of fibrous material comprising a series of narrowly associated rotatable turntables each having means for supporting in circular series and in substantially equally spaced relation an uneven number of reels, reels mounted on said carrier each having a series of radial sheet-supporting arms over each of which the sheet may be draped with the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly in parallelism, a series of sheet-manipulating stations located around said turntable in circumferential spacing corresponding to the spacing of said reels including a single loading station for the reels of adjacent turntables, a plurality of stations associated with each turntable having means for stitching a wide hem, a like plurality of stations associated with each turntable having means for stitching a narrow hem, a single station associated with each turntable having means for closing the ends of the hems of all of the sheets, and a single dofiing station for each pair of turntables, the respective sheet-manipulating stations being so positioned relatively to its turntable that a reel will be positioned once at each station during two successive revolutions of the turntable, and a traveling conveyer for transporting unhemmed sheets to the respective loading stations and for delivering the finished sheets from the doifing station.

4. Apparatus for hemming sheets of fibrous material comprising two parallel series of associated turntables each having means for supporting in circular series and in substantially equally spaced relation an uneven number of reels, reels mounted on said carrier each having a series of radial sheet-supporting arms over each of which the sheet may be draped with the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly in parallelism, a series of sheet-manipulating stations located around said turntable in circumferential spacing corresponding to the spacing of said reels including a single loading station for the reels of adjacent turntables of each series, a plurality of stations associated with each turntable having means for stitching a wide hem, a like plurality of stations associated with each turntable having means for stitching a narrow hem, a single station associated with each turntable having means for closing the ends of the hems of all of the sheets, and a single doffing station for each pair of turntables of each series, the respective sheet-manipulating stations being so positioned relatively to its turntable that a reel will be positioned once at each station during two successive revolutions of the turntable, and an endless conveyer located between the series of turntables for conveying the sheets to the loading stations and for delivering the finished sheets from the dofiing station.

5. In an apparatus for hemming sheets of fibrous material, rotatable sheet-supporting means comprisinga vertical column, a turntable rotatably mounted on said column, a series of reelstrotatably suspended from said turntable at equal distancesfrom the axis of said column, each of said reels havingv cylindrical radially extending arms and sleeves rotatably mounted on each of said arms over which the sheet may be draped and shoulder members at each end of said sleeve presenting non-corrosive surfaces adapted. to beengaged by'the edges'of said sheet.

6. An apparatus for hemming sheets of fibrous material comprising a vertical column, a turntable rotatably mounted on said column, a series of reels uneven in number rotatably suspended from said turntable at equal distances from the axis of said column and equal distances from each other, each of said reels having a series of radial arms over which the central portion of a sheet may be draped, and manually controlled means for arresting rotation of said turntable to present the respective sheet-supporting reels at a like number of sheet-manipulating stations in such manner that each reel will be arrested at each station once during two successive revolutions of said turntable.

7. Apparatus for hemming sheets of flexible material comprising a reel, adapted to be positioned in proximity to a hemming machine, comprising a rotatable circular arm-supporting member having an annular peripheral boss provided with a series of inwardly extending recesses each having a vertical radial wall and a wall diverging from said radial wall, sheet-supporting arms pivotally mounted in said circular member within the apex of the respective recesses and extending beyond the periphery of said circular member a sufiicient distance from the periphery thereof to support a sheet draped over the arm with the portions of the sheet having the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly.

8. Apparatus for concurrently hemming sheets of fibrous material comprising a turntable having a peripheral annular real support, a series of reels uneven in number mounted on said annular support in substantially equally spaced relation, each reel having a series of sheet supporting arms over each of which a central portion of a sheet is draped with the unhemmed edges hanging downwardly, an equal number of similarly spaced operating stations adjacent to the path of the reels comprising a plurality of wide hemming stations, a plurality of narrow hemming stations, and alternating with said wide and narrow hemming stations respectively a single loading station, a single hem-closing station, and a single dofling station, means for arresting said turntable successively at every other station, whereby the same reel will be positioned once at each station during two successive revolutions of said turntable, thereby enabling simultaneous wide and narrow hemming respectively of a part of the sheets of each of a plurality of carriers at different stations and closing of the ends of the hems at a single station, doffing the sheets at a single station, and reloading of the carriers at another single station.

9. Apparatus for concurrently hemming sheets of fibrous material comprising a rotatable circular turntable having a peripheral annular reel support, a series of seven reels mounted on said annular support in substantially equally spaced relation, each reel having a series of sheet supporting arms over each of which a central portion of a sheet is draped with the unliemmed edges hanging downwardly, seven similarly spaced operating stations adjacent to the path of the reels comprising two wide hemming stations and two narrow hemming stations and alternating with said wide and narrow hemming stations respectively a single loading station, a single hemclosing station, and a single dofiing station, means for arresting said turntable successively at every other station, whereby the same reel will be positioned once at each station during two successive revolutions of said turntable thereby enabling simultaneous wide and narrow hemming respectively of a part of the sheets of each of two carriers at different stations and closing of the ends of the hems at a single station, doifing the sheets at a single station and reloading of the carriers at another single station.

RUSS E. ANNIS.

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