The Leavers machine is a lacemaking machine that John Levers adapted from Heathcoat's Old Loughborough machine. It was made in Nottingham in 1813. The name of the machine was the Leavers machine (the 'a' was added to aid pronunciation in France). The original machine made net but it was discovered that the Jacquard apparatus could be adapted to it. From 1841 lace complete with pattern, net and outline could be made on the Leavers machine.
Most lace machines stem from the weft-knitting Stocking frame. The Leavers machine is a derivative of Heathcoat's 1809 Old Loughborough. The Leavers machine was invented by John Levers [sic], a framesmith and setter-up of Sutton-in-Ashfield. Sources give the date as either 1813 or 1814, and the location as Derby Road, Nottingham. Patent applications up until 1930, spelled the name without an 'a', but about 1906, foreign sources had started to insert an 'a'. The Lace working party of 1946 standardised the name with an 'a' and the trade association henceforth adopted that spelling. [1]
Until 1823 they were used solely to make plain net, working on a 60 inch beam at 80 motions per minute [2]
In 1828 an improvement was made to drive the bobbin carriage at intervals, thus leaving time for 'shogging' the guide bars between each movement. In 1841 use of a knob Jacquard allowed the insertion of thick thread (liner). The knobs allowed a greater distance and allowed the automatic gimping around flowered patterns. [3]
The number of Leavers in use was dependent on the market and during periods of depression or cotton shortage many frames were broken up for their iron content. The use of Raschel machines, noted for being better for artificial fibres increased in the 1970s and, with fine polyesters, the two products have converged. [4]
Before 1909 there were only 100 Leavers machines in the United States. Importing them was prohibitively expensive due to a 45% import tariff. The US lost many soldiers to malaria in a skirmish in Spanish America, and need for mosquito netting was seen. The US Tariff Act of 1909 provided free entry for Leavers machines, during a 19 month window from 6 August 1909 to 31 December 1910. Thus by 1947 there were 730 machines in 54 mills employing 5000 people. [5]
The 'twist-hands' were mainly emigrants from the lace making areas of France and England, as operating the machine is a complex process to learn. The Amalgamated Lace Operators of America, Leavers Section considered a three year apprenticeship to be the minimum and longer to be fully effective. [5]
The Leavers machine is probably the most versatile of all machines for making patterned lace. [6] [7] A 120 inches (300 cm) machine will weigh 17 tons and have 40,000 moving parts and carry between 12,000 and 50,000 threads. Working widths are always multiples of 9 inches (230 mm) since the web is calculated in quarter yards. [8]
It has two warp beams, though it can be run using just one or none. An S-twist thread is out on the front warp (right warp) and a Z- twist on the back warp (left warp, reverse warp). All the warp ends pass through a sley with individual perforations- to keep the threads from tangling. On a machine with 3000 front warp ends, that will mean 6000 perforations, all front warp ends will be of the same count, and all back warp ends will be of the same count, though the two warps can carry different counts. The warp threads interact with the brass bobbin threads to form the net or openwork ground. The reverse warp threads (introduced in 1830) lock the front warp threads against the bobbin threads. The warp threads are tensioned by a spring. [9]
Beams are the vertical threads from a beam roller that contributes to the pattern. Lace is made up of motif that is repeated vertically and horizontally. If a design has 48 horizontal repeats, there will be 48 threads on each beam roller. [9] Every beam roller has its own guidebar, made of thin watch-spring steel. Each front warp ends has its own guidebar. The back warp ends share 4 stump bars between them. The guide bars are controlled by the Jacquards so can be reposition for each motion, indeed they are also known as Jacquard bars; they are held in a bar box above the sley but below the carriages. [10]
There are up to 32 processes involved in designing and producing a run of Leavers lace, To start with, there are 5 five processes in transferring the initial art work to the machine. There are nine processes needed to prepare the 4 types of yarn. The single process of running the machine and up to 14 finishing processes, thus there is a lot of ancillary equipment. [11]
The art work is designed six times life size and reduced using a pantograph. The design is converted to the Jacquard code and punched onto the Jacquard cards. The cards are stitched and mounted on the Jacquard.
The thread arrives either on cones or in skeins. It has to be slip wound onto spools. There are four types of yarn used in Leavers machine
The finishing processes are clipping, scalloping, drawing, cutting, hand cutting, cloth looking and mending and the familiar textile processes such as bleaching, dyeing, stretching to width, drying, folding and packing.
Spinning is a twisting technique to form yarn from fibers. The fiber intended is drawn out, twisted, and wound onto a bobbin. A few popular fibers that are spun into yarn other than cotton, which is the most popular, are viscose, animal fibers such as wool, and synthetic polyester. Originally done by hand using a spindle whorl, starting in the 500s AD the spinning wheel became the predominant spinning tool across Asia and Europe. The spinning jenny and spinning mule, invented in the late 1700s, made mechanical spinning far more efficient than spinning by hand, and especially made cotton manufacturing one of the most important industries of the Industrial Revolution.
A loom is a device used to weave cloth and tapestry. The basic purpose of any loom is to hold the warp threads under tension to facilitate the interweaving of the weft threads. The precise shape of the loom and its mechanics may vary, but the basic function is the same.
Bobbin lace is a lace textile made by braiding and twisting lengths of thread, which are wound on bobbins to manage them. As the work progresses, the weaving is held in place with pins set in a lace pillow, the placement of the pins usually determined by a pattern or pricking pinned on the pillow.
A bobbin or spool is a spindle or cylinder, with or without flanges, on which yarn, thread, wire, tape or film is wound. Bobbins are typically found in industrial textile machinery, as well as in sewing machines, fishing reels, tape measures, film rolls, cassette tapes, within electronic and electrical equipment, and for various other applications.
Guipure lace is a type of bobbin lace. It connects the motifs with bars or plaits rather than net or mesh.
Gimp is a narrow ornamental trim used in sewing or embroidery. It is made of silk, wool, polyester, or cotton and is often stiffened with metallic wire or coarse cord running through it. Gimp is used as trimming for dresses, curtains, furniture, etc. Originally the term referred to a thread with a cord or wire in the center, but now is mainly used for a trimming braided or twisted from this thread. Sometimes gimp is covered in beads or spangles.
Textile manufacturing is a major industry. It is largely based on the conversion of fibre into yarn, then yarn into fabric. These are then dyed or printed, fabricated into cloth which is then converted into useful goods such as clothing, household items, upholstery and various industrial products.
The spinning mule is a machine used to spin cotton and other fibres. They were used extensively from the late 18th to the early 20th century in the mills of Lancashire and elsewhere. Mules were worked in pairs by a minder, with the help of two boys: the little piecer and the big or side piecer. The carriage carried up to 1,320 spindles and could be 150 feet (46 m) long, and would move forward and back a distance of 5 feet (1.5 m) four times a minute.
Warp knitting is defined as a loop-forming process in which the yarn is fed into the knitting zone, parallel to the fabric selvage. It forms vertical loops in one course and then moves diagonally to knit the next course. Thus the yarns zigzag from side to side along the length of the fabric. Each stitch in a course is made by many different yarns. Each stitch in one wale is made by several different yarns.
Bobbinet tulle or genuine tulle is a specific type of tulle which has been made in the United Kingdom since the invention of the bobbinet machine. John Heathcoat coined the term "bobbin net", or bobbinet as it is spelled today, to distinguish this machine-made tulle from the handmade "pillow lace", produced using a lace pillow to create bobbin lace. Machines based on his original designs are still in operation today producing fabrics in Perry Street, Chard, Somerset, UK.
The manufacture of textiles is one of the oldest of human technologies. To make textiles, the first requirement is a source of fiber from which a yarn can be made, primarily by spinning. The yarn is processed by knitting or weaving, which turns yarn into cloth. The machine used for weaving is the loom. For decoration, the process of colouring yarn or the finished material is dyeing. For more information of the various steps, see textile manufacturing.
A winding machine or winder is a machine for wrapping string, twine, cord, thread, yarn, rope, wire, ribbon, tape, etc. onto a spool, bobbin, reel, etc.
Textile manufacturing is one of the oldest human activities. The oldest known textiles date back to about 5000 B.C. In order to make textiles, the first requirement is a source of fibre from which a yarn can be made, primarily by spinning. The yarn is processed by knitting or weaving to create cloth. The machine used for weaving is the loom. Cloth is finished by what are described as wet process to become fabric. The fabric may be dyed, printed or decorated by embroidering with coloured yarns.
Bradford Industrial Museum, established 1974 in Moorside Mills, Eccleshill, Bradford, United Kingdom, specializes in relics of local industry, especially printing and textile machinery, kept in working condition for regular demonstrations to the public. There is a Horse Emporium in the old canteen block plus a shop in the mill, and entry is free of charge.
Silk throwing is the industrial process wherein silk that has been reeled into skeins, is cleaned, receives a twist and is wound onto bobbins. The yarn is now twisted together with threads, in a process known as doubling. Colloquially silk throwing can be used to refer to the whole process: reeling, throwing and doubling. Silk had to be thrown to make it strong enough to be used as organzine for the warp in a loom, or tram for weft.
Doubling is a textile industry term synonymous with combining. It can be used for various processes during spinning. During the carding stage, several sources of roving are doubled together and drawn, to remove variations in thickness. After spinning, yarn is doubled for many reasons. Yarn may be doubled to produce warp for weaving, to make cotton for lace, crochet and knitting. It is used for embroidery threads and sewing threads, for example: sewing thread is usually 6-cable thread. Two threads of spun 60s cotton are twisted together, and three of these double threads are twisted into a cable, of what is now 5s yarn. This is mercerised, gassed and wound onto a bobbin.
Lace machines took over the commercial manufacture of lace during the nineteenth century.
The lace curtain machine is a lace machine invented by John Livesey in Nottingham in 1846. It was an adaptation of John Heathcoat's bobbinet machine. It made the miles of curtaining which screened Victorian and later windows.
The Pusher machine was a lace making machine, based on the bobbinet, that was invented in 1812 Samuel Clark and James Mart.
The Game of Thrones Tapestry is a hand-crafted tapestry, woven by hand on a jacquard loom, with additional embroidery. The tapestry tells the entire story of the television show, Game of Thrones. It consists of seven 11-metre-long panels and one 10.5-metre panel. The eight panels depict scenes from each episode and include images of crew at work. The tapestry was commissioned by HBO and Tourism Ireland, the tourism bureau of Northern Ireland where HBO filmed much of the series.
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| Needle lace |
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| Bobbin lace |
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