Edmund Cartwright

Edmond or Edmund Cartwright ( born April 24, 1743 Marnham, Nottingham, † October 30, 1823 in Kent) was a priest and canon of the Cathedral of Lincoln ( since 1786 ) with a doctorate. He is known for the invention of the mechanical loom Power Loom.

Life

In 1766, Cartwright joined the University College, Oxford with a Master of Arts. He worked initially as a poet and writer. 1784 Cartwright then began with the development of a mechanical loom after he was unlike his contemporaries consider also the weaving 'll be automated. The following year, he received the first patent for a loom, which had to be operated with a hand crank. The chain was located in this invention wound in parallel on a tree. To operate two strong men were required, the fatigued quickly. This, however, a crucial step in the mechanization of the weaving was done, and pointed the way to the textile factory. Cartwright also invented a Wollkämmmaschine (1789 ), a cable winder (1792 ) and a three- furrow plow and developed in 1797 a direct-acting steam engine with an overhead wave and ( for the first time ) with a metal piston. 1786 Cartwright received a patent on an advanced weaving machine, the drive is not visible on the patent documents. The warp yarns were individually withdrawn here from a creel. What was new was the drive of contactors, reed and shafts via a bottom camshaft and cam. The following year, Cartwright opened his own mechanical weaving mill, which was operated with steam power. In 1793 he had the weaving close, however, the operation was not profitable. Cartwright later had to cede the rights to his patents. Then Cartwright set to work to support the American Robert Fulton in the development of the steamboat.

There must be a development of the second patent, which provided the drive with steam. She went down in history under the name of Power Loom.

Cartwright's invention was not applied immediately. That may be a variety of reasons: The workers feared job losses after spinning had already been automated. First factories with power looms were set on fire. In addition, the publishing system, the risk rolling the hand weaving from publisher to part from the home workers. In the factories, the entrepreneur had to bear all the risk. The barriers to entry were quite high, as the Power Looms were expensive. Moreover, the progress in productivity was too low due to the Power Looms. There were many more to automate parts of this half- machine, including such important goods as the trigger and the relaxation of the chain, as well as the once rich with the chain size.

Cartwright's invention was not a completely new development. It was the development of the Quick Protect by John Kay in 1733 and the extension to broader tissue.

In the years 1790 and 1792 Cartwright was also a combing machine for worsted spinning patented. Both inventions had no commercial success, but the second, the so-called Big Ben, served as a template for the development of other combers about 50 years later.