wear the journals off at the heavy side, and of course cause the cylinder to run arooked, and thereby spoil the carding on the machines. This will inevitably be the result of a few years use of iron doffers that are incorrectly balanced.

CLOTHING THE CARDS.

Care must be taken, in putting the sheet-cards on the main cylinder, to fasten them on as tight as they will bear without tearing the leather, or pulling the tacks out of the backs of the sheets. Especial attention is required if the cards are made of calf-skin, as this, if not put on very tight, is very apt to stretch and become slack in grinding. These cards will cause a great deal of trouble afterwards, by the leather and teeth rising up in the middle of the sheets, and rubbing against the doffer-teeth. When this occurs, there remains no remedy but to strip off the sheets, turn up the cylinders, and re-cover them with the same sheets. In turning up the cylinders and rollers, be very careful to take as little as possible off the wood, just sufficient to make them true, and no more.

The sheets are put on with good stout eight or ten ounce tacks, driven at the distance of about seven-eighths of an inch apart. Cylinders made of mahogany or bay-wood, the kind most commonly used, may be covered with six ounce tacks; and, for pine cylinders, ten ounce tacks are large enough. The holes in the sheets should be pierced by a tool, having three, four, or five points, each point being separated seveneighths of an inch from the others. The tacks must be driven in a straight line, at equal distances and opposite to each other in the sheets, so as to form regular rings around the cylinder; this has a neat and workmanlike appearance, and is correct in principle. We can form a comparatively

correct opinion of a carder's abilities and skill in arranging and keeping his room. in snug order, by observing the manner in which he covers his cards. When covering the doffer, put on the fillet-cards as tight as possible without breaking them. If the doffer be made of cast-iron, it will be advisable to give it two good coats of white lead, not so thick as to prevent it from being laid on very even. A portion of copal varnish should be mixed with the second coat, as it prevents the paint from becoming too hard. The backs of the fillet-teeth will imbed themselves in this coating of paint, and keep the fillets from running slack each time the card is ground, which they are very apt to do on the bare, smooth surface of the metal, causing a great deal of trouble and loss of time.

GRINDING THE CARDS.

In setting the emery rollers to grind the cards, do not set them to bear too hard or too heavy on the wire, for this will heat, soften, or break the wire, if it is not very good and tough. The emery rollers should be seven or eight inches in diameter, and always two or three inches wider than the cardcylinders, so that they may traverse an inch each way on the cylinder, and not leave any of the wire bare. Traversing is effected by means of a waving pulley, about 54 inches in diameter; the outer rim or edge of the pulley runs in a slot attached to the stand of the roller: or the traversing is produced by a crooked strap, which, fitting between the rims of the pulley, will move the emery roller longitudinally and around at the same time. The traverse motion may be also produced by a waving pulley at the emery roller. The emery roller must be kept on the cylinders until they are ground perfectly true, and until the greater portion of the

teeth are ground to a point. The perfect rotundity of the cylinder may be ascertained by the sound it produces on the emery roller as it runs: the sight may also be of service in this respect, either when the cylinder is in motion, or by stopping it, and giving it a careful examination. When the surface of a card-cylinder has been sufficiently ground, it will have a blackish appearance, while those parts that are not ground enough will appear more or less clear and bright. As long as a considerable quantity of white teeth appear, the grinding must be continued. One day will be sufficient to grind up a new card, if the emery is in tolerably good order.

HAND-EMERIES.

When the cylinder has been ground perfectly true, and nearly all the bright teeth have disappeared, the cards are finished off by reducing the teeth to a smooth point, which is done by a wooden hand-emery for the doffer, and a canvas emery for the main cylinder. The emery for the doffer should be made of clean, well-seasoned pine wood, one inch thick, three inches wide, and two or three inches longer than the width of the card-cylinder. For twenty-eight inch cards, the emery should be thirty or thirty-one inches long, and for thirty inch cards, thirty-two or thirty-three inches long, so that, in traversing the emery-board backwards and. forwards two or three inches, the wire will be always covered, and no part of it left bare at the end of the cylinders; for, if such be the case, the parts left bare will be higher than those on which the emery was constantly operating. In grinding with the hand-emery, it must be moved perfectly straight and parallel, and not pressed too heavily on the cylinder, as this makes the fillet slack at the right-hand side, and proportion.

ally light on the left-hand side of the doffer. When these hand-emeries are over twenty-six inches in length, they should have a strip of wood attached to the centre of the upper side. This strip or back-bone should be full an inch wide, and 24 or 24 inches deep in the middle, sloping off to each end, and be fastened on by stout screws. This prevents them from warping. If they become warped or crooked, it has the effect of grinding off the card-wire, and destroying the straight, level surface, which must be guarded against by every possible means. Good, well-made canvas emeries are undoubtedly the best for finishing or grinding the main cylinder on ordinary occasions; they are made by attaching a piece of stout, even canvas, twelve inches wide, and seventeen or eighteen inches long, to an iron or wooden frame, one end of which must be made to move with slats, so as to make the canvas slack enough to form a curve like a saddle when applied to the cylinder. On this account it is commonly called saddlegrinder. It is advisable not to make it so slack as to permit the ends where the canvas is fastened to come in contact with the teeth. Those ends, if attached to a flat board, should rise about 2 inches, which will allow the canvas 17 or 18 inches to form a sufficient curve without touching the back. There must be a handle on the back of the board to hold it by: two handles are better than one, if reaching from end to end, as the person grinding would then have to use both hands, and could, of course, hold it steadier. If the canvas is on an iron frame, this frame should be made in two parts, with a curved back, and be connected on the back by a slide and two

screws.

7*.

USING THE HAND-EMERY.

In using the hand-emery, the operator must be careful not to press it upon the wire, but to let it bear its own weight. While moving it backwards and forwards, or rather from side to side, he should also take heed that the grinder dwells a little longer at the ends of the sheets, or the sides of the cards, than in the middle: the reason for this is very obvious, the emery passing over the middle twice for the once that it does over either end; and, without resting a short time at each side, the cylinder would be ground hollow, consequently, on starting the card, it would be found to make bad work. Many cards are injured by learners, or by persons unacquainted with the proper manner of holding or using canvas emeries. Canvas emeries cannot be made the full width of the cylinder—at least they are not made so—it would make them quite too heavy, and they would do more to injure than to benefit the wires of the cards.

GROUND HOLLOW.

If, through ignorance or inattention, it should happen that either of the cylinders or likerins is ground hollow in the middle, if the surface is in any way injured, or if the cylinder is losing its rotundity, it will be impossible, while in this condition, for a card to make good work. One card working badly will spoil the work of twenty cards working in a proper manner, if mixed with it at the drawing-frame. When any of these difficulties occur, the only remedy is to put on the. emery roller again, and reduce all the prominent places, making the cylinder as even, true, and round, as it was originally.