Editing Power loom (section)

==History==
[[File:TM158 Strong Calico Loom with Planed Framing and Catlow's Patent Dobby.png|thumb|upright|A loom from the 1890s with a [[dobby loom|dobby]] head. Illustration from the Textile Mercury.]]
The first ideas for an automatic loom were developed in 1784 by M. [[Jean-Baptiste de Gennes|de Gennes]] in Paris and by [[Vaucanson]] in 1745, but these designs were never developed and were forgotten.  In 1785 [[Edmund Cartwright]] patented a power loom which used water power to speed up the weaving process, the predecessor to the modern power loom. His ideas were licensed first by Grimshaw of [[Manchester]] who built a small steam-powered weaving factory in Manchester in 1790, but the factory burnt down. Cartwright's was not a commercially successful machine; his looms had to be stopped to dress the warp. Over the next decades, Cartwright's ideas were modified into a reliable automatic loom.  These designs followed [[John Kay (flying shuttle)|John Kay]]'s invention of the flying shuttle, and they passed the shuttle through the shed using levers. With the increased speed of weaving, weavers were able to use more thread than spinners could produce.<ref>{{harvnb|Marsden|1895|p=64}}</ref>

===Series of initial inventors===
A series of inventors incrementally improved all aspects of the three principal processes and the ancillary processes. 
* Grimshaw of Manchester (1790): dressing the warp 
* Austin (1789, 1790): dressing the warp, 200 looms produced for Monteith of Pollockshaws 1800
* Thomas Johnson of Bredbury (1803): dressing frame, factory for 200 steam looms on Manchester in 1806, and two factories at [[Stockport]] in 1809. One at [[Westhoughton]], Lancashire (1809).
* William Radcliffe of Stockport (1802): improved take up mechanism
* John Todd of [[Burnley]] (1803): a heald roller and new shedding arrangements, the healds were corded to treadles actuated by cams on the second shaft.
* William Horrocks of Stockport (1803): The frame was still wooden but the lathe was pendant from the frame and operated by cams on the first shaft, the shedding was operated by cams on the second shaft, the take up motion was copied from Radcliffe.
* Peter Marsland (1806): improvements to the lathe motion to counteract poor picking
* William Cotton (1810): improvements to the letting off motion
* William Horrocks (1813): [[Horrocks loom]], modifications to the lathe motion, improving on Marsland
* Peter Ewart (1813): a use of pneumatics
* Joseph and Peter Taylor (1815): double beat foot lathe for heavy cloths
* [[Paul Moody (inventor)|Paul Moody]] (1815): produces the first power loom in North America. Exporting a UK loom would have been illegal.
* [[John Capron]] and Sons (1820): installed the first power looms for woolens in North America at [[Uxbridge, Massachusetts]].
* William Horrocks (1821): a system to wet the warp and weft during use, improving the effectiveness of the sizing
* [[Richard Roberts (engineer)|Richard Roberts]] (1830): [[Roberts Loom]], These improvements were a geared take up wheel and tappets to operate multiple heddles<ref>{{harvnb|Marsden|1895|pp=70,71}}</ref>
* Stanford, Pritchard and Wilkinson: patented a method to stop on the break of weft or warp. It was not used.
* William Dickinson of Blackburn: Blackburn Loom, the modern overpick

===Further useful improvements===
There now appear a series of useful improvements that are contained in patents for useless devices
* Horny, Kenworthy and Bullough of Blackburn (1834): the vibrating or fly reed
* John Ramsbottom and Richard Holt of Todmorden (1834): a new automatic weft stopping motion
* James Bullough of Blackburn (1835): improved automatic weft stopping motion and taking up and letting off arrangements
* Andrew Parkinson (1836): improved stretcher ([[Temple (Weaving)|temple]]).
* William Kenworthy and James Bullough (1841): trough and roller [[Temple (Weaving)|temple]] (became the standard), A simple stop-motion.<ref>{{harvnb|Marsden|1895|pp=88–95}}</ref>
At this point the loom has become automatic except for refilling weft pirns. The Cartwight loom weaver could work one loom at 120-130 picks per minute- with a Kenworthy and Bullough's [[Lancashire Loom]], a weaver can run four or more looms working at 220-260 picks per minute- thus giving eight (or more) times more throughput.
* James Henry Northrop (1894) invented a self-threading shuttle and shuttle spring jaws to hold a bobbin by means of rings on the butt. This paved the way to his automatic filling and changing battery of 1891, the basic feature of the [[Northrop Loom]]. The principal advantage of the Northrop loom was that it was fully automatic; when a warp thread broke, the loom stopped until it was fixed. When the shuttle ran out of thread, Northrop's mechanism ejected the depleted pirn and loaded a new full one without stopping. A loom operative could work 16 or more looms whereas previously they could only operate eight. Thus, the labor cost was halved. Mill owners had to decide whether the labor saving was worth the capital investment in a new loom. In all 700,000 looms were sold. By 1914, Northrop looms made up 40% of American looms. Northrop was responsible for several hundred weaving related patents.