Spencer Wright Industries, Inc.

Philip Harold Crossley

A tufting machine with a pair of closely spaced apart needle bars which reciprocate together but the needles carried by one bar may be controlled selectively to be either in a position to form pile or be retracted to a position where they do not form pile when the needle bars are driven toward the backing material selectively. A control system is provided to control the selection of the needles of the one needle bar and also the feeding of yarn to the needles of the one needle bar so that yarn from needles which are not tufting is drawn tight on the backing. The needles may be mounted in modules and selected needle modules may be independently controllable by pneumatic cylinders so that various overtufted patterns may be made by the controlled needles in a background formed by the needles in the other bar that tuft on every stitch.

Tufting machine for overtufting patterns

A tufting machine has two slidable needle bars in back-to-back relationship, each needle bar being reciprocated toward and away from a backing material in unison. Each needle bar carries a plurality of transversely spaced apart needles mounted in needle modules, the needles in one bar being staggered relative to those in the other bar. The needles in both needle bars may cooperate with identical hooks positioned on the opposite side of the backing material. Each needle bar is slidable transversely independently of the other needle bar. The gauge between needles in each needle bar is twice the gauge between the hooks and the hooks have a common throat length so that each hook may cooperate with a needle in either needle bar. Thus each needle bar may be shifted transversely by a distance equal to the pitch between needles of the composite needle bar assembly rather than the larger pitch between needles in the same needle bar as in the prior art. This permits the gauge at which a particular yarn may be shifted to be substantially equal to half the gauge of that capable in the prior art so that substantially improved pattern definition may result.

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Blackburn, United Kingdom

Philip Harold Crossley