Slicker

“ See Page 1.
3 Regulation Army Slicker.
A Combination Riding and Walking Coat. Can be adjusted for riding or walking purposes.
Olive Drab Army Slicker. Made from an olive drab back to back Asia cotton cloth with a rubber interlining, making this coat absolutely waterproof. Coat has reinforced front which closes with wide lapover snap fasteners. One large right patch pocket and one opening for saber strap on left side. Large military collar, ventilation eyelets under the arms. Average length, 50 inches. Sizes, 34 to 48 inches breast measure. State size. Average shipping weight, 41⁄2 pounds. ”

“ The cage and the indicator enable the factory people to closely estimate the amount of raw material used each day. It is also a check on every department. It will show any error that may arise in the receiving or shipping departments. The slicer is a round iron shaft, rotating horizontally, and fitted with steel knives capable of slicing four hundred tons of beets in twenty-four hours. The rotating knives, which, descend upon the beets, cut them into thin slices, thus exposing the sugar-cells, which is an important factor in the diffusion system. ”

“ The slices are then separated, and that cut out of one slice is fitted into the others so that one cutting produces several repetitions of the design with variations in ground and pattern. When there are only two slices of material the technical term for them is Boulle and Counter. When the various parts have been arranged in their places, face downwards, paper is glued over them to keep the whole in place, and filings of the material rubbed in to fill up any interstices. ”

“ A "Cut Splice" (Fig. 109) is made just as an eye splice or short splice, but instead of splicing two ropes together end to end, or splicing an end into a standing part, the ends are lapped and each is spliced into the standing part of the other, thus forming a loop or eye in the centre of a rope. Once the short and long splices are mastered, all other splices, as well as many useful variations, will come easy. Oftentimes, for example, one strand of a rope may become worn, frayed, or broken, while the remaining strands are perfectly sound. ”

“ Take away slice after slice in this direction, and then resorting to the meat lying on either side of the blade bone, according to the quantity required, in this instance cutting lengthways of the joint. When no more can be obtained from the upper side of the joint, it must be turned, and there are many people who do not consider that they have had the best of a shoulder of mutton until this side is attacked. It will now present almost the appearance of a new joint, being quite flat, and offering a succession of juicy slices along its entire length. ”

“ This is obtained by the process of splitting, for which a machine is used whose exactness is such, that one slice is taken from the inner part of the whole skin, reducing it in thickness without cutting a hole in any part. The skin is stretched tightly round a roller, which slowly revolves against a straight knife-edge, fixed at a certain distance from it, according to the thickness of the skin, and which is passed by the machine backwards and forwards, cutting the skin a little further each time. ”

“ The stirrer is a hard baked cylinder of fire clay fastened to an iron bar. First heated in the mouth of the pot, the stirrer is plunged in the molten glass and given a steady rotating motion, the long bar being swivelled and furnished with a wooden handle for the workman. ”

“ The management of the beating engine is left to the skill and judgment of the foreman in charge. The knives may be sharp or dull, the roll may be closely pressed upon the bed-plate or slightly elevated, the bars and knives may have the angles which they make with each other altered, so that they either cut off sharply, like the blades of scissors, or tear the rags more slowly as they pass between them. The duration of the beating also varies according to the nature of the pulp, the length of fibre required, the condition of the knives, &c. ”

“ The silk-waste spinner receives his silk in quite a different form: merely the raw material, packed in bales of various sizes and weights, the contents being a much-tangled mass of all lengths of fibre mixed with much foreign matter, such as ends of straws, twigs, leaves, worms and chrysalis. It is the spinner’s business to straighten out these fibres, with the aid of machinery, and then to so join them that they become a thread, which is known as spun silk. ”

“ The cross slide is formed on the top of the lower slider, which has beneath a nut for the feed screw, whose handle is shown at a, hence rotating a will cause the lower slider to traverse along the lower slide and carry the tool along the work to its cut. To maintain the fit of the sliders to the slides a slip of metal is inserted, as at e and at c, and these are set up by screws as at f, f and b, b. ”

“ This is especially convenient for carving thin slices from any large roasts, or other varieties of solid meat. The width of the blade helps to steady the meat, and its great length enables one to cut with a single, long, smooth stroke through the entire surface. With a knife having a short blade a sort of sawing motion would be made, and the slice would be jagged. As there are no joints to separate, a point on the blade is unnecessary.
A jointer is another form of carver, useful where the joints are so large or so difficult to separate that considerable strength is required. ”

“ On emerging from the drawing rollers, the combed slivers pass between slicking rollers, and then approach the sliver plate which bridges the gap between the slicking rollers and the delivery rollers, and by means of which plate two or more individual slivers are diverted at right angles, first to join each other, and then again diverted at right angles to join another sliver which passes straight from the drawing rollers and over the sliver plate to the guide of the delivery rollers. ”

“ We became expert in cutting up enormous joints of meat, our implements a short-handled knife invariably coated with grease, a fork when we could get one, and a small wooden board. So expert, indeed, that one day a woman hovered round as we sliced and cut and hacked, watching us intently for some minutes. ”

“ Even slivers produced on a combing machine, in which the fibres are, as has been observed, in much better order than when treated in a carding engine, are improved by being subjected to this drawing action. The net result of the process is an improvement in the strength of the resultant thread. Not only is it essential to improve the parallelisation of the fibres in the sliver, but it is equally desirable to produce a sliver of even weight and thickness. ”

“ To convert the scythe or the sickle, or some other sharp blade into a fast reciprocating cutter, to hang such cutter low so that it would cut near the ground, to protect it from contact with stones by a proper guard, to actuate it by the wheels of the vehicle, to hinge the cutter-bar to the frame so that its outer end might be raised, and to arrange a seat on the machine so that the driver could control the operating parts by means of a lever, or handles, were the main problems to be solved. ”

“ The mode in which the rags are cut will be understood by considering that the teeth of the block are placed somewhat inclined to the axis of the cylinder, while the teeth of the cylinder are parallel to its axis, so that the cutting edges meet at a small angle and pass over each other something like the blade of a pair of shears, and the rags between them are cut up in a similar manner; and as they are brought many times under the action of the cutters, and must necessarily present their fibres each time in different directions, they are reduced to the condition of pulp. ”

“ And as to cutting, it is only necessary to place the number of pieces of fabric desired to be cut in cutting dies, or upon a table, and over them an “over-board” cutter, which comprises a reciprocating band-saw, or a rotary knife, all quick, keen and delicate, in an apparatus guided by hand, in order to produce in the operation a great pile of the parts formerly so slowly produced, one at a time, by scissors or shears. ”

“ In carving the sirloin and similar ribbed joints, a too pliant blade is not desirable. When, however, we are dealing with a round of beef lying flat before us, or the boiled silver side, or a piece of roast so-called boned beef, the knife cannot well be too yielding, nor, again, the slices cut too thin. Never either omit with this sort of [624] joint, where one has to cut directly towards the fork, to raise its finger guard, for, if the knife slip, it will run straight up over the bow of the prongs, to the imminent peril of the carver’s hand. ”

“ The labour employed is chiefly that of women and girls, who, armed with sharp sickles or large knives with heavy and curved blades, stand beneath the trellises and hold a wooden tray in one hand beneath the bunch to be severed. One skilled sweep of the 200 sickle and the latter falls into the tray with a minimum of damage to the luscious fruit. ”

“ However, you may get from both sides of a large shoulder enough to help ten people, provided your slices are not too thick, which they should not be. The fat is to be cut from the aforesaid angular bit in slices, longways. After the right and left sides are exhausted, and the carver stopped by the knuckle on one side and the blade-bone on the other, the end of the shoulder is to be turned, and cut straight down from the center bone to the end, comprising the three best slices of the joint. ”

“ The sliver from each can is then placed into the corresponding sliver guide, and thus the full width of the machine is occupied. The slivers are guided by the sliver guides on to an endless cloth or "feed sheet" which, in turn, conveys them continuously between the feed rollers. The feed apparatus in such machines is invariably of the roller type, and sometimes it involves what is known as a "porcupine" roller. It will be understood that the feeding of level slivers is a different problem from that which necessitates the feeding of comparatively uneven stricks. ”

“ The spindle carries cutters for boring, whereas milling cutters or the auxiliary facing arm are bolted to the end A of the spindle sleeve. The work itself is attached either directly or indirectly to the table or platen P. When the machine is in operation, the cutter or tool revolves with the spindle sleeve or spindle and either the cutter or the part being machined is given a feeding movement, depending on the character of the work. The spindle can be moved in or out by hand for adjustment, or by power for feeding the cutter, as when boring or drilling. ”

“ Inside the inner pail, consequently, there is a stirrer, which, by means of a handle, continually scrapes the side of the pail. It is obvious that if the stirrer is fixed, and the pail itself made to revolve, that is the same as if the pail were fixed and the stirrer made to revolve. ”

“ These slices show that the gutta-percha is by no means uniform in different parts, either in color or texture. To bring about a uniformity is the object of the shredding or tearing process. The slices are thrown into a tank of water, which is heated by steam to such a temperature as to soften the mass; dirt and heavy impurities fall to the bottom, leaving a pasty mass of gum; and the mass being thrown into another rotating machine, is there so torn and rent, and dragged asunder by jagged teeth, as to be reduced to fragments. ”

“ Fig. 1936, from The American Machinist, represents an example of the employment of shank cutters, the work being a handle for a lathe cross-feed screw, and it is obvious that the double cornering cutter may be used upon both edges, and the cut being carried around the hub by the parallel part of the cutter; the whole of the work on the handle including the boring, if the hole is cast in, may be done by the shank cutter, the handle end being finished and the boring done first, the hub being finished on an arbor. ”

“ How to Split with a Jack-knife
Fig. 40 shows the proper way to use the knife in splitting a stick, so that it will not strain the spring at the back of the [44] handle of the knife, and at the same time it will help you guide the knife blade and tend to make a straight split. Do not try to pry the stick apart with a knife or you will sooner or later break the blade, a serious thing for a wilderness man to do, for it leaves him without one of the most useful tools. ”

“ Of course, in long-splicing, as in many other things, different men have different styles. Suppose, for example, a colliery hauling rope is to be spliced, and that it works endless from a hauling engine to a terminal return pulley, mounted on the tension bogie; suppose also that the rope has been put in position, with the ends left at the most convenient place ready for splicing. If 60 ft. of end is available for the splice, decide on that length, and, measuring about 40 ft. ”

“ Standing there on the elastic plank, which seems to give more life and vigor to his blows, it springs to the swing of the axe and the chips fly fast. As you look, he seems to be inspired with eager hurry, and the chips fly in a constant shower. Soon a deep, wedge-like cut is seen eating its way into the heart of the trunk. ”

“ Among some hundreds of scrapers, principally from the Yorkshire Wolds, I have met with between twenty and thirty which show decided marks of being worn away along the circular edge, by friction. In some, the edge is only worn away sufficiently to remove all keenness or asperity, and to make it feel smooth to the touch, and this perhaps along one part only of the arc. In others, the whole edge is completely rounded, and many of the small facets by which it was originally surrounded, entirely effaced. ”

“ Another set of knives stands out motionless at right angles from the inner surface of the cylinder, and projects nearly to the central shaft, having their edges looking opposite to the line of motion of the revolving blades. Thus the two sets of slicing implements, the one active, and the other passive, operate like shears in cutting the clay into small pieces, while the active blades, by their spiral form, force the clay in its comminuted state out at an aperture at the bottom of the cylinder or cone, whence it is conveyed into a cylindrical vat, to be worked into a pap with water. ”