ylinder" as many as 600
steel wire teeth in one square inch. For a cylinder 40 inches wide and
50 inches diameter, this works out to the vast number of over 3,800,000
steel wire teeth on one cylinder, each tooth being about 1/4 inch long,
and secured in a cloth or rubber foundation before the latter is wound
round the cylinder.

The steel teeth of the cylinder strip the fibres from the taker-in and
carry them in an upward direction, the surface speed of the cylinder
being over 2000 feet per minute.

Placed over the cylinder, and extending for nearly one-half of its
circumference, are what are technically known as the "flats."

These are narrow iron bars, each about 1-3/8 inches wide; each being
covered with steel wire teeth in the same manner as the cylinder; and
each extending right across the width of the cylinder, and resting on a
suitable bearing termed the "bend."

They are formed into an endless chain containing about 108 "flats," but
only about 44 of which are in actual work at one time; this endless
chain of flats being given a slow movement of about 3 inches per minute.

Here it may be said that the various working parts are set as close as
possible to each other without being in actual contact, the usual
distance being about 1/143rd of an inch determined by a specially
constructed gauge, in the hands of a skilled workman.

The steel teeth of the flats, being set very close to those of the
cylinder, catch hold of and retain a portion of the short warty fibres
and fine impurities that may be on the points of the cylinder teeth, the
amount of this reaching about 3 per cent. of the cotton passed through
the machine. In addition to this the teeth of the flats work against
those of the cylinder so as to exercise a combing action on the cotton
fibres.

Having passed the "flats," the cotton is deposited by the cylinder on
what is termed the doffer. This is a cylindrical body, exactly similar
to the main "cylinder" excepting that it is only about half the
diameter, say 24 inches. Its steel wire teeth are set in the opposite
way to those of the cylinder, and its surface speed is only about 75
feet per minute. These two circumstances acting together enable it to
take the cotton fibres from the main cylinder.

The operations of carding may now be said to be practically performed,
as the remaining operations have for their object the stripping,
collecting, and guiding of the cotton into a form suitable for the nex