Letters-patent were issued to George E. King on the 26th February, 1867, for a new and useful improvement in fluting machines. He surrendered them, and on the 23d June, 1868, had two patents granted him as reissues of the original. The first of these, No. 3000, was for the machine by which the article of fluting and puffing described in the patent was made; and the other, No. 3001, was for the article made as described. The record before us is that of a suit in chancery brought by him against Robert Werner for an infringement of both these patents. Werner defended on the ground that the patents were void for want of novelty, and also by denying the infringement. The Circuit Court held that the defence was sustained as to the patent for the article produced, on the ground that it was not new, but rendered a decree in favor of King as to the reissued patent, No. 3000, for the machine. Werner alone appeals, and seeks a reversal of the decree on both the grounds urged below.
We will examine the question of infringement first; for, if the appellant has not infringed the patent of the appellee, he can very well leave to others the task of contesting its validity.
The appellant is also patentee of a machine for crimping and fluting, which produces an article similar to that of the appellee, and parts of the machine by which the purpose is effected are substantially the same as his. If on looking at the machine in detail there is such substantial identity as to all its parts, the appellant must be held to be an infringer, for his patent bears a date more than four years subsequent to that of the appellee.
The appellee's schedule declares that his invention is designed for making puffing applicable to shirt-bosoms, trimming, or other purposes of dress, in which the article, as it issues from the machine, is (without having recourse to laundering) delivered in a complete form, either singly, or in two or more series or rows, composed of flattened borders with flutes running along their inner edges, and puffed or wrinkled surfaces between the flutes.
The fabric to be fluted and puffed is drawn between a pair of rollers moved by a crank, the rollers, where they approach each other, having flutes or grooves so arranged as by their pressure on the fabric as it passes between them to make the fluting and to flatten it. These grooves on the rollers, while they are continuous in the annular or circumferential direction of the rollers, are interrupted in their longitudinal direction by smooth spaces, so that the material passing between the rollers is fluted or crimped in parts of its width and left plain in other parts which do not pass over the grooves. It is obvious, if this plain portion of the fabric, as it passes over the plain surface of the roller, can be so presented as to be compressed laterally, or in any other manner to have more of the material thus forced into the machine than is necessary to cover this plain surface, that when it comes out of the machine, while the fluted parts are fixed and flattened, the intermediate portion must present a puffed and irregular surface. It is this effect which is desired, and which King, by an additional contrivance, produces; and it is this contrivance which, in combination with the fluting-rollers already described, but which are not new, he claims as his invention.
This part of the machine consists of a double-plated segment of a hollow cylinder, the arch of which is upwards, so arranged with regard to the fluting-rollers that the part of the material which is intended to be puffed and not fluted, passing first between the plates of this arched guide, is presented to the plain surface of the roller, with the width of the strip increased by the difference between the lines of the curved or arched surface of the cylinder and the plain or horizontal surface of the roller which receives it. The result is, that when the material comes out of the machine this redundancy of the plain part of it assumes the form of irregular puffs, which is the end to be attained. All this is very well described, and specific references illustrated by drawings are given to the various parts of the machine.
'What I claim as new,' he says, in conclusion, 'and desire to secure by letters-patent, is: the guide, E, constructed with one or more curved or arched portions, a, in combination with suitable fluting-rollers, substantially as herein set forth for the purpose specified.'