Louis-Jerome Perrot

Louis-Jérôme Perrot, born 1798 in Senlis, died 1878 in Paris, invented the perrotine, a block-printing machine. It was widely used on the Continent, but found little favour in the UK.

'Its low output compared with that of the roller machine made the success of the Perrotine short-lived; it virtually disappeared during the second half of the nineteenth century, though a few Austrian and Czech plants have continued to use it for blue and white articles.'

1839 'THE PERROTINE. The new patent machine for block-printing, called the Perrotine, after its inventor, M. Perrot, of Rouen, is now extensively used on the Continent, and is likely, from the efficiency and accuracy with which it can be worked, to attract the attention of the numerous establishments here engaged in the important branch of commerce to which it is adapted. This novel machine is contributed by Messrs. Joseph and John Lockett, of this town [Manchester], and manufactured by them, they having recently taken out a patent for it. It is calculated for working one, two, or three colours, either separately or at once (but it can be adapted to print a greater number, if required), with blocks cut in the ordinary manner. Dr. Ure, in his " Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures," &c., says, under the article " calico printing," —"The Perrotine is a machine for executing block printing by mechanical power ; and is performs as much work, it is said, as twenty expert hands. I have seen its operation in many factories in France and Belgium in a very satisfactory manner; but, I believe, there are none of them as yet in this country. Three wooden blocks, from two and a half to three feet long, according to the breadth of the cloth, and from two to five inches broad, faced with pear-tree wood, engraved in relief, are mounted in a powerful cast-iron frame-work, with their planes at right angles to each other, so that each of them may be brought to bear in succession on the face, top, and back of a square prism of iron, covered with cloth, and fitted to revolve upon an axis between the said blocks. The calico passes between the prism and the engraved blocks, and receives -sucessive impressions from them, as it is successively drawn through by a winding cylinder. The blocks are pressed against the calico through the agency of springs, which imitate the elastic pressure of the workman's hand. Each block receives a coat of coloured paste from a woollen surface, smeared, after every contact, with a mechanical brush. One man, with one or two children for superintending the colour-giving surfaces, can turn off about thirty pieces English per day, in three colours, which is the work of fully twenty men and twenty children in block-printing by hand." The Perrotine, we are informed, is more particularly adapted to the printing of mousselines de laine, merinoes, stuffs, silks, and woollens. Its chief merits are rapidity of production, correctness of figure, and brilliancy of colour. For the printing of fabrics of that class, the block is essential in the majority of styles, as an engraved copper roller will not saturate the cloth with colour in the way that a block will, and the result is comparatively a sickly colour. Very beautiful and delicate patterns can be worked by this machine, which cannot be worked by hand-block printing. A very finely cut block, if worked by hand, will leave the numerous small interstices in the design choked with colour, when furnished by the tearing sieve with colour of the proper consistency to saturate the cloth; and if the colour be thicker, so as not thus to interfere with the beauty of the figure, then the cloth is not fully furnished, and the colours are poor. A beautiful contrivance in the Perrotine obviates this difficulty. The colour is taken up by the finely-wrought block in a state of consistence that will not choke up any of the finest work on its surface ; this is applied to the cloth ; a second supply of the colour is taken up by the same block, and struck with mathematical accuracy on the identical impression ; thus the cloth receives two coats of colour, the figures are perfect, and the colours brilliant. It would be exceedingly difficult for a workman to fit his block by hand with sufficient accuracy on this plan: The fabric is kept in its correct position, while receiving the pattern by a very ingenious roller, furnished with sharp steel pins, set at distances of about an inch and a half. The machine can readily be worked by steam power, and one man is then sufficient to superintend it. 250 of these Perrotines, we are informed, are now at work on the Continent.— Manchester Guardian.'

1845 Law Intelligence: Vice Chancellor's Court: 'PERROT v. NOVELLI. A motion for an injunction was made in this case to restrain the defendants from making, vending, imitating, or counterfeiting certain machines, the invention of the plaintiff, and called “Perrotines,” and mentioned letters patent granted to the defendant Lockett, and for other purposes. The motion also sought the appointment of a receiver and manager of the property derivable under the letters patent. M. Louis Jerome Pierrot, the plaintiff, a civil engineer, native of France, is the inventor of the machines in question, to be used for printing calicoes, papers, floorcloths, and other materials, in an easier mode than that heretofore adopted. The defendant Novelli is a partner in the house of Backhouse and Price, calico printers at Manchester. The plaintiff had obtained from the government of France the exclusive right of making and selling the machines there, but in order to avoid the loss of his right, which he would incur if he took out a patent in another country, procured the patent to be granted to the defendant Lockett. It was agreed that the defendants should act as the plaintiff’s agents on certain terms, and they undertook to try and dispose of the machines in the United Kingdom, and pay M. Perrot for every machine sold 400 f. up to 1.000 f., according to the number of colours to be used in the printing. Accounts were also to be kept and rendered. The letters patent were obtained in 1837, and the bill charged fraud upon the defendants, and alleged that they had employed the machines sent to them for their own use, gain, and advantage as calico printers, but had not sold any of them, and rendered no account to the plaintiff of the moneys they had received, and had misrepresented the value and usefulness of the invention for the purposes intended.— His Honour said, that whether the conduct of the defendant had been fraudulent and unfair be could give no opinion. It was clear that more than seven years had elapsed since the agreement, and yet the plaintiff had not received a single shilling under it. He had, however, been offered 32/., and no more. Upon the materials before the court, his Honour was not satisfied that justice had been done to M. Perrot. The defendants had not acted under the agreement, and with regard to the subject of it, as the plaintiff had a right to expect they should. It was quite time that an opportunity should be afforded of trying what some other management would do. It was a clear case for the appointment of a manager and receiver. This was an order which, if the defendants' case was true and sincere, could not, as his Honour understood their answer, be prejudicial to them. He did not decide the motion upon that ground. He left the question of alleged fraud and unfairness open and undecided; but the strenuousness and earnestness of the opposition to the motion, even as to that part it which related to the appointment of a receiver, were remarkable, considering the case made by the answer. He should, therefore, order that it should be referred to the Master to appoint a proper person to superintend the manufacture and sale of the machines, and to receive the proceeds and profits. An account must be kept of the cost and sales of the machines, and a statement must be made whether the machines were made with or without improvements. This order to be without prejudice to the manner in which the profits are to be apportioned and divided. The Master to be at liberty to give directions as to the manner in which the receiver should act.'

1851 'THE GREAT EXHIBITION. .... CLASS XVIIL— WOVEN, FELTED, LAID FABRICS, DYED AND PRINTED. .... The cotton cloth is next well bleached, because, the whiter it is, the more light it will reflect from its surface, and the more brilliant will be the colour of its dyes. The goods are next rinsed, dried, and sometimes smoothed under the calender. If they are not calendered, they are run through a machine, called in Lancashire the "candroy," which spreads them smoothly in the act of rolling them upon a cylinder. There are four mechanical modes of printing calicoes; first, by small wooden blocks, worked by hand; second, by larger wood-cut blocks, placed in either two or three planes, standing at right angles to each other, called a Perrotine, from the name of its inventor; the third is by flat copperplates, a method now almost obsolete; and a fourth is by a system of copper cylinders, mounted in a frame of great elegance, but no little complexity, by which two, three, four, or even five colours may be printed on in rapid succession by the mere rotation of the machine, driven by the agency of steam or water.
The hand-blocks are made of sycamore or pear-tree wood, or of deal faced with these woods, and are from two to three inches thick, nine or ten inches long, and five broad, with a strong box handle on the back for seizing them by. The face of the block is either carved in relief into the desired design, like an ordinary wood-cut, or the figure is formed by the insertion edgewise into the wood of narrow slips of flattened copper wire. These tiny fillets, being filed level on one edge, are cut or bent into the proper shape, and forced into the wood by the tap of a hammer at the traced lines of the configuration. Their upper surfaces are now filed flat, and polished into one horizontal plane for the sake of equality of impression. As the slips are of equal thickness in their whole depth, from having been made by running the wire between the steel cylinders of a flatting-mill, the lines of the figure, however much they get worn by use, are always equally broad as at first; an advantage which does not belong to wood-cutting. The interstices between the ridges thus formed are filled up with felt stuff. Sometimes a delicate part of the design is made by the wood cutter, and the rest by the insertion of copper slips.
Calico-printing by hand is performed by applying the face of the block to a piece of woollen cloth stretched over one end of a sieve-hoop, and imbued with a colouring matter of a thin pasty consistence by means of a fiat brush. The block is then applied to the surface of the cotton cloth while extended upon a flat table covered with a blanket, and the impression is transferred to it by striking the bock of the block with a light mallet. This method, besides tho great cost of labour which it involves, has the inconvenience of causing many irregularities in the execution of the work. It has been superseded to a considerable extent, both in France and Belgium by the Perrotine. Three thin wooden blocks, engraved in relief, about three feet long, and from two to five inches broad, are successively brought to bear on three of the four faces of a prismatic roller of iron, round which the cloth is successively wound. Each block rests on springs, which enable it to press with the delicacy of a skilful arm; and each receives Its peculiar-coloured paste from a woollen surface imbued by a mechanical brush in rapid alternation. In England a machine has been introduced in which three or more oblong blocks are laid side by side, and are imbued with different colours all at the same time, from a trough arranged for the purpose.
The cylinder machine consists of a hollow cylinder of copper, about three feet long, and three or four inches in diameter, whose surface is engraved, not by the hand-graver, but by the mechanical pressure of a steel roller from one [to?] two inches in diameter, and three inches long, which transfers the figures engraved on it to the relatively softer copper. The first steel roller, called the die, is softened before being engraved in intaglio; it is then hardened, and made, by a powerful press, to transfer its design in relief to a similar die called the mill, which is the one used for transferring the design to the copper cylinder. The process of etching is also sometimes had recourse to for covering the cylinder with varLus figures. The engraved cylinders are mounted upon a strong iron shaft or arbor, carrying a toothed wheel at its end, in order to put it in train with the rotatory printing machine for one, two, or more colours. On a roller, at the upper part of this apparatus, are wound whole calico webs, stitched together, the end of which is then introduced between the engraved copper cylinder and a large central cylinder, covered with a blanket, against which it is made to bear with regulated pressure. The engraved cylinder turns on the top of another cylinder covered with woollen cloth, which revolves with the former, while its under part is plunged in an oblong trough containing the dyeing matter, which is of a pasty consistence. The engraved cylinder is thus supplied with an abundance of impressible colour, and is cleared of the superfluity by the thin edge of a flat ruler, made of bronze, called vulgarly the doctor, which is applied obliquely to it with a gentle force. The cylinder, after its escape from this wiping tool, sets upon the calico, and rolls it onwards with its revolution, imparting its figured design with great precision. ....'
NOTE: Although the article dates from 1851, most of the text is lifted from Ure's Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures and Mines, published in 1839.

See Also

Loading...