Basile Bouchon () was a
textile
Textile is an Hyponymy and hypernymy, umbrella term that includes various Fiber, fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, Staple (textiles)#Filament fiber, filaments, Thread (yarn), threads, different #Fabric, fabric types, etc. At f ...
worker in the
silk
Silk is a natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be woven into textiles. The protein fiber of silk is composed mainly of fibroin and is produced by certain insect larvae to form cocoons. The best-known silk is obtained from th ...
center in
Lyon
Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of ...
who invented a way to control a
loom
A loom is a device used to weave cloth and tapestry. The basic purpose of any loom is to hold the warp threads under tension to facilitate the interweaving of the weft threads. The precise shape of the loom and its mechanics may vary, but t ...
with a perforated paper tape in 1725. The son of an
organ
Organ may refer to:
Biology
* Organ (biology), a part of an organism
Musical instruments
* Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone
** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument
** Hammond ...
maker, Bouchon partially automated the tedious setting up process of the
drawloom in which an operator lifted the warp threads using cords.
This development is considered to be the first industrial application of a semi-automated machine.
The cords of the
warp
Warp, warped or warping may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Books and comics
* WaRP Graphics, an alternative comics publisher
* ''Warp'' (First Comics), comic book series published by First Comics based on the play ''Warp!''
* Warp (comics), a ...
were passed through the eyes of horizontal needles arranged to slide in a box. These were either raised or not depending on whether there was not or was a hole in the tape at that point.
This was similar to the
piano roll developed at the end of the 19th century and may have been inspired by the patterns that were traditionally drawn on squared paper.
Three years later, his assistant Jean-Baptiste Falcon expanded the number of cords that could be handled by arranging the holes in rows and using rectangular cards that were joined together in an endless loop.
Though this eliminated mistakes in the lifting of threads, it still needed an extra operator to control it and the first attempt at automation was made by
Jacques Vaucanson in 1745. But it was not until 1805 that the wildly successful
Jacquard mechanism was finally produced.
References
Further reading
*Poncelet, Jean-Victor, ''Travaux de la Commission Française. L’Exposition Universelle de 1851'', vol. 3, part 1 (Machines et outils appliqués aux arts textiles), section 2, pages 348-349 (1857).
oncelet's history of the Jacquard loom is the basis for most subsequent accounts.*Usher, Abbot Payson. ''A History of Mechanical Inventions''. Revised edition. (Mineola, N.Y.: Dover Publications, Inc., 1988), pages 289-291. (Originally published in 1929 by Harvard University Press in Cambridge, Mass.)
*
Randell, Brian, ed. ''The Origins of Digital Computers: Selected Papers'', 3rd ed. (N.Y., N.Y.: Springer-Verlag, 1982), page 5.
*Eymard, Paul (1863
“Historique du métier Jacquard” ''Annales des Sciences physiques et naturelles''*, 3rd series, vol. 7, pages 34–56; see especially page 37. (* published in Lyon, France by Barret)
*Ballot, Charles. ''L’introduction du machinisme dans l’industrie française''. (Lille-Paris: F. Rieder, 1923), page 339.
*Ballot, Charles. ''Revue d'histoire de Lyon: Études, Documents, Bibliographie'' (Lyon, France: A. Rey et Co., 1913), vol. 2, pages 6–10.
*Barlow, Alfred. ''The History and Principles of Weaving by Hand and by Power'' (London, England: Kessinger Publishing, 2007). See Chapter 11. (Originally published in 1876 by Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington in London.)
External links
Photograph of replica of Bouchon loom
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bouchon, Basile
18th-century French inventors
Textile workers
Year of birth missing
Year of death missing
Engineers from Lyon