INVENTION OF A LETTER-STAMPING MACHINE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XXIII, Issue 1397, 9 May 1865, Page 5

INVENTION OF A LETTER-STAMPING MACHINE.

our readers About four working model of a machine that we had seea chief Poßtnias tcr of invented by Mr-J _ • ~i e dßtes on letters, ob"""TpmC. *"* &C - Sin °u ' el ' ,VC rh t s> W.»tio» ,t » P«£ feet success. i , k i n ,i I,as been to adapt it so mto a machine of tin* t thickness. This diffi* *** [ Tlt once sJriko most people ™ in the crush anything tWc J* r ' ihev would nece , • s ;, nn j e and ingenious eon* Tlu> Overcome in the machine we are trivance. KH?I , nm j the date stamps mit exercise now on a letter an inch in no more P^l >n th , v r (1() on an empty envelope of thickncs> th. 0 r * re; ,j er9 who mx*ivtKl letters Jrorn tissue paper- ? u^. c bv the last Knglish mail will the (^' riS viinjj' their envelopes. to admire not fail. u f"!"^ of the date stamp, the iK^utifu l!t j; !Ulta l , 8 in bringing this machine one of the elm* f (Uiml in t!u , preservation of f intoirenera _ rt ; c ] o « date stamps: those iff Mr. those ,ons ''i: " hare now camped upwards of Wr i 2 hi s ,uauh,t, S t , finc Hues in the stamps ap- [ hJ buivwrtctdV left the e« ; pcaraMlu" >at Btamring ,his numher of -, u . r s. Tla tn have been to batter I leUerS -n thto liS. find destroy the clearness of J down J e b „ t| u » stumps. In K'brujjl the ni j wa9 stamped bv the machine, ' ar v the Kn|«- the Inspector of in 11,0 KTThe mail consisted of 5,524 letter#, and J l> oit i "h' >■ person in one honr and torty*W ' Mr. Crawford, we learn, expressed ftve 'if Thir pleased with the maimer in which J performed by the machine, and the inn it in the most favourable terms Postmaster-General. On the 95th « ' the Jinuary mail from England, together M T" the mails arriving at the same time I' 1 other places, containing in all 7,252 letters, t ,l J ! bv the machine, although the person * er ti i t "subjected to many interruptions, m Sr and forty minutes. On this occasion the II J Tttcred «nd Mr. Joseph Palmer were H n watch the working of the machine on j El oHhe Office authority and totem an J •f„ «To it. merits. We believe that their report J Shichlv satisfactory to the inventor. The stamp- • " if" 1000 letters was timed by them, and that Zt ™ Suwdthnwgh the niaclime in nine iliirtvseconds. 300 letters were then stamped Ke tot date ami** in i* f* «* "jf g se vra minutes thirty sownds to complete to» Derson had been employed two years in the General London, as a date-stamper. The Stamping Of \n English mail is the severest test which can be L Lito the machine, as the letters adhere very » much together, from the length of time they have been tied up. 300 letters, which had not been tied T were stamped by the machine and completed in Commutes five seconds. But no exact limit can at c present te placed upon the speed with which the machine can be worked, as the number of letters that P can be stamped in a given time entirely depends J noon the speed with which the person working the ■ nTchine can feed it with letters, and they have been done much quicker each time the machine has been « tried Thus, the mails which arrived on Friday last J contained 6,615 letters; and the Post-office messenger, "William Baynes, who worked and fed the machine, pasted that great number of letters through, one at atime, in one hour and nine minutes ; this was ® equal to 100 per minute all the mail through, and he ■ was not in the least fatigued at the end of the work. * To stamp this number of English letters by hand would occupv one person between five and six hours, I and the probability i- that he would be thoroughly ® exhausted before l e finished them, and would have 8 severelv injured his hand and wrist, by the con- c tinuous concussion for so long a period. We believe that numerous attempts have before I now been made to invent machines for stamping 1 letters, «ith greater or less success. The best we 1 have heard of was one for a time in use in the 8 General Post-office, London; but this, our informant " tells us, required the letters to be all of about the 4 thickness of a letter containing a single sheet of 1 paper, and consequently they had to be picked for * it. and this drawback rendered the machine useless. The greatest number done by this machine in an 1 hoar was, we are informed, 5000. We consider the invention of a thoroughly practical machine of so. ' u«eiu': and simple a character as the one invented by ' Mr. Wright, as a matter of which not only he, but ' the whole colony, has some just reason to be proud ; I siid tre sincerely trust that his long and patient endeavours (for the invention has occupied his atten- { tion for nearly three years), may soon meet with a substantial reward. 1