GRINDING AND GRINDING MACHINES
Machinery's Reference Series

Contents

Types of Grinding Machines
Principles of Grinding, by Oskar Kylin
Economy in Grinding, by John J. Thacher
The Disk Grinder
Grinding Kinks and Examples of Grinding
Cost of Grinding, by H. F. Noyes
The Bursting of Emery Wheels

Chapter 1 Excerpt

History of the Universal Grinding Machine

The universal grinding machine has had so great an influence on modern machine shop methods, and has done so much to raise the standard of workmanship and to increase the economy of production that a few words relating to the history of the development of this machine may be of interest.

The origin of the modern universal grinding machine is found in the crude grinding lathes of the early sixties. Mr. Joseph R. Brown, senior member of the firm now known as the Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Co., was intimately connected with the development of these grinding lathes into the universal grinding machine. The grinding lathe, as first built at the Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Co.'s works, was intended for the accurate and economical manufacture of the company's own products, and there was no idea of putting the machines on the market. In this respect the origin and development of the grinding machine was very much like the origin and development of the universal milling machine. The first work for which the grinding machines were designed was for grinding needle bars, foot bars and shafts of the Wilcox & Gibbs sewing machines. The first machine was built in 1864 and 1865, and one of these early machines is still in use in the Brown & Sharpe works. Cylindrical grinding, however, was done at the Brown & Sharpe works as early as 1862, this being indicated by the existence of drawings of a back-rest, dated September 22, 1862, which contains the essential features of a solid grinding machine back-rest of to-day.

These early machines were not grinding machines in the present meaning of the word, but were grinding lathes using, to a considerable extent, the parts of a 14-inch Putnam lathe. A great number of these were sold both in this country and abroad. Mr. Brown, however, realized the need of building a new machine designed especially for grinding, and in 1868 the design for such a machine was made. This design shows a machine containing most of the essential elements of the universal grinding machine of to-day. None of these machines were built at this time, however, on account of the pressure of other matters, and it was first in 1874 that working drawings were made for a complete machine containing practically all the features of the modern universal grinding machine. The first of these machines was exhibited at the Centennial Exposition in...

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