Jacquard machine

This portrait of Jacquard was woven in silk on a Jacquard loom and required 24,000 punched cards to create (1839). It was only produced to order. Charles Babbage owned one of these portraits; it inspired him in using perforated cards in his Analytical Engine.[1] It is in the collection of the Science Museum in London, England.[2]

The Jacquard machine (French: [ʒakaʁ]) is a device fitted to a loom that simplifies the process of manufacturing textiles with such complex patterns as brocade, damask and matelassé.[3] The resulting ensemble of the loom and Jacquard machine is then called a Jacquard loom. The machine was patented by Joseph Marie Jacquard in 1804,[4][5][6][7] based on earlier inventions by the Frenchmen Basile Bouchon (1725), Jean Baptiste Falcon (1728), and Jacques Vaucanson (1740).[8] The machine was controlled by a "chain of cards"; a number of punched cards laced together into a continuous sequence.[9] Multiple rows of holes were punched on each card, with one complete card corresponding to one row of the design.

Both the Jacquard process and the necessary loom attachment are named after their inventor. This mechanism is probably one of the most important weaving innovations as Jacquard shedding made possible the automatic production of unlimited varieties of complex pattern weaving. The term "Jacquard" is not specific or limited to any particular loom, but rather refers to the added control mechanism that automates the patterning. The process can also be used for patterned knitwear and machine-knitted textiles such as jerseys.[10]

This use of replaceable punched cards to control a sequence of operations is considered an important step in the history of computing hardware, having inspired Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine.

  1. ^ Hyman, Anthony, ed. Science and Reform: Selected Works of Charles Babbage, Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1989, p. 298.
  2. ^ Delve (2007), p. 99.
  3. ^ "Fabric Glossary". Archived from the original on January 5, 2009. Retrieved 2008-11-21.
  4. ^ Eric Hobsbawm, "The Age of Revolution", (London 1962; repr. 2008), p.45.
  5. ^ Schoenherr, Steven. "Jacquard's Punched Card". www.aes-media.org. Retrieved 2022-06-18.
  6. ^ "The Jacquard Mechanism: Innovation". Macclesfield Museums. Retrieved 2022-06-18.
  7. ^ Keranen, Rachel (2016). Inventions in Computing: From the Abacus to Personal Computers. Cavendish Square Publishing, LLC. pp. 41–43. ISBN 978-1-5026-2301-0.
  8. ^ C. Razy p.120 (1913)
  9. ^ Newton, William, ed. (January 1, 1866). "To James Melvin, of Pinlaws, County Fife, N.B., for improvements in jacquard machines.—[dated 10th May, 1865.]". Newton's London Journal of Arts and Sciences. 23. London: 334.
  10. ^ Parrillo Chapman, Lisa (2008). Textile Design Engineering Within the Product Shape. pp. 69–70. ISBN 978-1109003987.