One of his
earliest contrivances was an embroidering-machine, in which twenty
needles were employed, working simultaneously; and he succeeded in
accomplishing his object after about six months' labour. For this
invention, which he exhibited at the Exposition of 1834, he
received a gold medal, and was decorated with the Legion of Honour.
Other inventions quickly followed--an improved loom, a machine for
measuring and folding fabrics, an improvement of the "bobbin and
fly frames" of the English spinners, and a weft winding-machine,
with various improvements in the machinery for preparing, spinning,
and weaving silk and cotton. One of his most ingenious
contrivances was his loom for weaving simultaneously two pieces of
velvet or other piled fabric, united by the pile common to both,
with a knife and traversing apparatus for separating the two
fabrics when woven. But by far the most beautiful and ingenious of
his inventions was the combing-machine, the history of which we now
proceed shortly to describe.
Heilmann had for some years been diligently studying the
contrivance of a machine for combing long-stapled cotton, the
ordinary carding-machine being found ineffective in preparing the
raw material for spinning, especially the finer sorts of yarn,
besides causing considerable waste.
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