Power loom

The power loom was designed in 1784 by Edmund Cartwright and first built in 1785. It was a mechanised loom that was driven by driving shafts. By 1850, Edmund's designs were in full effect in England, with over 250,000 machines in use.

It was one of the key inventions of the Industrial Revolution, though it did not achieve its full potential for another 25 years after its invention. It was initially limited by its reliance on water power, which required workshops equipped with power looms to be located near a source of running water. By the start of the 19th century, however, the advanced steam engines of James Watt and others enabled the use of power looms anywhere that steam power could be installed. Cartwright himself profited greatly from this, selling hundreds of his looms to Manchester firms. The power loom allowed large amounts of cloth to be made in a shorter time than a human could do it.

Originally, powered looms were shuttle-operated but in the early part of the 20th century the faster and more efficient shuttleless loom came into use. Today, advances in technology have produced a variety of looms designed to maximize production for specific types of material. The most common of these are air-jet looms and water-jet looms. Computer-driven looms are now also available to individual (non-industrial) weavers. Industrial looms can weave at speeds of six rows per second and faster.

See also

• Textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution
• Timeline of clothing and textiles technology

what did the Power Loom do?