disappear as the fibre proceeds on its way through the different
machines.

[Illustration: FIG. 8 BALE OPENER _By permission of Messrs. Urquhart,
Lindsay & Co., Ltd_.]

The layers of heads are often beaten with a heavy sledge hammer in
hand batching, but for machine batching a bale opener is used, and
this operation constitutes the preliminary opening. As already
indicated, the heads of jute are fed into the machine from the left
in Fig. 8, each head being laid on a travelling feed cloth which
carries the heads of jute successively between a pair of feed
rollers from which they are delivered to two pairs of very
deeply-fluted crushing rollers or breakers. The last pair of
deep-fluted rollers is seen clearly on the right in the figure.
These two pairs of heavy rollers crush and bend the compressed heads
of jute and deliver them in a much softer condition to the delivery
sheet on the right. The delivery sheet is an endless cloth which has
a continuous motion, and thus the softened heads are carried to the
extreme right, at which position they are taken from the sheet by
the operatives. The upper rollers in the machine may rise in their
bearings against the downward pressure of the volute springs on the
bearings; this provision is essential because of the thick and thin
places of the heads.

A different type of bale opener, made by Messrs. Charles Parker, Sons, &
Co., Dundee, and designed from the Butchart patent is illustrated in
Fig. 9. It differs mainly from the machine illustrated in Fig. 8 in
the shape of the crushing or opening rollers.