Rope drive

[2][3] James Combe experimented first with circular ropes laid from leather strips, then from manila hemp.

[4] Combe Barbour were makers of textile machinery and differential speed gearing was often needed as part of the spinning process, where one shaft could be smoothly adjusted to run slightly faster or slower than another.

These multiple rope drives replaced the earlier technique of a vertical wrought iron shaft with bevel gears at each floor.

They remained in use for as long as mills were driven by central steam engines, rather than individual electric motors.

A Yorkshire mill converted to use a 1,000 hp Allen diesel engine in 1938, and retained the rope drives.