Prototype. Chapter text drafted from the research notes and not yet checked at the archives. Images awaiting permission are marked.

CONFLICT: when was the tufting gun invented?

Research finding · not yet checked at the source

Themes: Hand-tufting tools & the gun, Global diffusion of tufting

Cited in chapter 9, note 42

Cite this source

“CONFLICT: when was the tufting gun invented?.” Research note.

Research notes

The Non-English Record brief says the gun was "invented in Hong Kong in 1973", but its own source says Tai Ping fitted a motor to an existing tufting gun in 1973. The US patent record shows a motor-in-handle tufting tool in 1932 (US1917162A), air-fed handheld tools in 1946–48, a trigger and knife in 1952, and a "hand gun-type device" in 1964 (US3142276A). Safer wording: "Tai Ping built and motorised its own hand tufting gun in Hong Kong, by 1973; motorised handheld tufting tools had been patented in the US since 1932." Update: a trade source dates Anthony Yeh's motorised/pneumatic gun at Tai Ping to 1960 (see the Tai Ping company record), against the Hong Kong Heritage Project's 1973 motorisation.