Patent GB-190522114-A (GB)
Title: Improvements relating to Station Indicators for Vehicles.
Filed: 1905-10-30
Granted: 1906-05-24
Abstract: 22,114. Berliner Ausstellungs - Gallerien Ges. Feb. 14, [date applied for under Patents Act, 1901]. Indicators, station, stopping-place, and like. -A station indicator for vehicles, in which an indicator band of paper or linen is wound from and on to each of two rollers, has its automatic reversing mechanism actuated by a solenoid energized intermittently by means of contacts arranged upon the track. The band 3 may be illuminated by an incandescent electric lamp arranged behind it. A bell or the like may also be arranged to sound each time the name of a fresh station appears. A vertically - guided sliding member 12, Fig. 4, is raised by a solenoid 4, Fig. 3, which, when de-energized, allows the slider 12 to descend, under the action of gravity and a spring 8, so that one of two pawls 17 pivoted thereto seizes one of several pins 15<a>, arranged at equal intervals on an endless chain 15, so rotating the rollers carrying the band 3, through attached chain-wheels 14, and exhibiting the name of a fresh station. When the current passes, the sulenoid 4 draws its armature 5 up and, with the latter, a chain 6 attached to, and passing round the periphery of, a sector 7. It also simultaneously raises the piston of a dashpot, provided to avoid shocks &c. The sector 7 is mounted on and rotates an horizontal shaft 9, fixed at the back of the band and subjected to the action of the attached spring 8, which normally keeps the armature 5 down upon a fixed stop, so raising the slider 12 through a crank 10 and link 11. The pawls 17, owing to their shape, slip the pins 15<a> when the slider 12 is raised, and are drawn together again by a spring 19 until one of the stop-pins 17<a> on the backs of the pawls 17 strikes a cam-disk 20 rigidly connected to and rotatably mounted with a ratchet-wheel 22. When the slider 12 descends, the other pawl 17 engages one of the pins 15<a>. Each time the slider 12 rises and falls, an arm 23, pivoted upon the common spindle of the cam 20 and ratchet-wheel 22, is oscillated by the action of a cam-groove 24 in which a pin 23<a> upon the arm 23 slides. An attached pawl 25 partially rotates the cam 20 through the ratchet-wheel 22, a stationary pawl 26 preventing any retraction. The periphery of the cam has the form of two circular arcs, of different radius connected by two inclined surfaces 27. The larger arc prevents the engagement of one pawl 17 with the pins 15<a>, and the mechanism is reversed when the action of this arc is transferred, by the rotation of the ratchet-wheel 22, to the other pawl 17. Both the pawls 17 may be put out of operation through the action of the inclined faces 29 of a band actuated lever 31 upon forwardly-extending pins 28 on the pawls, so permitting the chain 15 to be moved and cause the name of any desired station to appear. One of the chain-wheels 14 is, preferably connected with its shaft 13 through a tensioning-device 32 serving to keep the band 3 stretched. A locking-device may be provided, to retain the band rollers during the journey, which is adapted to release the rollers at the time when their actuation is taking place. The apparatus is preferably protected by a casing which shows the stretched portion only of the band 3 through a window.