Patent GB-594518-A (GB)
Title: Improvements in and relating to washing machines
IPC: D06F37/24
Filed: 1943-07-08
Abstract: 594,518. Centrifugal machines. BRITISH THOMSON-HOUSTON CO., Ltd. July 8, 1943, No. 11084. Convention date, July 8,1942. [Class 23] [Also in Group VIII] A washing machine comprises a clothes centrifuging receptacle mounted on a vertical drive shaft by flexible means designed to give a minimum of frictional resistance to tilting of the basket relatively to the drive shaft, which shaft is journalled in a resilient gyratory support provided with friction damping means to resist tilting of the shaft. The receptacle 2, Figs. 1 and 2, also serves as a wash tub in which an agitator 34 may be oscillated. The tub is supported in a spider 6 the arms of which, formed with stiffening ribs 30, are attached by bolts 27 to a resilient ring 26, to which at intermediate points are attached the arms 24 of a spider fixed to the lower end of a sleeve 13. At the upper end, the sleeve has projections 14, Fig. 5, grooved and splined on to a tubular shaft 16 and circumferentially grooved to take a snap ring 18 for engaging a shoulder on the shaft, so supporting the sleeve 13. On the sleeve are a nut 22 and a projecting flange 21 above and below and of greater diameter than the central clearance opening 23 in the hub 7 of the spider 6, the flange and nut limiting the relative movement between the tub and its supporting sleeve 13. The tub of thin metal, for example porcelain enamelled steel has fluted walls and rests against rubber buffers 9 in a heavy ring 5, carried at the spider 6. Journalled at 36 on the upper end of the sleeve 13is the hub 35 of the bladed agitator which at the top is secured by a capped nut 39 to its driving shaft 37. The shaft 37 is journalled in the top 38 of the hollow shaft 16 which is in turn journalled in a sleeve 94, in the top of a tube 93 and in roller bearings 95, Fig. 6, the outer raceway 99 of which is secured in a sleeve 100 flanged and bolted to a supporting ring 103. The ring has a spherical surface 104 and a flange 108 seated against a rubber ring 107 confined between the ring 103 and a pair of flanged rings 113, 73 bolted to a flanged ring 112, which is bolted to the floor 1 of the machine casing. Against the spherical inside of the ring 103 bear brake shoes 105 carried by a support member 106 flanged and bolted to the ring 73. The agitator hub has a trough 43, Figs. 1 and 2, slightly below the washing water level for collecting floating impurities and passing them through openings 44 in the hub, whence they pass through passages 20, Fig. 5, on the sleeve 13 into the bottom of the outer casing. The space between the agitator hub and the tub is sealed by a rubber seal 45 fixed to the sleeve 13 and to a sleeve 11 on which the tub is clamped against a shoulder 12 by a nut 10. The hollow shaft 16 is secured to the upper half 48, Fig. 6, of a spherical housing, which is clamped to the lower half 49 with a circular plate 50 between. The outer spherical surface of the lower part 49 lies in an annular brake lining 70 supported in a shoe 69 mounted on diametrically opposite pins 71 secured to the ring 73. The shoe is biassed by springs 74 to apply the brake to the housing and is depressible by means of an external lever 75, Fig. 1, and a rod 79 to free the housing. The clearance 116 in the bottom wall 1 of the outer casing is sealed by a rubber sleeve 117 clamped to the tube 93 and the bottom wall. The static unbalance due to the irregular position of the clothes is neutralized by the gyratory support afforded by the rubber ring 107, and the dynamic unbalance is neutralized by the support of the ring 26. The rubber ring 107 is initially so compressed that the restoring force to a tilt of the tub increases at an increasing rate. The pressure of the brake shoes 105 also increases as the tub tilts from its central position. Driving-mechanism.-In the lower half 49, Fig. 6, of the spherical housing a shaft 55 is journalled in a sleeve 56 and a sleeve and thrust bearing 57 and carries at the top end a pinion 58 and at the bottom is secured to a pulley 54 driven by a belt 52 from a motor 57a, Fig. 1. An over-running clutch 81, 82 is fitted between the pulley and the housing part 49, to which the inner member of the clutch is pinned at 83. Thus, when the brake 69 is slacked off, and the motor is run in the appropriate direction, the housing 49, 48 is driven as a whole and both shafts 16 and 37 rotate to spin the tub for centrifugal drying. For washing, the motor is rotated in the reverse direction and the agitator is rocked with its shaft 37 by an arm 66 thereon and a link 65 engaging a crank-pin 64 on a shaft 60 which is journalled in the plate 50 at 62 and in the housing at 61, and keyed to a pinion 59 engaging the pinion 58. For this rocking action the spherical housing 48, 49 is locked by the brake 69. This driving-mechanism forms the subject-matter of Specification 594,519.