Omaha daily bee., 1888-03-11
In THE ELECTRICAL FIELD.
Achievements Of the Wonderful
Fluid-Some New Discoveries.
A NEW ENGRAVING MACHINE.
The Hussey Keheater-English Con-
troll OF the Telephone-Novel Din
ner Device-Transporta
Electrical Brevities.
NEW ENGRAVING MACHINE.

Electrical World: The art of engrav
ing is perhaps one of the oldest in ex
istence, and still we find improvements
being made, in it, a most recent one, es-
pecially, being of such q nature that it
will no doubt have considerable influ-
ence on the art in general. Attempts
have often been made to substitute
machine for the engravers' hand, but
though success has been in measure,
attained, recent progress which has
called to its aid electricity, has brought
the engraving machine far in advance
of its former position. Without enter
ing into the construction OF the older
machines, we will at once proceed to
describe the machine now being intro
duced by Mr.. n. w. Thornton, of this
city, which presents some decidedly
novel features.
The machine consists of craving
tool which is supported at one end of a
pivoted bent lever, the other end of
which carries an armature which is
placed opposite the poles of horse
shoe electromagnetic. The pattern
which it is desired to reproduce, and
which we will assume to be in the form
of types in this case, is held in clamp,
and placed below the rider, which sup
ports a small rod of glass through which
passes a platinum wire ending flush
with its lower surface. The electric
circuit coming from battery contained
the case, is let to the types, and is COM
pleted through the platinum within the
glass rod, passing thence to the electro
magnet and back to the battery. 1t
will now be readily seen that whenever
the rider supporting the platinum
passes over the surface of the types, the
electric circuit is closed at that point;
but it is interrupted when passing over
the blank part of the type. The
electro-magnet energized in accordance
with the contacts SO made, attracts the
armature and lifts the craving tool
from the surface to be engraved, SO that
the motion of the small platinum wire
passing over the types is reproduced
exactly in the vertical motion of the
craving tool. Now, if at the same time
the substance to be engraved upon is
moved back and forth while the gray
ing tool is moved upward and downward
by the action of the current, it is evil
dent that the engraving made will be
an exact reproduction Of the type
surfaces. The additional details OF the
apparatus are quite simple. By
moving large handwheel to the right
the platinum contact wire is passed
over the types and makes it's contacts,
which are followed by the craving tool,
and at the same time the substance to
be engraved upon is moved laterally.
AT the end of the stroke, the hand
wheel is turned to the left; this auto
matically closes the electrical circuit,
and lifts the craving tool clear from the
material to be engraved upon. But
during the return stroke of the wheel,
the platen, upon which the material TO
be engraved upon is fastened, is moved
backward certain distance, so that the
CRAVING tool engrayes new line ut the
next stroke. When the circuit is
broken, a spring brings the tool down
upon the work.
The apparatus is so arranged that the