IMPROVE- MENTS IN PUMPS AND FIRE ENGINES
Year: 1855

page_text: Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 30th July 1855.
I, THOMAS CLUNES, of Aberdeen, in the County of Aberdeen, North Britain,
Plumber, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVE-
MENTS IN PUMPS AND FIRE ENGINES" to be as follows, that is to say:-
This Invention relates to a form or arrangement of a pump or apparatus for
the transmission of fluid matters wherein the cylinder or working barrel or
chamber is the moving or traversing part, no piston or bucket proper being
required.
This arrangement of pump answers for various purposes. As contrived for
fire engines, it consists, under one modification, of the usual horizontal double-
handed lever, set to oscillate upon its longitudinal centre on a fixed stud pin,
carried by a pedestal bracket on the top of an air vessel, resting on a sta-
tionary base flange. To this base is bolted the flange of a pair of curved water-
way pipes, which descend by a curved divergence to the level of the fluid to
be raised and forced out through the air vessel. The upper end of each pipe
is guarded by a clack valve, opening upwards in the interior of the air vessel.
The lower portion of each pipe is vertical, and is turned or rendered true for
the working action of the pump cylinder. This pump cylinder is made in its
general features like an ordinary pump barrel. It is closed at its lower end,
where a clack valve is inserted for the admission of the fluid to be pumped.

page_text: Its upper part is fitted with a wide stuffing box, made to fit accurately to the
turned portion of the water-way pipe, over the open lower end of which it is
entered to work perfectly fluid-tight. From the overhead working lever a
forked pendant rod jointed to the lever descends to joint stud pins in the
working cylinder. The same details are fitted up on each side of the air vessel
centre; then, as the lever is worked up and down, the pump cylinders are
alternately traversed over the lower ends of the water-way pipes as guides, and
the cylinders being immersed in the fluid to be lifted, the fluid enters the
valved bottom of the cylinder at each down stroke of the latter; then, at
the succeeding up stroke the fluid in the cylinder is expelled upwards through
the open water way, the cylinder foot valve closing, whilst the head or delivery
valve in the base of the air chamber opens upwards to allow the fluid to
enter the air vessel. The air vessel acts in the ordinary manner for securing
a continuous stream of fluid, and it is fitted with a discharge pipe for the
final expulsion of the fluid in the usual way.
In another modification, better suited as a ship's pump, the details of the
traversing cylinder are similarly arranged, except that the bottom end of
the cylinder is perfectly solid or closed, the fluid to be raised being caused to
descend into and then ascend from the water pipe and working cylinder from
the upper part. The upper curved end of the water-way pipe terminates in a
valved chamber at the base of the upper receiver, into which the fluid is to be
delivered. The upper opening of the water-way pipe is situated between two
clack valves, both opening upwards, one clear above and the other clear below
the water-way opening. From the chamber beneath the lower valve a station-
ary suction or lift pipe descends to the fluid to be raised. The traversing pump
cylinder may be worked in any convenient manner, and as it descends it tends
to cause a vacuum in the suction pipe and the main water-way pipe, so that
the fluid to be raised obviously flows upwards, & fills these parts as well as
the working cylinder. As the latter again rises, it then forces the fluid up
through the water-way pipe and through the valved chamber into the over-
head receiver.
The same general arrangement of pump lift or forcing apparatus may be
carried out under various modifications, with the primary receiving portion
of the apparatus, either moveable or stationary, as in the two forms herein-
before described.