CERTAIN IMPROVE- MENTS ON OR IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF FLUTES
Year: 1832

page_text: RUDALL & ROSE'S SPECIFICATION..
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME GREETING,
we, GEORGE RUDALL and JOHN MITCHELL ROSE, send greeting.
WHEREAS His present most Excellent Majesty King William the Fourth,
by His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date
at Westminster, the Twenty-seventh day of November, in the third year of
His reign, did, for Himself, His heirs and successors, give and grant unto
us, the said George Rudall and John Mitchell Rose, His especial licence,
sole privilege and authority, that we, the said George Rudall and John
Mitchell Rose, our executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as
we, the said George Rudall and John Mitchell Rose, our executors, adminis-
trators, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and no others, from time
to time and at all times during the term of years therein mentioned, should
and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales,
and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, our Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVE-
MENTS ON OR IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF FLUTES;" in which said Letters Patent is
contained a proviso, that we, the said George Rudall and John Mitchell
Rose, under our hands and seals, or under the hand and seal of one of us, shall
cause a particular description of the nature of our said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, to be inrolled in His said Majesty's
High Court of Chancery within six. calendar months next and immediately
after the date of the said in part recited Letters Patent, as in and by the same
reference being thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, we, the
said George Rudall and John Mitchell Rose, do hereby declare that the

page_text: nature of our said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formed, are particularly described and ascertained by the following description
thereof, reference being had to the Drawing hereunto annexed, and to the
Figures and letters marked thereon, that is to say:-
Our improvements on or in the construction of flutes have for their object a
mode of elongating or contracting the flute for the purpose of varying the pitch
or tune of the instrument, and of shifting the situation of the cork or stopper
simultaneous, and in due proportion to the increased or diminished length of
the flute when so adjusted, by which contrivance the flute may with the utmost
facility be brought into unison with another instrument, the tune of which may
happen to be either above or below concert pitch.
The objects of the improvement above described may be effected by different
mechanical means applied either within the flute or extenally.
The mode which we find best suited to the purpose is shewn in the accom-
panying Drawings, where Figure represents a portion of a flute to which the
improvements are adapted. Figure 2, is the same, shewn partly in section for
the purpose of exposing to view the internal sliding tube. Figure 3 is a further
section of the same, the tubes being cut longitudinally through the middle to
exhibit the mechanism by which they are to be moved. Figure 4 represents
a shaft with two screws a and b, the threads of which pass round the shaft with
different degrees of obliquity, (that is to say,) the one is a quick, the other a
slow screw. The disc c is to be securely fixed by a pin to the upper end of
the shaft as a thumbpiece, by which the shaft may be turned round. Figure 5
exhibits the screw shaft and its appendages connected together, and attached
to the sliding tube d, d, and to the cork or stopper e, but shewn in this Figure
detached from the flute. The same parts will be seen in section, and in their
working positions within the flute in Figure 3. At the upper end of the top
joint of the flute the fulcrum piece f is fixed by pins passed from the outside.
Through a central hole in this fulcrum piece the neck or upper end of the
screw shaft a protrudes, and the shaft is held in that situation by the disc c
being pinned or otherwise fastened on to its end, as before described, which
allows the screw shaft to turn round freely when moved by the thumbpiece c.
In the upper end of the sliding tube d a screw box g is securely fixed, and
through this box the shaft passes, and in it the large screw a works; hence on
turning the shaft the screw box g and sliding tube d will be moved upward or
downwards, and the flute consequently be shortened or elongated. The cork
or stopper e has a bridge or disc h fixed within it with a hole in the centre,
in which the lesser screw 6 works; and as the shaft is turned to move the
sliding tube up or down, the cork or stopper is simultaneously moved also

page_text: nearer to or further from the mouth hole a certain distance proportionate to
the varying length of the flute, so as to regulate with great accuracy the pitch
or tune of the instrument; a cap i, having a milled edge, may be affixed to the
disc or thumbpiece e, for the convenience of turning the screw shaft, by which
the whole of the working parts will be concealed from view. A rib k is
placed on the side of the tube for the purpose of guiding the tubed as it slides,
and preventing its turning round; but that object might be effected equally
well by placing a guide elsewhere. It may be desirable to add that the threads
of the screw shaft a and b should be so formed that while the tube d is sliden
a distance of one inch and a quarter, the cork or stopper e should be moved a
distance equal to three sixteenths of an inch or thereabouts.
In witness whereof, we, the said George Rudall and John Mitchell
Rose, have hereunto set our hands and seals, this Twenty-fifth day
of May, in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and
thirty-three.
Inrolled the Twenty-fifth day of May, One thousand eight hundred and
thirty-three.