IMPROVEMENTS IN MEANS OR APPARATUS FOR EXTINGUISHING FIRES IN ROOMS, PUBLIC BUILDINGS, SHIPS, AND OTHER ENCLOSED PLACES a
Year: 1883

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Phillips Thompson at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents on the 20th September 1883.
A communication from Monsieur Toussaint André a person resident at Paris
in the Republic of France.
WILLIAM PHILLIPS THOMPSON of the Liverpool and London Agency for
Foreign Patent Solicitors, 6, Lord Street, Liverpool, in the county of Lancaster,
Fellow of the Institute of Patent Agents "IMPROVEMENTS IN MEANS OR APPARATUS
FOR EXTINGUISHING FIRES IN ROOMS, PUBLIC BUILDINGS, SHIPS, AND OTHER
ENCLOSED PLACES a communication from Monsieur Toussaint André, a 'person
resident at Paris, in the republic of France
"
The following is an abstract translated from the description of the invention as
forwarded to me by my foreign correspondent.
This invention relates to a System of distributing water in the apartments of
buildings of all kinds, which permits of ensuring the rapid extinction of fires at
the very point where they have broken out. It consists essentially in the
adaptation in the upper part of these places of a system of piping, preferably of
iron, going round each of the rooms or halls and pierced with holes which are
freely open and furnished with taps; these pipes moreover are arranged so as to
receive water under pressure, taken direct from the street main or from a cistern
above, by the simple turning of taps arranged so as to be easily worked from the
interior. It will be understood that this system can be applied equally well to
inhabited or private houses, as to warehouses or shops of all kinds, to places of
public resort such as cafés, theatres, libraries, etcetera, and to steamers and vessels
of the mercantile and naval marine.
The following description will serve to indicate some of the practical applications
of the system. Under the cornice of each room and preferably on its four sides,
is fixed the iron pipe before mentioned; it can be either simply pierced with holes
at intervals or provided with a certain number of taps; in both cases however
these orifices are arranged so as not to correspond on the two opposite sides of
the room in which they are placed, so as to ensure the uniform distribution of the
liquid over all the room. When the pipes are simply pierced with holes, they are
put in direct communication by means of special conduits with the main which
brings water into the building or property, and which for this purpose carries a

page_text: series of taps placed in an easily accessible position, preferably on the ground
floor. As these taps carry numbers corresponding to the different rooms of the
building or property, it will be easy to instantaneously bring to bear in the room
where the fire has broken out, a quantity of water sufficient to insure its rapid
and complete extinction, thus preventing its spreading to neighbouring premises,
a result always to be striven for in such circumstances.
When the pipes are provided with taps to close the orifices, it is no longer
necessary to supply each room separately by special pipes from the main, it suffices
to put them into communication with one another and with the main as with
ordinary house water piping. This considerably simplifies the importance of the
system of piping, only that in order to attain the desired end, it is necessary to be
able to open or close instantaneously all the taps in any one room of the building or
property. This result is accomplished by uniting the keys of all the taps in the
same line by means of metal rods connected together at the four corners by bell
crank levers, so that it suffices to actuate any one of these rods in order to ensure
the simultaneous opening of all the taps in a room. For doing this, one of these
rods is carried through the outside wall of the house and is there connected by a
bell crank lever to a rod which goes down to the ground floor and can there be
pulled by hand in case of fire. Or all these rods can by means of suitable
articulations be brought to end at one easily accessible point, so that, as they are
provided with numbers, it will be easy to bring to bear in the room where the fire
has broken out, a quantity of water sufficient for its extinction.
It will readily be understood that one or other of the arrangements just
described can be applied to all kinds of buildings besides inhabited houses; thus
in a theatre for example, the pipes, either simply perforated or provided with taps,
may be arranged in the upper part of the various divisions of the auditorium or
on the stage at the most convenient points for instantaneously inundating the
place where a fire may have broken out.
The system can also be applied in a special form for the extinction of fires on
board ship, the installation being rendered more easy and its supply of water
under pressure being maintained by the use of pumps worked either by the main
engines, or by one of the winches used for loading and unloading cargo, or lastly
by the engine which works the bilge pumps for pumping water from the hold.
Lastly it is to be understood that the arrangements to be adopted for the
practical realization of this system may be modified and varied according to the
nature of the places in which it has to be fixed; thus for instance, the direction of
the orifices formed in the pipes or the regulating of the taps with which these pipes
are furnished may be modified in many ways, so as to throw the liquid over all
portions of any given locality and even if required on the walls themselves on the
upper parts of which the pipes are fixed.