IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR CONNECTING TOGETHER OR 'COUPLING' CARRIAGES OF RAILWAY OR OTHER TRAINS."
Year: 1873

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Thomas Attwood Brockelbank, of Great Tower
Street, in the City of London, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS
IN APPARATUS FOR CONNECTING TOGETHER OR 'COUPLING' CARRIAGES OF
RAILWAY OR OTHER TRAINS."
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Thomas Attwood
Brockelbank at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with
his Petition, on the 27th November 1873.
:
I, THOMAS ATTWOOD BROCKELBANK, of Great Tower Street, in the
City of London, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR CONNECTING TOGETHER OR 'COUPLING'
CARRIAGES OF RAILWAY OR OTHER TRAINS," to be as follows:-
The object of the Invention is to simplify the connecting means for
carriages of railway and other trains, and to avoid the necessity for the
passage of servants between carriages in effecting the connecting or dis-
connecting, or the coupling or uncoupling of them. For this purpose
each end of each carriage is provided with a combined hook and loop

page_text: which are suspended so as to turn on pivots, and by means of stops are
prevented from falling below about a horizontal line, so that when the
ends of two carriages so provided are brought together the hook of one
will slide over the end of and take into the loop of the other. Each
combined hook and loop is by its pivots supported on a rod capable of
sliding endwise without turning on a socket provided for it, and this rod
is also formed with a screw thread which is taken into by a corresponding
female screw thread in another socket capable of revolving, and in its
rotation of moving the rod in or out according to the direction of its
rotation. The desired rotation to this screw socket in either direction is
effected by a bevilled or other pinion or other means applied thereto, and
such pinion when used may be actuated by ordinary gear capable of
being operated from the side or other part of the carriage.
In order to disconnect the hook of one carriage from the loop of the
other the parts are actuated so as to cause the bar carrying the combined
hook and loop to move outwards from the end of the carriage to which
it is affixed, when the hook will not only be free of the loop of the
adjoining carriage, but the stop will act on a projection therefrom to
cause it to rise off that loop; or the releasing of the hook may be other.
wise effected. Spring or weight may aid the correct action of the parts.
The screw rods also carry ordinary hook and chain connections if
desired.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said Thomas Attwood Brockelbank in the Great Seal
Patent Office on the 27th May 1874.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
ATTWOOD. BROCKELBANK, of Great Tower Street, in the City of London,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Twenty-seventh day of November, in
the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-three, in
the thirty-seventh year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and
successors, give and grant unto me, the said Thomas Attwood Brockel-
bank, Her special license that I, the said Thomas Attwood Brockelbank,'
my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said

page_text: Thomas Attwood Brockelbank, my executors, administrators, and assigns,
should at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and
at all times thereafter during the term therein expressed, should and
lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within the United King-
dom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of
Man, an Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR CONNECTING
TOGETHER OR COUPLING' CARRIAGES OF RAILWAY OR OTHER TRAINS," upon the
condition (amongst others) that I, the said Thomas Attwood Brockel-
bank, my executors or administrators, by an instrument in writing
under my, or their, or one of their hands and seals, should particularly
describe and ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in what
manner the same was to be performed, and cause the same to be filed
in the Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar months next and
immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Thomas Attwood Brockelbank, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained
in and by the following statement thereof, that is to say :-
The object of the Invention is to simplify the connecting means for
carriages of railway and other trains, and to avoid the necessity for the
passage of servants between carriages in effecting the connecting or dis-
connecting, or the coupling or uncoupling of them. For this purpose
each end of each carriage is provided with a combined hook and loop
which are suspended so as to turn on pivots, and by means of stops are
prevented from falling below about a horizontal line, so that when the
ends of two carriages so provided are brought together the hook of one
will slide over the end of and take into the loop of the other. Each
combined hook and loop is by its pivots supported on a rod capable of
sliding endwise without turning on a socket provided for it, and this rod
is also formed with a screw thread which is taken into by a corre-
sponding female screw thread in another socket capable of revolving,
and in its rotation of moving the rod in or out according to the direction
of its rotation. The desired rotation to this screw socket in either.
direction is effected by a bevelled or other pinion or other means applied
thereto, and such pinion when used may be actuated by ordinary gear
capable of being operated from the side or other part of the carriage.
In order to disconnect the hook of one carriage from the loop of the
other, the parts are actuated so as to cause the bar carrying the com-

page_text: it to rise off that loop, or the releasing of the hook may be otherwise
effected. Spring or weight may aid the correct action of the parts. The
screw rods also carry ordinary hook and chain connections if desired.
But that the Invention may be fully understood, I will by the aid of
the accompanying Drawings proceed to describe means pursued by me
in carrying the same into effect.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS.
Figure 1 shows by side view and Figure 2 by plan view, both partly
in section, an arrangement of apparatus according to my Invention
applied to parts of railway carriages. In both Figures the same letters
.indicate corresponding parts, and the combined hook and loop to each
carriage are similarly arranged and operated. A indicates the part of
one carriage, and B the part of another carriage. Each carriage is
provided with a combined wedge-shaped hook a and loop 6, the loop
being formed by the arms a¹, a¹, of the hook a; each of these combined
hooks and loops is suspended so as to be capable of turning on
pivots a, a, applied to the cross head c, and the cross head c is formed
with an eye c¹ to receive the ordinary or other coupling hook and chain,
and also with capability for it, turning laterally on the pin c³ by which
it is attached to the connecting rod and draw bar d of the carriage.
These connecting rods and draw bars d, d, are formed in parts, having
right and left hand screw threads formed on them connected by corre-
spondingly threaded nuts or sockets e which are formed. square on their
outer surface to slide in corresponding square openings or passageś
formed for them in the necks f, upon each of which is applied a bevelled
pinion g, by turning which in one or the other direction the parts of the
rods d, d, will be drawn towards or separated farther from each other for
the
purpose of drawing together the carriages thus connected and there-
by tightening such connections, or of loosening and thereby releasing
them as the case may be. The cross heads c, as sliewn, are prevented
from turning with the portion of screw to which they are attached in
the turning of the bevilled pinion g by their pivots a² resting on the
fixed stems or rods h, h, but this may be otherwise provided for. i are
short chains, each of which is connected at one end by an eye ¹ to the

page_text: body of the carriage, and at the other end to an arm a³ from the arms a¹
in order to regulate the distance of movement of the combined hook and
loop a, b. By turning the pinion g in one direction the cross head c
will be forced in a direction outwards from the carriage, when by the
chains acting on the ends of the arms as the combined hook a and loop 6
so acted upon will be raised; or by turning the bevilled wheel g in the
opposite direction the combined hook and loop so acted upon will be
ப
loop a, b. By turning the pinion g in one direction the cross head c
will be forced in a direction outwards from the carriage, when by the
chains acting on the ends of the arms as the combined hook a and loop 6
so acted upon will be raised; or by turning the bevilled wheel g in the
opposite direction the combined hook and loop so acted upon will be
lowered.
It will be seen that the outer end of each hook at a' is formed to an
edge or wedge-shaped, and such form will be found important in insuring
the automatic action of either hook in its looping with the other.
. The socket e may be turned as desired by means of a key or other
suitable means acting on one end of a shaft or axis j, as indicated, at
the side of the carriage A, the other end of which shaft or axis is pro-
vided with a bevilled pinion ¹, the teeth of which take into the teeth of
the bevilled pinion 9, or the socket e may be turned by means of a
handle wheel applied, as shewn, in the part carriage B on a
shaft or
axis, and to which is also applied another bevilled toothed wheel m,
the teeth of which take into the teeth of a wheel 9. c³ are stops to
limit the extent of motion downwards of the arms a¹.
Figure 3 shews a plan; Figure 4 a side view, and Figure 5 an end
view of parts of a railway truck shewing a simple application of the
Invention to such description of railway carriages. In this case the
lifting of the hook of one combined hook and loop from the loop of the
other combination is effected by means of the hooked end m¹ of an
arm m² applied to a shaft or axis m which is provided with two of these
arms m², and also with a lever arm or handle m³ at each end of it so that
the rod may be operated from either side of the carriage, or this
uncoupling may be otherwise effected. In using this arrangement in
order to raise the hook the axis m is moved endwise in a direction to
cause one of the hooked ends m¹ thereof to
hook and loop, when by acting on one of the
hook and loop may be raised, and the handle m³ so acted on be held in
position by being passed under a hook n.
pass under the combined.
handles m³ the combined
Figures 6 and 7 shew by plan and side section a simple modification
of the Invention applied to the buffer of a railway carriage.

page_text: Having thus described my Invention, and means which I adopt in
carrying the same into effect, I would have it understood that I do not
confine myself to the various details shewn and described, as the same
may be varied without departing from the peculiar character of the In-
vention, but what I do claim is the arranging or combining parts
whereby a combined hook and loop applied to one carriage are capable
of interlocking with the corresponding parts of another carriage so as to
connect together or couple carriages of railway or other trains, and the
tightening together or releasing of the parts is secured, substantially as
-described.