IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS REGULATORS
Year: 1860

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to William Kemble Hall, Engineer, of 36, Cannon
Street, in the City of London, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN
GAS REGULATORS."-A communication from abroad by Calvin T. Herring,
of St. Louis, in the United States of America.
Sealed the 11th January 1861, and dated the 11th July 1860.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William Kemble Hall
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
11th July 1860.
I, WILLIAM KEMBLE HALL, Engineer, of 36, Cannon Street, London, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS
REGULATORS," to be as follows:-
The object of this Invention is to regulate the flow of gas through pipes;
and it consists in the application of thin curved metal plates to the flexible
diaphragm of a gas regulator, so as to impart to the said regulator the sensi-
bility incident to the application of plates thereto, without impairing the
extent of its action or its flexibility, as is the case when the plates are made
flat and clamped close to the diaphragm.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said William Kemble Hall in the Great Seal Patent Office on
the 11th January 1861.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, WILLIAM
KEMBLE HALL, Engineer, of 36, Cannon Street, in the City of London, send
greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Eleventh day of July, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and sixty, in the twenty-fourth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me,
the said William Kemble Hall, Her special licence that I, the said William
Kemble Hall, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I,
the said William Kemble Hall, 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 Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "Im-
PROVEMENTS IN GAS REGULATORS," (a communication to me from abroad by
Calvin T. Herring, of St. Louis, in the United States of America,) upon the
condition (amongst others) that I, the said William Kemble Hall, my execu-
tors 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 causo
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 William Kemble Hall, 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 and accompanying Drawings, that is to say :-
The object of this Invention is to regulate the flow of gas through pipes;
and it consists in the application of thin curved metal plates to the flexible
diaphragm of a gas regulator, so as to impart to the said regulator the sensi-
bility incident to the application of plates thereto, without impairing the extent
of its action or its flexibility, as is the case when the plates are made flat and
clamped close to the diaphragm.
Figure 1 of the accompanying Drawing is a vertical section, and Figure 2
is a plan of a gas regulator according to my said Invention. The chamber is
made in two parts, joined by screws at a. The flexible diaphragm 6 is secured

page_text: at the edge by the joint between the parts of the chamber; the valve stem c
passes through a hole in the centre of the diaphragm, and also through holes
in the curved plates d, d, and is furnished with screw nuts e, e, by which the
flexible diaphragm and the curved plates are clamped together; the valve f is
fixed to the lower end of the valve stem, so as to close the orifice from the
receiving pipe g. This valve closes or opens as the pressure of the gas may be
increased or diminished. When any of the burners supplied by the eduction
pipe h are shut off, the pressure of the gas will be increased against the under
side of the diaphragm, and will cause the stem and its valve to be lifted
and partially closed, and thus diminish the flow of gas to the chamber and
burners.
If the diaphragm were attached to the valve stem without the plates d, d, it
would fall to the curve represented by the dotted line x, and when the gas was
admitted it would puff up around the stem, as indicated by the dotted line y;
thus giving a slow, irregular, and uncertain motion to the regulating valve;
and if the plates were made flat and applied close to the diaphragm, it would,
when the gas was admitted, assume the crimped form outside the plates shown
by the dotted line 2, and also give the valve an uneasy and uncertain action.
But the objections to flat plates and to the use of a flexible diaphragm without
plates are avoided by employing the plates d, d, curved and arranged according
to my Invention, so that the diaphragm will fold or curl between the plates
in raising, as well as around the outside of them.
I therefore claim as my Invention, the application of the curved plates d, d,
to the flexible diaphragm, substantially as described, for the purpose specified.
In witness whereof, I, the said William Kemble Hall, have hereunto set
my band and seal, this Eleventh day of January, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-one.
WILLIAM KEMBLE HALL. (L.B.)