IMPROVEMENTS IN SKATES
Year: 1875

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Edward Gardner Colton at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
16th September 1875.
I, EDWARD GARDNER COLTON, of 15, Radstock Road, Fairfield, near.
Liverpool, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for
"IMPROVEMENTS IN SKATES," to be as follows :—
All the self-securing skates known to me as in use are very.com-
plicated, and are also liable to give way under heavy strain, and are too
costly for the generality of purchasers.
It is to construct a skate combining the rapidity of adjustment so
much desired with simplicity, strength, and cheapness, that this my
Invention is designed; it is as follows:-
-
1st. I use two pedestals instead of one to support the heel plate; this
is a useful but not necessary part of my Invention, as almost any of the
usual forms of blade will do.
1

page_text: plate having a swivelling pin and depression therein for the lever, as
will be hereafter explained, or it may be entirely cut away at this point
& the pin fixed in the blade.
3rd. A metallic plate projecting out on each side of the blade forms
the sole plate; this is lower on one side than the other by a dépth
-equal-to-the-thickness of steel in the lever to be afterwards described;
on the higher side (it being the opposite one to that to which the lever
moves on being loosed from the blade in the manner to be hercafter
described) is one of the adjustable clips for holding the sole of the boot,
the other being attached to the lever.
:
4th. A steel lever pivotted at one end and extending almost from heel
to toe of the skate; on this lever near the heel is an adjustable bracket
attached, having a sharp edge or points for firmly grasping the front of
the heel. I prefer to arrange the lever with a longitudinal slot in
which the pin in the heel plate works, and another curved or diagonal
slot over the sole plate in which another pin in the sole plate works.
The end nearest the toe is then hammered, tempered, and bent, so as to
form a spring and has a clip thereon, which is capable of firmly
grasping a projection on the blade (which is also used to support a toe
rest) when forced to a position above the latter.
5th. Above the sole plate the lever has two projections laterally, one
on each side; one of these is sufficiently large to contain the curved or
diagonal slot, which is so arranged that when the lever is in its normal
position the end of the slot nearest the toe is occupied by the pin, the
remaining portion of the slot projecting backward and laterally into the
projection.
6th. To the other projection-of-the lever above the sole plate is
attached one of the ordinary adjustable clips for grasping the boot sole,
|_ the-other-being-attached-to-the-sole-plate.
7th. When the skate is to be applied, the various clips having been
adiusted to fit the main of hoots worn
the cension the

page_text: skate falls off. Instead of this clip any suitable catch can be used for
locking the lever to the projection on the blade.
8. It will be seen at once that the skate could be arranged so that
the lever could clip a notch on the heel part of the blade (or be locked
by any suitable catch to the heel plate itself) instead of the toe; in this
case it would be made to swivel at the toe in the manner I have
described as applicable to the toe, and in which case the longitudinal
and diagonal slots and pins would be dispensed with; but these are
simple specimens of the almost innumerable possible variations of the
plan I have described, the principle being the same.
Any way may be used for securing the plates to the blade, but I
prefer the screws and T shaped slots cut in the blade as in the old
wooden skate.