IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY EMPLOYED WHEN CULTIVATING LAND BY STEAM POWER
Year: 1862

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Jeremiah Head at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 29th October
1862.
I, JEREMIAH HEAD, of the Steam Plough Wharf, New Swindon, in the
County of Wilts, Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of the Inven-
tion for IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY EMPLOYED WHEN CULTIVATING LAND BY
STEAM POWER," to be as follows:-
In order that steam cultivation may be continued when too dark to see to
steer the cultivating implements, I apply apparatus to the implements and
machinery for carrying lamps, and provide for telegraphing by means of lights
between the engines, the cultivating implements, and the anchoring apparatus ;
this I prefer to accomplish by means of four lamps, three of them for signalling,
and the fourth a large bull's-eye lamp concentrating its light in. one direction..
Of the first three signalling lamps one is at the engine, placed in any conspicuous
position and used by the engine man for signalling, and it may if desired, be
used for any other of his requirements; the second lamp is at the anchor for
a similar purpose, and the third lamp is on the plough or other cultivating
implement within reach of the ploughman'at whichever end of the implement
he may be, and is principally necessary to give him power to signal at any part
of his journey. The large bull's-eye lamp is placed upon a piece of iron
similar to a carriage step hanging from the end of the furrow wheel axle or
other convenient part of the ploughing or other cultivating implement. On

page_text: the bottom of the lamp is a projecting stud or pin fitting in a corresponding
hole in the step iron. The lamp is free to turn in a horizontal plane upon this
pin, and the step iron is free to turn in a vertical plane in order to allow the
light to be pointed in any desired direction where it is secured by pins slipped
into corresponding holes or otherwise. The light of this lamp is made to
shine in the guiding furrow, if ploughing, or on the edge of the last work if
any other operation is being conducted just in front of the furrow wheel,
and the ploughman keeping his eye fixed upon this single lighted portion
is able to steer the implement. In constructing balance ploughing machinery
or implements moved by steam power where a set of ploughs are used at
each end of the machine or implements, and where the set of ploughs are
attached to a rigid frame balanced upon the wheels, the skife or body of
each plough of a set is attached to the frame in such manner that the skife
or body of each plough may be readily altered in a vertical direction indepen-
dently of the other plough body or bodies of the set. For this purpose the
skife or body of each plough is connected to the frame by two (or more) bolts,
one of them, the hindermost by preference, acting as an axis in such a manner
as to be able to move thereon. The hole (or holes) in the skife through which
the other bolt passes, is elongated in a vertical direction to admit of such
motion.
And in order to set or adjust the plough body and the other parts of the plough
connected thereto, there is a projection by preference in the front part of the skife
or body forming a nut, through which two screws (more or less) pass, their points
being upon the frame and screwed through the projection, more or less,
according to whether it is desired to raise or depress the point of the skife.
It may be done equally well by using the foremost bolt as an axis, and placing
the screw in the after part of the skife. Any other suitable adjustable
apparatus may be applied, the object being to enable the attendant easily to
regulate the angle which the several plough bodies and parts attached thereto
enter the ground by which the irregularities of the working of balance ploughs
consequent on excessive hardness of the ground or passing furrows and other
obstacles can be prevented or materially reduced.