IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS
Year: 1876

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Samuel Parker Bidder, of Hillfield House, Mitcham, in
the County of Surrey, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC
TELEGRAPHS"
Sealed the 5th January 1877, and dated the 26th July 1876.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Samuel Parker Bidder at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents on the 26th July 1870.
SAMUEL PARKER BIDDER, of Hillfield House, Mitcham, in the County of Surrey.
"IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS."
My Invention relates to that system of electric telegraphs wherein the message is
recorded in marks upon a strip of paper, such as the Morse system and others. It
has been the practice in some of these systems to send messages by passing strips
of paper, previously perforated by hand according to a particular code, through a
sending instrument adapted for that purpose whereby the message is recorded in
ink or other marking material upon the paper strip in the receiving instrument.
Now according to one part of my present Invention instead of marking the
message in ink on the paper I record the same by causing the receiving instrument
to perforate the paper strip in precisely the same manner as the paper strip by
means of which the message is forwarded from the sending instrument, so that the
paper strips thus perforated may serve both as a record and as the means for
forwarding the same message to another station by passing it through a sending
instrument.
The
For the above purpose I cause an arm connected to the armature of the receiving
instrument to act upon one or more punches, so as to depress them and cause them
to puncture the paper strip as it passes through a guide plate beneath the punch or
punches, the guide plate having holes through which the punches enter.
punches have at the same time a rapid rotary motion imparted to them by means
of a toothed wheel driven by the clockwork of the instrument and gearing with a
spur pinion on the axis of the punch, this pinion being of sufficient width to
remain in gear with the wheel while it slides to and fro relatively to the same in
following the motion of the punch. By thus imparting a rapid rotary motion to
the punches they are caused to perforate the paper with the greatest ease, requiring

page_text: little or no greater power in the electro-magnet of the instrument than in those of
ordinary construction.
The cutting action of the punches may be somewhat increased by forming their
end surface slightly concave and by making one part of the circular edge slightly
higher than the other. By preference I cause the arm of the electro-magnet to act
upon a lever, one end of which has a notch in which enters a disc on the axis of
the punch, while the other end is connected to a spring which effects the raising of
the punch after it has been depressed by the armature arm.
The apparatus, as described, will produce circular perforations corresponding to
the shape of the punch or punches, and is therefore adapted to record nessages
according to any known code in which words or cyphers are represented by one or
more rows of dots having different relative positions.
According to another improvement I so arrange and actuate the before-described
punch that it will perforate the paper in the form of dots and dashes according to
the "Morse" system. To effect this I impart to the punch or punches by any
suitable means a rapid up-and-down motion of limited extent relative to the
armature lever in addition to the up-and-down motion imparted to it by the move-
ment of such lever, and to the rapid rotary motion above described. For this
purpose the punch may be provided with an oblique groove on its axis, the said
groove returning into itself and the end of the lever that is actuated by the
armature enters this groove, so that as the punch revolves it will have a rapid
up-and-down motion of limited extent imparted to it relatively to the lever. If
now the punch be depressed by the lover and allowed to rise again quickly owing
to a current of short duration passing through the electro-magnets it will produce a
circular perforation in the paper strip representing a dot, if on the other hand owing
to the passing of a current of longer duration the punch be held in its depressed
position by the lever for a certain length of time it will first punch a circular hole, and
then owing to its quick up-and-down motion relatively to the lover, while the paper
is travelling along, it will by a succession of quick punching actions slot the paper
so as to represent a dash.
It will be evident that by this arrangement messages may be forwarded either
by passing a paper strip with dot-and-dash perforations through any known arrango-
ment of sending instrument adapted for that purpose, or by employing the ordinary
"Morse" sending instrument worked by hand.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent filed by
the said Samuel Parker Bidder in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 25th
January 1877.
SAMUEL PARKER BIDDER, of Hillfield House, Mitcham, in the County of Surrey.
"IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS.”
My Invention relates to that system of electric telegraphs wherein the message is
recorded in marks upon a strip of paper, such as the Morse system and others. It
has been the practice in some of these systems to send messages by passing strips
of paper, previously perforated by hand according to a particular code, through a
sending instrument adapted for that purpose, whereby the message is recorded in
ink or other marking material upon the paper strip in the receiving instrument.
Now according to one part of my present Invention instead of marking the
message in ink on the paper I record the same by causing the receiving instrument
to perforate the paper strip in precisely the same manner as the paper strip by
means of which the message is forwarded from the sending instrument, so that the
paper strips thus perforated may serve both as a record and as the means for
forwarding the same message to another station by passing it through a sending
instrument.

page_text: For the above purpose I cause an arm connected to the armature of the receiving
instrument to act upon one or more punches, so as to depress them and cause them
to puncture the paper strip as it passes through a guide plate beneath the punch or
punches, the guide plate having holes through which the punches enter. The
punches have at the same time a rapid rotary motion imparted to them by means
of a toothed wheel driven by the clockwork of the instrument and gearing with a
spur pinion on the axis of the punch, this pinion being of sufficient width to
remain in gear with the wheel while it slides to and fro relatively to the same in
following the motion of the punch. By thus imparting a rapid rotary motion to
the punches they are caused to perforate the paper with the greatest ease, requiring
little or no greater power in the electro-magnet of the instrument than in those of
ordinary construction.
The cutting action of the punches may be somewhat increased by forming their
end surface slightly concave and by making one part of the circular edge slightly
higher than the other. By preference I cause the arm of the electro-magnet to act
upon a lever, one end of which has a notch in which enters a disc on the axis of the
punch, while the other end is connected to a spring which effects the raising of the
punch after it has been depressed by the armature arm.
The apparatus, as described, will produce circular perforations corresponding to
the shape of the punch or punches, and is therefore adapted to record messages
according to any known code in which words or cyphers are represented by one or
more rows of dots, having different relative positions.
According to another improvement I so arrange and actuate the before-described
punch that it will perforate the paper in the form of dots and dashes, according to
the "Morso" system. To effect this I impart to the punch or punches by any
suitable means a rapid up-and-down motion of limited extent relative to the
armature lever in addition to the up-and-down motion imparted to it by the move-
ment of such lever, and to the rapid rotary motion above described. For this
purpose the punch may be provided with an oblique groove on its axis, the said
groove returning into itself and the end of the lever that is actuated by the
armature enters this groove, so that as the punch revolves it will have a rapid
up-and-down motion of limited extent imparted to it relatively to the lever. If
now the punch be depressed by the lever and allowed to rise again quickly, owing
to a current of short duration passing through the electro-magnets, it will produce a
circular perforation in the paper strip representing a dot; if on the other hand,
owing to the passing of a current of longer duration, the punch be held in its
depressed position by the lever for a certain length of time it will first punch a
circular hole, and then owing to its quick up-and-down motion relatively to the
lever while the paper is travelling along, it will by a succession of quick punching
actions slot the paper so as to represent a dash.
It will be evident that by this arrangement messages may be forwarded either by
passing a paper strip with dot-and-dash perforations through any known arrange-
ment of sending instrument adapted for that purpose, or by employing the ordinary
"Morse" sending instrument worked by hand.
The accompanying Drawing shows the side clevation of a receiving instrument
with my before-described Invention applied thereto.
The arm A connected to the armature B of the electro-magnet carries a stud at
its end which enters a cam groove C¹ on the spindle C having the punch D fixed or
formed on its lower end. The spindle C also has a broad pinion C formed on it
which is in gear with a spur wheel E on a spindle E' receiving rapid rotary motion
from the clockwork of the instrument. Thus it will be seen that as the spindle C
with its punch is moved up and down by the arm A in obedience to the currents
passed through the coils of the electro-magnet the punch will receive a rapid rotary
motion whereby, in conjunction with a slight inclination of its bottom surface, it
will be enabled with ease to punch the paper strip F which is passed through
between two guide plates G, G1, through a hole in the upper one of which the punch
works, and which together with the plate H at top serves as guides to the spindle.

page_text: Owing to the oblique cam groove C³ the spindle and punch have, in addition to the
before-described up-and-down motion imparted to them by the arm A, a slight
vertical up-and-down motion imparted to them relatively to this arm, so that when
this is depressed for a longer time by the action of the electro-magnet for the purpose
of producing a dash according to the Morse system, the punch will first punch a
circular hole in the paper and will then, by a succession of quick short strokes slot
the paper as it passes along, so as to correspond in form with a dash. If the
instrument is required to record messages according to any code in which only dots
are employed such last described additional motion of the punches may be dispensed
with.
It will be readily understood that in recording messages according to my Invention
it is not absolutely necessary that the punches should be actuated directly by the
armature; thus, in place of this arrangement the armature may be made to actuate
balanced valves in a pipe supplying air pressure to small cylinders, the pistons of
which are connected to the punches in a similar manner to the arrangement now
employed for punching paper strips for the transmission of messages. In this case
the requisite power for punching the paper may be supplied by the air pressure
without its being necessary to impart the before-described rotary motion to the
punch, unless it be required at the same time to impart the before-described
vibrating motion for slotting the paper.
Having thus described the nature of my Invention, and in what manner the
same is to be performed, I wish it to be understood that I am aware it has already
been proposed to record messages by pricking the paper strip with a pointed
instrument, and I do not claim this arrangement, but I claim,-
First. The method substantially as herein described of recording electric telegraph
messages by causing the receiving instrument to punch holes in the paper strip in
accordance with the code employed, so that such punched paper strip can serve both
as a record and for retransmitting the saine message at the receiving station.
Second. Arranging in combination with the armature or armatures of an electric
telegraph receiving instrument one or more punches having oblique lower faces, and
having a rapid rotary motion imparted to them at the same time that they receive
an up-and-down motion from the annature, substantially as and for the purposes
herein described.
Third. In combination with the arrangement of punches set forth in the second
clain, the arrangement for imparting a rapid up-and-down motion of the punch
relatively to the arm by which they are raised and lowered, so as to slot the paper
in a manner corresponding to the dash of the Morse code, substantially as herciu
described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Samuel Parker Bidder, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twenty-fourth day of January, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and seventy-seven.