IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR CULTIVATING LAND BY STEAM POWER
Year: 1878

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Fisken at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents on the 31st August 1878.
WILLIAM FISKEN, of Stamfordham, in the County of Northumberland, Presby-
terian Minister. "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR CULTIVATING LAND BY
STEAM POWER."
This Invention relates to improvements on the apparatus or machinery for
cultivating land by steam power, forming the subject of Patents granted to me on
the 25th day of April, 1862, No. 1221, and on October 1873, No. 3262.
This Invention consists in improvements on the combined anchor windlasses
which are used in the apparatus embraced under the above Patents.
In the improved anchor windlass I employ one oblong coulter of sufficient size
and strength of metal to bear the necessary resistance to the pull of the tilling.
implement. The oblong coulter cuts into the headland soil lengthwise, and at right
angles to the line of furrow. A small coulter is hinged to the end of the main
coulter for the purpose of steering. To this small coulter is fixed rigidly a beam,
which lies above the soil. On the front end of the beam is fixed a shoe or wheel.
The rope from the forward winding drum passes through eyes on the front of the
main coulter and point of the beam on the small guide coulter, so as to draw the
anchor ahead. By this means as the rope is wound up by the forward drum the
coulter is pulled through the soil direct to the anchor ahead. Upon the middle of
the main oblong coulter is fixed a vertical stud of ample strength to bear the pull
of the tilling implement. To this stud is attached as on a pivot the oblong wind-
lass frame, the stud passing through eyes on the lower and upper bars of the
windlass frame and near one of its ends.
The frame bearing the winding drum and other appendages turns pivot wise on
the coulter stem or stud, and is pulled by the action of the plough hauling rope
in a line with the furrow, the other end of the frame being held fast by the coulter
stud; the rope guide pulleys are attached to the furrow end of the frame. The
forward hauling drum is placed on the coulter stud between the upper and lower
bars of the frame, and the bearings for the coulter stem or stud on the frame are
so adjusted as to allow the forward drum wheel to come in working contact with
TD...
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page_text: the pinion on the main driving shaft. The forward drum and the winding drum
are geared with a clutch between the driving pinion of each, which clutch is fitted
to act on either pinion by means of the clutch handle. A rod in connection with
the clutch extends to the furrow end of the frame, and ends in a bent fork in front
of the rope guide pulley, so that the ball on the hauling rope in front of the tilling
implement first strikes the bent fork of the clutch bar and puts the main drum
out of gear. An upright lever having its fulcrum on the frame is connected with
the clutch bar at the end of the frame next the field, and is used by the ploughman
for working the clutch by hand when required to clutch either drum independently
of the rope-ball action. A castor wheel or shoe is fixed to the field end of the
windlass frame to facilitate its swinging motion.
For guiding the rope evenly upon the main drum I place an upright cylinder
upon the furrow or field end of the frame, turning upon a stud fixed in the frame.
Upon the outer side of this cylinder there is forined a groove rising gradually from
the lower end of the cylinder to a point on the opposite side and top of the cylinder,
and then gradually falling until it reaches again the lower end of the cylinder
where it started, the distance vertically from the lower point to the upper being
the width of the mouth of the winding drum. In this groove so cut moves a stud
pin fixed to the guide pulley box, and causes this box with its pulley to move up
and down in its frame as the cylinder is moved. For the purpose of moving the
cylinder at its proper speed a toothed wheel is fixed on one of its ends. Two
rocking levers are placed on opposite sides of the periphery of this wheel, having
the stud axle of the cylinder for the fulcrum, on which they move, and on each of
these levers a pawl is placed to work into the wheel teeth. To the outer ends of
each of these levers is attached a bar or rod, and the other ends of these bars or
rods work on a crank pin or excentric placed on the top of the winding drum
shaft. By means of the drum's rotation these bars and levers receive a recipro-
cating motion, and thus serve to actuate alternately the pawles on the opposite
sides of the cylinder, which taking into the teeth of the wheel attached to that
cylinder will cause it slowly to rotate.
The length of crank or throw of the eccentric, and length of levers and pitch of
-teeth, are so adjusted that at-each-rotation-of-the-winding-drum-the-cylinder is-
moved so far round as to cause the stud pin attached to the guide pulley box to
rise or fall a distance equal to the thickness of the rope being coiled, and that a
complete rotation of the cam cylinder is made while the rope is being coiled from
one side of the drum to the other, and back.
The wheel fixed on the cylinder must have at least twice as many teeth as there
are coils of rope put on the winding drum by one revolution of the cylinder.