IMPROVEMENTS IN COAMING MEAT CONDUCTORS SUITABLE FOR ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS
Year: 1859

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Thomas Barnabas Daft, of Tottenham, in the County
of Middlesex, Civil Engineer, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN
COAMING MEAT CONDUCTORS SUITABLE FOR ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS."
Sealed the 29th November 1859, and dated the 24th September 1859.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Thomas Barnabas Daft at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
24th September 1859.
I, THOMAS BARNABAS DAFT, of Tottenham, in the County of Middlesex,
Civil Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of the Invention for "IMPROVE-
MENTS IN COATING METAL CONDUCTORS SUITABLE FOR ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS," to
be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object improvements in the manufacture of the
insulators or cables whereby insulation of the conductor is obtained by perfect
attachment between the conductor and the insulator or cable, combined with
lightness, strength, and durability.
I carry out these improvements as follows:-I take the copper or other suitable
metallic conductor, and coat the same with brass by any of the well known means,
and put upon it a sufficient thickness of india-rubber or india-rubber compound
to form the insulator or cable, or I take the copper or other suitable metallic
conductor coated in like manner with brass, and flatten the same by passing
it through rollers so as to give it a tape-like shape. I now proceed to cover

page_text: the same with india-rubber or india-rubber compound, to a sufficient thickness
to form the insulator or cable. In both cases, by the action of sulphur or its
equivalent with heat, I change, vulcanize, or cure, the india-rubber or india-
rubber compound on the brass surface of the conducting wire, which being
pressed thereon, during the changing, vulcanizing, or curing process, becomes
perfectly attached in every part to the conductor. I take especial care that
the brass surface of the conductor is clean and free from oxidization before
covering it with the india-rubber or india-rubber compound. I sometimes
place two or more conductors a certain distance apart so as to have two or
more distinct and separate conductors in one insulator or cable, but for this
purpose I prefer the tape-like conductor. If additional strength is required
one or more wires or bands may be applied made of iron or other suitable
material. If the strengthening wire or band be made of metal, then I prefer
that it be coated with brass so as to obtain by the curing, vulcanizing, or
changing of the india-rubber or india-rubber compound by sulphur and heat
together with pressure on the brass, the perfect attachment before mentioned.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Thomas Barnabas Daft in the Great Seal Patent Office on
the 24th March 1860.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
BARNABAS DAFT, of Tottenham, in the County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-fourth day of September, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-nine, in the twenty-third year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me,
the said Thomas Barnabas Daft, Her special licence that I, the said Thomas
Barnabas Daft, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I,
the said Thomas Barnabas Daft, 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 "Iм-
PROVEMENTS IN COATING METAL CONDUCTORS SUITABLE FOR ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS,"
upon the condition (amongst others) that I, the said Thomas Barnabas
Daft, my executors or administrators, by an instrument in writing under

page_text: 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 cause 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 Thomas Barnabas Daft, 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 thereof, that is to say :-
I take the copper or other suitable metallic conductor and coat it with brass
by any of the well known means. When a copper conductor is employed, I
prefer to cast a coating of brass on to a cylindrical ingot of copper, then to
roll the coated ingot down into a small rod, and after to draw down the rod
into a wire of the desired size. If the conductor be of iron, which material
however I do not prefer, I coat it with brass by the process of electro-deposit.
In place of coating with brass a conductor of another metal, a conductor of
solid brass may be employed. On to the conductor so coated, or otherwise, I
put a sufficient thickness of india-rubber or india-rubber compound to form
the insulator or cable. I am, as heretofore, guided as to the thickness of the
insulator to be applied by the circumstances under which the cable is to be
employed. I then pay over the india-rubber or india-rubber compound yarn
of a suitable thickness spirally wrapped; the yarn I have previously saturated
with india-rubber solution so as to entirely fill up all interstices and make the
yarn a perfectly solid cord of fibre and india-rubber; or, the yarn may be
agglomerated into a solid mass with the rubber without solution, the rubber
being tacky and a rubber coating put over in the same condition; I then lay
longitudinal strands of similarly prepared yarn over the spirally wrapped yarn,
placing them as near together as they will go, so as to show in transverse
section a complete circle of yarn ends. In performing these operations I take
care that the india-rubber is in a tacky or adhesive state, as is well understood.
I now add another spiral wrapping of yarn (previously treated as before men-
tioned) and over the whole I put a coating of india-rubber or india-rubber
compound. I then, as the finishing coating of india-rubber or india-rubber
compound is given to the cable, render the outside unadhesive by means of
French chalk or otherwise, as is well understood, and when the india-rubber
has been compounded with sulphur, previous to applying it to the cable, as I
prefer that it should be, I proceed to vulcanize it while it is either embedded
in French chalk or otherwise protected from adhering together either by steam,
water, or dry heat, as is well understood. If sulphur is not compounded with

page_text: the india-rubber, it should be vulcanized by immersion in a vulcanizing bath.
For some purposes I flatten the conductor to which a surface of brass has been
given as before explained, by passing round wire through rollers so as to give
it a tape-like shape, and cover the same by giving it a coating of india-rubber
or india-rubber compound of a sufficient thickness to form the insulator or
cable. I then apply strips of metal to support the flat sides, while I bind cloth
spirally around the whole to give pressure of the india-rubber or india-rubber
compound on to the conductor during the process of vulcanization. When
desirable I place two or more conductors at suitable distances apart, and either
flattened or of a tape-like shape, and place the conductors either side by side so
as to form a cable when completed of a band-like form, or I place them one
above the other or in a triangle, so as to admit of the exterior being of a cir-
cular form. And in cases where additional strength is required I place strips
or wires of iron or steel, coated, by preference, with brass, or strips of brass,
longitudinally upon the insulating material and cover them with an outside
coating of india-rubber or india-rubber compound, binding the whole tightly
together, and then vulcanizing the same either by steam, hot water, or air.
In all cases, as before mentioned, I take special care that the surfaces of the
conductors are clean and free from oxidization before covering them with the
india-rubber compound. For shore ends, and in similar cases, I cover the
exterior of the cable with wire in the usual manner.
What I claim as my Invention, is the causing a good adhesion of the india-
rubber or india-rubber compound to the conductor by the means herein-before
described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Thomas Barnabas Daft, have here-
unto set my hand and seal, this Twenty-fourth day of March, in the
year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty.