IMPROVEMENTS IN WATER WHEELS
Year: 1839

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, ROBERT
COPLAND, of Courland, Wandsworth Road, in the County of Surrey, Esquire,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by
Her Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Twenty-fourth day of January, in the second year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me,
the said Robert Copland, Her especial licence, full power, sole privilege and
authority, that I, the said Robert Copland, my exors, adñiors, and assigns, or
such others as I, the said Robert Copland, my exors, adñors, or assigns,
should at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time, and at all
times during the term of years therein expressed, should and lawfully might
make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and the Town of
Berwick-upon-Tweed, and also in all Her said Majesty's Colonies and Plan-
tations abroad, my Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN WATER WHEELS;" in
which said Letters Patent is contained a proviso that I, the said Robert
Copland, shall cause a particular description of the nature of my said Inven-
tion, and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be inrolled in Her
said Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six calendar months next and
immediately after the date of the said in part recited Letters Patent, as in
and by the same, reference being thereunto had, will more fully and at large
appear.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said-
Robert Copland, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention,
and the manner in which the same is to be performed, are fully de-
scribed and ascertained in and by the following statement thereof, (that is
to say):
:-
My Invention relates to that description of water wheels which are used for
driving floating mills, and are employed on rivers, tideways, or streams, which
description of mills are extensively used on the rivers on the Continent, but
in such cases the wheels are generally similar to ordinary undershot water
wheels. Now the object of my Invention is to improve such description of
floating mills by the application of wheels, so constructed and arranged,
that in place of having the float boards at right angles to the stream, and
parallel to the axis of the paddle wheels, as has been generally the case
heretofore in the common undershot water wheel, I arrange the shaft or
axis parallel, or nearly so, with the stream, and the diameter of the wheel
at right angles, or nearly so, to the stream; and the float boards I place at
an angle to the stream, preferring them to be set at an angle of forty-five
degrees, but this angle is not absolutely necessary, and may be varied. And
in employing these wheels they may be wholly or partially immersed; but
I prefer, where the depth of water is sufficient, that the wheel should be
wholly immersed.
The means of constructing water wheels being well understood, whether of
iron, wood, or other material, it will not be necessary to enter into a mecha-
nical detail of the parts, as the only variation from the ordinary construction
of water wheels, and of their application according to my Invention, consist
in getting the line of diameter of the wheel across the stream, and having the
float boards angularly placed, my Invention relating, as above described,
to the mode of arranging the parts of a water wheel of floating mills
in respect to the stream, as above described, and which arrangement of
the wheels will give a much greater power or force than the common
undershot water wheel of the same diameter and area of floats, and in the
same stream.
.
In witness whereof, I, the said Robert Copland, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twenty-fourth day of July, One thousand eight
hundred and thinte ning
ROBERT (L.B.) COPLAND.

page_text: AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Twenty-fourth day of July, in
the year of our Lord 1889, the aforesaid Robert Copland came before our said
Lady the Queen in Her Chancery, and acknowledged the Specification afore-
said, and all and every thing therein contained and specified, in form above
written. And also the Specification aforesaid was stamped according to the
tenor of the Statute made for that purpose.
Inrolled the Twenty-fourth day of July, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and thirty-nine.