AN IMPROVED TAP OR COCK FOR PERMITTING OR INTERRUPTING the Flow OF WATER OR OTHER FLUID.”
Year: 1880

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by David Reginald Ashton at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 25th February 1880.
DAVID REGINALD ASHTON, of 15, London Road, in the Parish of Christ Church,
Clapton, Brass Finisher. "AN IMPROVED TAP OR COCK FOR PERMITTING OR
INTERRUPTING the Flow OF WATER OR OTHER FLUID.”
It is a cock for water to take the place of ordinary taps now in use over sinks
in sculleries, and in gardens, & stable yards, and elsewhere for the letting &
stopping of water; and as half way cocks for the regulation of water flowing any
distance, and for stopping the same, if necessary, at any intermediate point; and
as ball valves over cisterns and waterbutts, and for the more effectual prevention
of leakage and the promotion of saving in time and expense, and of obviating the
chance of damage to leaden pipe to which it is attached. It is made of brass, but
is so differently constructed to the old fashioned bib cock now in use, that leakage
will be prevented for a very long time, if not altogether, as instead of continually
turning the tap round the water is obtained by raising a lever which lifts a plunger,
the head of which passes through a stuffing box of spun yarn and Russian tallow,
while to stop the water the lever is pressed down & forces the tail of the plunger,
which is of a conical form, into a leather socket made to fit it, and which makes an
effectual stoppage under any pressure, & indeed the greater the pressure of water
the firmer the conical end of the plunger is fixed into the leather socket, as both
that end of the plunger & the socket are below the pipe to which the cock is
fixed; thus friction is prevented & leakage done away with. The expense will
be less because the primary cost of the new cock will not be so great by a long
way as that of the old ones, and when it does (as perhaps it may) become leaky
after many years use the outlay for repairing will be only a very few pence, as only
the under part of the cock need be taken off and a fresh leather inserted, while
the top will only require screwing up a half turn or so, or at most restuffing at a
cost perhaps of one halfpenny. Its uses as a half-way cock will be identical &
its properties the same as when used as a bib cock, while as a ball valve it will
only require a longer lever & reversion of the flange, & will be of great public
utility over any Invention of the same pretension now in the market, as the friction
will, as already shewn, be abolished and leakage thus prevented. Adverting the
saving of time very little need be said, because the cock can be made of the same
bore as the service pipe or supply itself, and will necessarilly fill a bucket or other

page_text: utensil much more rapidly than the old & curtailed bore cock of the present day.
Then as to the property of preventing damage to the pipe to which it is fixed, as it
has been repeatedly found that servants & others filling vessels from old taps
have suspended them to the top & bent the supply pipe, & having discovered
the bend have straightened it, & having often repeated the offence the pipe has 5
of course broken off, so in the new cock herein described the only point to which
anything could be suspended is the lever to hang anything to, which would be to
pull it down & cause the plunger to fall and stop the water, thus obviating the
chance of this depredation.