IMPROVEMENTS IN OIL LAMPS AND IN FITTINGS CONNECTED THEREWITH
Year: 1878

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Thomas Wright Shaw at the Office of
the Commissioners of Påtents on the 20th September 1878.
THOMAS WRIGHT SHAW, of the City of Edinburgh, North Britain, Gentleman.
"IMPROVEMENTS IN OIL LAMPS AND IN FITTINGS CONNECTED THEREWITH.”
This Invention has reference to improved fittings connected with oil lamps for
general lighting purposes, as for houses, offices, and other apartments and purposes,
whereby a more steady and uniform and larger light is obtained with the ordinary
size of burner and wick, with less smoke and greater economy of oil; and also to
a simple and instantaneous mode and means of extinguishing the light without
opening up the globe or tampering with the chimney or wick; and further to
improvements upon the Invention for which Provisional Protection were granted
to me, No. 3296, dated 21st August, 1878.
And the nature and novelty of the Invention when applied to ordinary lamps
with burners having the hollow air inlet space under and leading up through a
perforated diaphragm into the close air dome and into which the air enters from
the outside by opening in this chamber below the gallery supporting the glass
chimney or outer globe or both when these are used consist in closing in these outer
openings, or only making one large opening, and fitting on or over these openings
or opening a hinged, swivelling, or sliding door or cover, which would regulate the
quantity or supply of air to support combustion properly, and give the best and
brightest light of the size desired, and also suit for instantaneously extinguishing
the light when shut so as to admit no air.
When applied to the new air inlet tube or tubes of my said former Invention
for admitting the air to the chamber above the oil vessel of the lamp, whether
these are led from the top of the lamp, as described in my former Provisional
Specification, or only formed as inlet branches below the gallery of the globe or
funnel, these inlet air tubes would be fitted with a hinged, sliding, or other
equivalent closing door, cock, or valve, which when closed would prevent the
admission of all air to the burner, and when opened less or more regulate the
admission of the air to the proper degree to support combustion as desired.
D 077

page_text: A further improvement consists in fitting the outer globes or glass shades of such
lights air-tight below at or on their galleries, and particularly in fitting on their
top opening an air-tight metallic or other funnel, capable of resisting the heat
above the light without melting or breaking, preferably with the lower end
extending down considerably within and below the supporting flange resting on
the upper part of the globe, so as to draw the waste gases of combustion up through
the funnel, and draw the air direct to the flame, and brighten and clear it, thus
making the globe a close combustion chamber or lamp and thereby burning all the
smoke, or preventing the formation thereof, without the use of and more effectually
than by the ordinary glass chimneys heretofore in use, the dispensing with which
allows a much greater amount of light to pass through the shade or globe.