IMPROVEMENTS IN PORTABLE OR POCKET APPARATUS FOR MEASURING AND INDICATING DISTANCES, CHIEFLY APPLICABLE FOR MEASURING LINES ON DRAWINGS AND PLANS, IN COM- BINATION WITH A PENCIL CASE AND COMPASS, OR OTHERWISE
Year: 1879

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Eugène Colin at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents on the 28th May 1879. A communication from
abroad by Fritz Châtelain, of Neuchâtel, in Switzerland.
EUGÈNE COLIN, of East Retford, in the County of Nottingham. “IMPROVEMENTS
IN PORTABLE OR POCKET APPARATUS FOR MEASURING AND INDICATING DISTANCES,
CHIEFLY APPLICABLE FOR MEASURING LINES ON DRAWINGS AND PLANS, IN COM-
BINATION WITH A PENCIL CASE AND COMPASS, OR OTHERWISE." A communication
from abroad by Fritz Châtelain, of Neuchâtel, in Switzerland.
This Invention relates to portable apparatus for measuring and indicating
distances, being chiefly applicable as a pocket instrument for measuring the lines
of drawings, plans, or maps, and capable of being combined with a pencil case and
compass.
As a pocket instrument the case can be of ivory or a metallic or other suitable
substance, the holder for the pencil being at the lower ond, and an ordinary compass
or seal can be placed in the cap or cover at the upper end. The case will have
a longitudinal slot or groove, on one or both sides of which will be a scale or index of
measure of length.
The measuring and indicating apparatus consists of a friction wheel, which may
have a serrated or toothed face, combined with or connected to a bevil wheel rotating
in or upon horizontal bearings; this bevil wheel will gear into a second wheel fixed
on or being part of a screwed or chased spindle; the screwed spindle rotates in
bearings in the case of the instrument, and carries a screwed or chased nut or
collar, on which said nut is fixed or formed a single or double finger or pointer, so
made and fitted as to slide in the slot or groove of the case, and indicate the distance
traversed.
In using the measuring and indicating apparatus above specified, which is
combined with a pencil case and compass, the top or cover will be unscrewed or
detached, and the friction wheel can be applied to one end of a line of a drawing or
map, and being traversed thereon the bevil wheels and screwed spindle in connection
therewith will be rotated, and the nut or collar on the said screwed spindle will be
moved thereby along the groove in the case, and the distance traversed by the
friction wheel will be indicated on the scale or index of measure of length marked
on the case.

page_text: In the above described apparatus the friction wheel is in direct connection with
the screwed spindle through one pair of bevil wheels of equal or unequal size, but
as a modification thereof any suitable arrangement of gearing can be employed to
connect the screwed spindle with the friction wheel, and the scale on the case will
be made to correspond with the arrangement of gearing, so as to indicate correctly
the distance traversed by the friction wheel.
A portable apparatus constructed substantially as above specified can be con-
structed for the use of pedestrians, or applied to bicycles or other vehicles, for the
purpose of indicating the distance traversed.