A DOUBLE-ACTION HARVESTING AND MOWING MACHINE
Year: 1866

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William Mirabeau Wells
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition,
on the 20th February 1866.
I, WILLIAM MIRABEAU WELLS, of No. 15, Passage des Petites Ecuries,
Paris, France, Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "A DOUBLE-ACTION HARVESTING AND MOWING MACHINE," to be as follows:→→
My improved mowing and reaping machine is composed of wooden cross
pieces bolted together to form the framing carried by two full driving wheels,
and supporting the mowing and reaping mechanism, which consists of a
horizontal driving shaft driven by the rotation of the two driving wheels which
carry the framing. This driving shaft turns in two cast-iron boxed bearings
towards its centre, and is fixed to a cast-iron toothed wheel which tooths into
a pinion fixed on a second horizontal shaft, to which it communicates its rotary
motion. This second shaft also turns in cast-iron boxed bearings fixed to the
framing and carries a cast-iron conical toothed wheel fixed to it; this conical
wheel gears into a conical pinion fixed on a small shaft to which it gives
motion. A third shaft supported upon and turning in cast-iron supports
carries at its end a fly with crank and variable action, in which is fixed a pivot
pin tied by a connecting rod to another pin. A large iron lever with variable
holes fixed at the end of this shaft and having a radius at least three times
greater than that of the fly crank therefore only describes an arc or segment

page_text: of circle necessary to cause an upper blade to cross a lower blade, and vice
versa. A pinion fixed on the same axle as the iron lever with variable holes
above mentioned also describes an arc in proportion to its radius; it gears
above with one rack, and below with a second rack.; these two racks, which
are smooth on the parts opposed to the teeth, slide with gentle friction in a
cast-iron box, which serves to guide them and receive from the pinion fixed on
the axle of the lever with variable holes a come-and-go motion continuous and
in opposite direction; thus, while the upper rack moves away from the box in
which it slides, the lower rack is on the contrary nearing it, and going to meet
the upper one, and vice versa.. This movement is afterwards transmitted by
means of two iron rods to the upper blade and to the lower blade of steel or
bronze, on which are fixed, by means of one or two screws, triangular knives,
the upper ones chamfered above and the lower beneath, so as to produce the
-cut required, that is to say, like scissors. A cast-iron regulating pulley adjusted
on the driving shaft so as to move freely and with gentle friction turns on the
ground which supports it, and thus follows the inequalities of the soil, and
causes to rise and descend with it a moveable plate or table; itself guided in
this movement by two cast-iron grooved guides fixed to the wooden framing.
The distinctive characteristics of my double-action mowing and reaping
machine consist, 1, in the special arrangement of the blades, and their kuives,
and their working, which being effected by a contrary and opposite movement
always gives a perfect cutting in ripe and dry wheat, as well as in cereals wet
and mixed with weeds; 2, in driving the two knife blades by means of a
central pinion and two racks, the whole enclosed in a cast-iron box or casing,
and entirely protected from earth and dust; '3, in the free and entire rotation
of the cast-iron box and arrangement of knife blades around a single shaft, so
that the cutting arrangement follows the undulations of the ground; 4, in
the lifting of the entire arrangement of blades and blade carriers, so that by
simply removing the feed apron they may be fixed at the top of the framing to
permit the machine to travel with more facility; 5, in the fitting up of the
regulating pulley fixed to an iron rod, and thereby to a plate carrying the
entire arrangement of the box, the knives, and the blades on which they are
screwed, which regulating pulley moving freely on the ground renders,
together with the plate, the entire cutting arrangement independent of the
framing; 6, in the entire liberty which the preceding arrangements leave to the
box and to the cutting arrangement to follow the undulations of the soil;
7, in driving the shaft of the central pinion by a crank with fly and lever,
both with variable journey, and permitting the shaft of the central pinion to
raise and lower itself during the working of the machine without any dis-

page_text: arrangement; 8, in the faculty of being able to regulate the cutting arrange-
ment at pleasure by setting it at the desired height, as, for example, for
mowing; 9, in the construction of my full or solid driving wheels, and in the
complete closing of my case or framing by panels to prevent dust entering and
choking the mechanism.