IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR WORKING RAILWAY AND OTHER SIGNALS
Year: 1877

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Ebenezer Entwistle at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents on the 7th March 1877.
EBENEZER ENTWISTLE, of Blackburn, in the County of Lancaster. "IMPROVEMENTS
IN APPARATUS FOR WORKING RAILWAY AND OTHER SIGNALS."
This Invention relates to improvements in the mode of connecting and imparting
motion to railway and other signals where the intermedial connection between each
apparatus is connected by means of wire chain or equivalents, and such improve-
ments acting as a compensation for the expansion and contraction of such wire chain
or equivalents.
The present system of working railway signals is as follows:-The person or
persons in charge of the working of such signals, by the aid of a lever or levers,
draws the signal or signals to caution or clear, thereby allowing the weight at the
signal post to draw the signal to danger, which has proved very unsatisfactory, for
should the wire accidentally stick it prevents the weight, or weight lever, or
equivalent falling, and thereby indicating the line clear when it ought to indicate
danger.
Now in order to obviate these disadvantages I connect instead of the ordinary
weight lever or equivalent a slotted lever or equivalent working on a stud or
equivalent connected to a bracket or equivalent, secured to the ordinary signal post.
Working on a stud or equivalent, secured to the before-named bracket, I have a
double grooved pulley or equivalent. In one of the grooves I secure a chain or
equivalent; the other end of such chain is connected to a weight or equivalent
sufficient to draw the intermedial wire chain or equivalents, one end of which is
secured in the other groove of the said pulley, thereby producing a certain motion to
the said pulley. At a convenient part of the said pulley I secure a pin or equivalent
working freely in the slotted lever. Near the fulcrum of the motion lever I secure
a bracket or brackets; working in the said bracket or brackets is another double
grooved pulley combined with a mangle wheel or mangle and ratchet wheel, or the
equivalents thereof.
The motion lever end of the intermedial connecting wire chain or equivalent is
connected in one of the grooves of the said pulley. In the other groove of the said
pulley I secure a chain or equivalent, to which is connected a counterweight to
raise the aforesaid weight, and draw the intermedial connecting wire chain or

page_text: equivalents. Working in freely brackets connected at any convenient part of the
said motion lever is a shaft or equivalent; to the said shaft I secure a pinion or
pinions or equivalents, which revolve by the motion of the aforesaid mangle wheel
and the said shaft or equivalent, or the said pinion or pinions or equivalents are
secured to the catch handle, or catch handle rod or equivalents.
Having described the connections I will now give a description of its workings.
In the description of the connection will be found that there is a weight secured to
a grooved pulley at each end of the intermedial connecting wire chain or equivalent,
and that the counterweight is not at the signal end of the said wire, as in the
ordinary system of signalling, thereby drawing the signal to danger at the box or
station, and not at the signal post. Now the pinions are so arranged that when
the lever catch is drawn to enable the operator to pull over his lever the counter-
weight pulley is so locked that it is impossible for the pulley to revolve while the
lever is being drawn over, and the raising of the counterweight by the action of the
lever allows the weight at the signal to fall, and thereby work the pulley, and move
the pin from a perpendicular direction to a vertical direction, and working the
signal to caution or clear, and when the operator puts back his lever and the lever
catch is placed home again the counterweight has dropped and drawn the signal to
danger, and the counterweight pulley is released, and thereby allows the counter-
weight to act as a self-compensator for the expansion and contraction of the inter-
medial wire chain or equivalents.
The novelty of this my Invention consists in placing or fixing the counterweight
for drawing the intermedial wire chain or equivalent at the box or station end of
the said intermedial wire, and not at the signal post, and that by the counter-
balancing the arm at the shaft or axis of the arm all signals, distant or otherwise,
will remain at danger, also the meeting the expansion and contraction of the wire
chain or equivalent.
Another leading feature in this my Invention is, that the combination of the
above will enable signals to be locked at the box instead of at the post, and there-
fore in many instances a great saving.
At any convenient part of the apparatus in the signal box or station I connect a
disc or any other form of signal to the intermedial wire, by a wire chain or equiva-
lont, to acquaint the signalman when there is any alteration in the signal, or wire,
or equivalents, and by a small lever acting upon the ratchet part of the double
grooved pulley, in combination with a mangle wheel or mangle and ratchet wheel, he
can test the safety of the signals without interfering with the normal condition of
the signal, which is at danger.