IMPROVEMENTS IN THE CONSTRUCTION AND MANUFACTURE OF ARMOUR PLATES
Year: 1879

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Henry Studer at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents on the 17th November 1879.
HENRY STUDER, of Zurich, Switzerland, but temporarily of the Royal Hotel,
Blackfriars, London. "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE CONSTRUCTION AND MANUFACTURE
OF ARMOUR PLATES."
This Invention has for its object improvements in the construction and manu-
facture of armour plates, whereby when a fracture is produced in the face of an
armour plate by the impact of a shot, such fracture is effectually localised and
prevented from extending its ramifications through the entire substance of the plate,
thus preserving the same from total destruction and greatly enhancing its durability.
Another advantage of my improved method of constructing and manufacturing
armour plates is that owing to its combined simplicity and economy such plates
can be produced at a considerably reduced cost owing to the simplicity of such
improved method.
To carry out such improvements I construct an armour plate of two plates only,
viz., a front or face plate and a back plate, and I make such front plate either of
cast steel or of chilled cast iron having plugs or tangs of a conical or other suitable
form cast on the back thereof, while I make the back plate either of wrought iron or
I cast the same in mild steel or other suitable metal. Such back plate is provided
with suitable cavities or recesses extending through its entire thickness, into which
the plugs or tangs cast on the back of the face plate are inserted. These plugs may
be either so formed as to fit tightly into the corresponding recesses when forced
therein by hydraulic pressure or otherwise, or preferably they may be made to fit
loosely in such recesses and formed with a suitable shoulder on either side so that
when the front and back plates are fitted together convenient interstices or spaces
are left around or on either side of each plug or tang, into which interstices lead and
zinc fused together or any other suitable metal may be poured in a molten state.
By so doing the molten metal flows into the interstices, and penetrating beneath the
shoulders formed in the plugs as before mentioned forms when solidified a solid key
which holds the plugs in position and renders them immovable at the same time
that the front and back plates are thus firmly and inseparably united.
One great advantage of such improved method of construction and manufacture is
that should the front plate be fractured by the impact of a missile, such fracture will
only ramify through the thickness thereof without penetrating the back plate, thus
effectually localising the injury and materially prolonging the life of the plate.

page_text: I also in order to still further deaden such impact provide a suitable packing of
vulcanite, brown paper, leather, or other suitable material, which I place between
the opposing surfaces of the front and back plates before the same are joined
together, and with the same object I sometimes prefer to form the front plate in two,
three, or more separate and distinct blocks, instead of in one entire block, each of
such several blocks having one or more plugs or tangs cast on the back thereof as
necessary for the purpose of uniting the same with the back plate which I form in
one entire block.
Both the front and back plates may be made of any convenient form so as to
permit of their being bolted on or otherwise secured in any manner which may be
desired.
It will be obvious that by this improved method of construction and manufacture
not only is an immense economy both in cost and labour effected, but the powers of
resistance and durability of the armour plates are greatly increased.