AN IMPROVED MACHINE FOR RAISING WATER WITH LESS POWER THAN HAS HITHERTO BEEN EXPERIENCED FOR THE IMPELLING OF MACHINERY AND OTHER PURPOSES
Year: 1814

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, TOBIAS
MICHELL, of Upper Thames Street, in the City of London, Gentleman, send
greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Fourth day of August,
in the fifty-fourth year of His reign, give and grant unto me, the said Tobias
Michell, my exors, adiiors, and assigns, His especial licence, full power, sole
privilege and authority, that I, the said Tobias Michell, my exors, adññiors, and
assigns, during the term of years therein mentioned, should and lawfully
might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and the Town of
Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention of "AN IMPROVED MACHINE FOR RAISING
WATER WITH LESS POWER THAN HAS HITHERTO BEEN EXPERIENCED FOR THE
IMPELLING OF MACHINERY AND OTHER PURPOSES;" in which said Letters Patent
there is contained a proviso, obliging me, the said Tobias Michell, by an
instrument in writing under my hand and seal, to cause a particular descrip-
tion of the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six
calendar months after the date of the said recited Letters Patent, as in and by
the same (relation being thereunto had) may more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Tobias Michell, do hereby declare that my said Invention, and the manner in
which the same is to be performed, are particularly described in and by the

page_text: Drawings hereunto annexed, and the following description thereof, that is
to say:
.
· My said improved machine (in two constructions, as hereafter explained),
for raising &c. water, may be worked by the power of men, horses, or steam
engines, or any other mechanical power which acts with a continuous rotary
motion, and the machine will move the piston or buckets of one, two, four, or
more pumps with a reciprocating motion. The machine is so compact as to
render it particularly proper for ships' pumps, brewers, and distillers, and being
worked by a continuous rotary motion always in the same direction, it is less
fatiguing for men to work than the ordinary pumps. The nature of the machine
is set forth by the Drawings hereunto annexed, in which the different forms of
the Invention are exhibited.
The first, shewn in section at Fig. 1, and in elevation at Fig. 2, is adapted
for working a ship's pump or pumps for any other purpose, which are of that
kind called suction or lifting pumps. In these, A, A, is a barrel or axis, sup-
ported upon pivots at its two ends; to this are hooked the ends of chains B, B,
and C, C, which at the other ends suspend the buckets D, D, of the pumps
E, E, which are placed beneath the barrel A. The chains are passed round
the barrel in opposite directions, and therefore by giving a reciprocating motion
to the barrel the buckets of the pumps will be alternately drawn up, first one
side and then the other, and the weight and construction of the buckets are
such that they will descend by their own weight when the barrel unwinds the
chains. The reciprocating motion is communicated to the barrel by the wheel
F, which is not confined to any size, and pinion G, which is turned by men or
other power at the crank I. The wheel F, fixed upon the middle of the barrel,
and its teeth or cogs are round pins fixed into it, and projecting perpendicularly
from its surface, being strengthened by a ring a fixed upon their extremities,
in the manner shewn in Fig. 3. Two teeth are left out at the point H, so
as to leave a space sufficient to admit the pinion to pass through, so as to act
either within side the teeth or without side of them, as in the Figure. The
pinion is fixed upon the extremity of an axis K, which is sustained by passing
through a groove in two pieces of metal, secured by screw bolts L, and at the
opposite end it has a square, which is adapted to a socket M, formed in the end
of an axis N (which may have a fly wheel fixed upon it if convenient), and
the crank I (or other moving power, being attached to the axis N, it is put
in motion, as well as the pinion, whose teeth G act on the pins of the wheel F
and turn the barrel, thus raising the buckets at one side of the barrel, and
lowering down those at the other side; this continues until the pinion arrives
at the blank space H; it then turns round the last pin, and its spindle rising

page_text: in the groove L, the pinion enters into the ring of pins and acts within side, in
which situation it gives a contrary motion to the wheel F and barrel to what it
did when acting on the outside. The pinion continues within side until it has
turned the wheel nearly a revolution, and brought round the blank space H
again. It then turns round the last pin, and its spindle descending in the
groove piece L, it again assumes the position of the figures and acts upon the
outside. The socket M, which receives the square at the end of the axis K
of the pinion, is made large enough to admit as much play as will allow for
the inclination of the axis from the horizontal position, and it therefore acts
as an universal joint; or an ordinary universal joint may be employed to
connect the spindles N & K in lieu of the socket M. The groove in the
piece L is made to fit the neck of the axis K exactly in its width, and its
length in the vertical direction is such as to limit the pinion to the proper
distance from the inside of the pins of the wheel F when the spindle is at
the top of the groove, or from the outside of the pins when the spindle rests
in the bottom of the groove; in either of these situations the pinion is retained
by a projecting rim on the wheel forming the circle in which the pins are
arranged. The axis K has a large short pivot formed upon it beyond the pinion,
which bears against the said rim either on the outside, as in Fig. 2, and then
it confines the spindle to the bottom of the groove; or if the pinion is within
side the ring of cogs, the inside edge of the same rim keeps the spindle firm
to the top of its groove; this rim is of course cut away at the space H, where
the pinion is to pass from the outside to the inside of the pins of the wheel.
In lieu of the crank I to be turned by the power of men, the spindle N may
be put in motion by a communication from a horse wheel, water wheel, steam
engine, or any other mechanical power, and a fly wheel may be applied, as shewn
at R, to equalize the motion of it, if it is found convenient. When forcing
pumps are required to be worked on my plan, double chains, such as are used
in fire engines, may be used, viz:-One chain applied, as in the Figures, to
draw up the bucket, and another, which turns round the barrel in a contrary
direction, being carried upwards and fastened to the top of the pump rod, will
draw it down, then the barrel turns in a contrary direction.
Another means of working forcing pumps is to place cogged or toothed
wheels upon the barrel, and make the teeth act in the teeth of racks formed
upon the rods of pumps, and this plan may be used either for lifting or forcing
pumps. The barrel may be extended in length so as to work any number of
pumps, and the wheel may be fixed either at the end, in the middle, or at any
other part thereof. Fig. 4 is an elevation of another plan proper for working
a single pump. In this A, A, is the pump, having a frame fixed upon the top

page_text: of it to support two wheels a, a, between which the edges of the pump rod B
are received, and thus guided to rise and fall in a vertical direction. A row of
pins e, r, are fixed in the rod to form a rack, which is moved by the pinion
(shewn by dotted lines D); this pinion is fixed on the extremity of an axis,
provided with a socket, like M, Fig 2, and the neck of the axis passes through
a groove, as is shewn in Fig. 4, which will admit it to pass round the last pin
of the rod A, and thus come to act at the opposite sides of the pins, and it will
then give a contrary motion to the rod, making it ascend when it works on
one side of the pins, and descend when it works on the opposite side. The
pinion changes itself from one side to the other by shifting in its groove,
when either the upper or lower one of the pins e, r, come to act in it,
and it thus gives an alternating motion to the pump rod, although the motion
of the pinion is continuous in the same direction. The pins in the rod are
fixed in a raised surface, against the edges of which the pivot of the pinion
acts to keep it in its place at either end of the groove, in the same manner as
I have described of the circular rim upon the wheel F, Fig. 3. This motion
can be raised either for a lifting or forcing pump. The pumps are suffi-
ciently described by the Drawings, but their form may be varied at pleasure;
indeed any kind or description of pumps known or in use may be employed;
for my Invention consists not in the pumps, but by giving motion to pumps
by means of a barrel with the wheel and pinion or rack and pinion, which I
have described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Tobias Michell, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, the Third day of February, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifteen.
CANT DELL
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Third day of February, in the
year of our Lord 1815, the aforesaid Tobias Michell came before our said
Lord the King in his Chancery, and acknowledged the Specification aforesaid,
and all and every thing therein contained and specified, in form above written.
And also the Specification aforesaid was stampt, according to the tenor of the
Statute made for that purpose.