Ix- PROVEMENTS IN MOTIVE-POWER ENGINES, ROTARY PUMPS AND FANS
Year: 1869

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Walker at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 6th
July 1869.
I, WILLIAM WALKER, of Dundee, in the Kingdom of Scotland, North
Britain, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for." Ix-
PROVEMENTS IN MOTIVE-POWER ENGINES, ROTARY PUMPS AND FANS," to be as
follows:-
My improvements apply to the construction of rotary engines which
may be driven by steam, heated air, water, or other fluids under pressure,
and which may be used conversely when driven by motive power to
pump or force fluids.
The construction which I adopt is the following:-Two conical or
bevil wheels (toothed) are mounted so as to gear with one another, their
axes revolving in suitable bearings and forming an obtuse angle with
one another. Thus at one part of their periphery the faces of these
wheels are near together and their teeth gear with one another, while at
other parts of their periphery there is a distance or clear space between
the teeth of the one and the teeth of the other. Through this clear
space an induction pipe conveys the working fluid to a point a little on

page_text: the one side or the other of that part of the wheels which are in close
gear, and the fluid thus conveyed enters the space left between the top
of the tooth of the one wheel and the bottom of the hollow into which
this tooth gears in the other wheel, and tends to force the wheels apart.
This force being applied at one side of the central gearing line causes
the wheels to rotate so as to increase. the spaces occupied by the fluid
between the teeth. The outer circumferences of the wheels are shaped
spherically and are enclosed within a spherically shaped shroud or casing,
which prevents the escape of the working fluid. The whole is enclosed
in a case mounted in trunnions, so that by means of a screw or other
suitable gearing it can be made to turn partly round on its trunnions.
The induction pipe being attached to this case can thus be made to face.
a point at the one side or the other of the central gearing line of the
wheels at a greater or less distance from that line; thus the direction of
rotation can be reversed and the degree of expansive working can be
regulated. The fluid after expanding in the spaces between the teeth
escapes where they come out of gear with one another into the case,
from which it passes by a convenient eduction pipe. The motion given
to the wheels is conveyed by the shaft of either or the shafts of both to
drive machinery, when conversely the shaft of either is driven by power
fluid supplied by the induction pipe. is compressed, forced, or pumped by
their rotation.
Two or more such apparatus may be employed to constitute a hot air
or caloric engine in the following manner-The one apparatus acting
as a pump forces air or other elastic fluid into a furnace or heating
chamber, where its volume is expanded. The fluid thus expanded gives
motion to the other apparatus, and this motion effects the pumping of
the fluid with a surplus of power which may be employed for moving
machinery. In this combination instead of employing the rotary
apparatus above described for forcing the fluid any convenient pump
. may be employed driven by the motor apparatus, as may be readily
understood.