AN APPARATUS FOR GIVING INCREASED EFFECT TO PADDLES USED IN STEAM VESSELS APPLICABLE TO ROTARY MOVEMENT BY WHICH THEY ARE GENERALLY WORKED
Year: 1823

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, HENRY
HABBERLY PRICE, of Neath Abbey, in the County of Glamorganshire,
Engineer, (being one of the people called Quakers,) send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Fourth did by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of His United Kingdom, bearing date
at Westminster, the Eighteenth day of March, 1828, in the fourth year of His
reign, give and grant unto me, the said Henry Habberly Price, my exors,
adiñors, and assigns, His especial licence, full power, sole privilege and
authority, that I, the said Henry Habberly Price, my exors, admors, and
assigns, during the term of years therein expressed, should and lawfully might
make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and the Town of
Berwick-upon-Tweed, and also in all His Majesty's Colonies and Plantations
abroad, my Invention of "AN APPARATUS FOR GIVING INCREASED EFFECT TO
PADDLES USED IN STEAM VESSELS APPLICABLE TO ROTARY MOVEMENT BY WHICH THEY
ARE GENERALLY WORKED;" in which said Letters Patent there is contained a
proviso that if I, the said Henry Habberly Price, shall not particularly
describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, by an instrument in writing under my hand
and seal, and cause the same to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of
Chancery within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of
the said Letters Patent, that then the said Letters Patent, and all liberties and
advantages whatsoever thereby granted, shall utterly cease, determine, and
be utterly cease, determine, and become void, as in and by the same, relation
being thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Henry Habberly Price, do hereby declare, that whereas under particular
circumstances (such as going head to wind, or in a heavy sea, or in towing
vessels, or from other causes), it frequently happens that the steam engines applied
to the revolution of the paddle wheels of ordinary steam boats or vessels are
in some measure overpowered and considerably reduced in their speed, and the
velocity of the vessel through the water thereby impeded; the object of my
my said Invention, which I call my accelerator, is to give at pleasure to any
steam engine or engines, or other propellant force, greater power over the
paddle wheels or other rotary apparatus than they now possess, thereby to
effect a greater number of revolutions in any given time, and consequently to
produce a greater velocity through the water. The nature of my said Inven-
tion, and the manner in which the same is to be applied, are particularly
described and ascertained in and by the Drawings hereunto annexed, and the
following description thereof (that is to say) :-
Fig. 1 represents a side elevation, and Fig. 2 an end view of so much
of the rotary apparatus connected with the paddle wheels of any steam boat
as is necessary to describe my said Invention. A, A, is a toothed wheel, fixed
on the engine shaft E, in one part of which is fixed the crank pin a, as more
particularly shewn in Fig. 3, to which the crank rod of the steam engine is com-
monly attached to produce the rotary motion of the paddles. B, B, is another
toothed wheel (of larger diameter than A), fixed on the end of the shaft F,
which is intended to convey the rotary motion to the paddles, to one of the
arms of which the crank pin a is attached, either as shewn in Fig. 3, or by a
connecting linnk, or in any other way; thus it will appear that I substitute
the crank wheels A, A, and B, B, for the cranks commonly in use.
G is a
countershaft (on which are fixed the larger tooth wheel C, and the smaller
tooth wheel D), resting on the sliding plummer blocks or bearings e, e;
the wheels C and D may therefore be easily thrown into gear with the wheels A
and B, by means of the levers 9, which work small pinions k, k, in the racks
i, i, Fig. 1, attached to the sliding plummer blocks e, e, and the keys d should
then be slipt into the recesses at i, Fig. 1, to prevent the said plummer
blocks falling back. Whenever these wheels are thrown into gear it is neces-
sary to substitute the crank pin h, Fig. 4, (to which the engine is to be
attached,) for the crank pin a, in the crank wheel A, by knocking out a and
driving in and fixing h in its stead. The wheel B, and consequently the
paddle shaft F, can then only derive its rotary motion from the wheel A
through the countershaft G, by means of the tooth wheels C and D; and C
being longer than A, & B than D, the wheel A and engine shaft E must

page_text: evidently make a greater number of revolutions in a given time than the
wheel B and the paddle shaft F on which it is fixed; consequently, the engine
attached to the wheel A by means of the crank pin h (Fig. 4) will have a
greater power over the paddle wheels, and if the tooth wheels are properly
proportioned to each other the engine may, in any weather, make her full
number of strokes per minute; on the other hand, whenever a change of cir-
cumstances renders it desirable to return to the ordinary method of propelling;
the engines are to be stopped, the crank pin a is to be re-fixed in place of h, the
countershaft and tooth wheels are to be thrown out of gear by the same means
as they were thrown in, and the machine will proceed in the same way as if
no accelerating apparatus were near it. The same object may be effected in
I do not
other ways, but I have described that which I myself prefer.
however confine myself to this particular application of my principle, my Patent
being, as I hereby declare it to be, for an apparatus which I may apply
to the paddle wheels or other propelling machinery of steam boats or vessels,
or remove at pleasure, the shaft or axis of the said paddle wheel or wheels
remaining always in the same line and direction as the shaft or axis to which
the steam engine or engines may be attached, thus giving me the power to
apply the engines directly to the paddle wheels in the ordernary way, whilst my
accelerating apparatus remain at rest, or by the application of the said apparatus
whenever that may be more desirable to effect the object I have in view.
In witness whereof, I, the said Henry Habberly Price, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Eighteenth day of September, One thousand