A METHOD OF CONVERTING ROTARY INTO RECIPROCATING MOTION, ESPECIALLY APPLICABLE TO MACHINERY FOR FORCING PLASTIC SUBSTANCES THROUGH MOULDS AND DIES
Year: 1856

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Joseph Wheeler, of Wootton-under-Edge, in the
County of Gloucester, Gentleman, for the Invention of "A METHOD OF
CONVERTING ROTARY INTO RECIPROCATING MOTION, ESPECIALLY APPLICABLE TO
MACHINERY FOR FORCING PLASTIC SUBSTANCES THROUGH MOULDS AND DIES."
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Joseph Wheeler at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
22nd November 1856.
I, JOSEPH WHEELER, of Wootton-under-Edge, in the County of Gloucester,
Gentleman, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "A METHOD
OF CONVERTING ROTARY INTO RECIPROCATING MOTION, ESPECIALLY APPLICABLE TO
MACHINERY FOR FORCING PLASTIC SUBSTANCES THROUGH MOULDS AND DIES," to be as
follows:-
At the bottom of or upon a shaft I fix a toothed wheel. The shaft rotates in
fixed bearings. In a frame connected with or forming part of the instrument,
to which to-and-fro motion is to be communicated, I place loosely pins, held
between top and bottom plates. These pins and plates form a two-sided rack,
into which the teeth on the wheel gear. A stud projects from the bottom of
the under plate at each end, and on the pins and plates being shifted from one
side of the frame to the other, these studs follow guides in or on the bottom of

page_text: the frame. Upon rotary motion being imparted to the shaft, and the double-
sided rack being in gear therewith, the toothed wheel drives the rack and
consequently the wholo instrument forward until the last pin in the rack is
presented to the wheel, when the wheel, revolving in fixed bearings, turns the
rack over, gears into the pins or teeth on the opposite side thereof, and drives
it and the whole instrument in the direction opposite to that in which it had
been first propelled, and so on continuously.
When applied to the forcing of plastic substances, the shaft of the pug mill
may be prolonged into a frame beneath, fitted with the aforesaid appliances;
pistons or plungers being connected to each end of the instrument, and suitablo
cases for containing the plastic materials, with dies or moulds in the face
thereof being provided and being fed from the pug mill, the to-and-fro
motion imparted to the pistons would cause them alternately to press the
plastic substance through the dies.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Joseph Wheeler in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
22nd May 1857.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JOSEPH
WHEELER, of Wootton-under-Edge, in the County of Gloucester, Gentleman,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-second day of November, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six, in the twentieth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, tho
said Joseph Wheeler, Her special licence that I, the said Joseph Wheeler, my
executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Joseph
Wheeler, my executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any time agree
with, and no others, from time to time and at all times thereafter during the
term therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and
vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel
Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "A METHOD OF CONVERTING
ROTARY INTO RECIPROCATING MOTION, ESPECIALLY APPLICABLE TO MACHINERY FOR
FORCING PLASTIC SUBSTANCES THROUGH MOULDS AND DIES," upon the condition
(amongst others) that I, the said Joseph Wheeler, my executors or admini-
strators, by an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of their hands
and seals, should particularly describe and ascertain the nature of the said

page_text: Invention, and in what manner the same was to be performed, and cause the
same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar months
next and immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Joseph Wheeler, do hereby declare the
nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formed; to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement thereof, reference being had to the Drawings hereunto annexed, that
is to say:
At the bottom of or upon a shaft I fix a toothed wheel. The shaft rotates in
fixed bearings. In a frame connected with or forming part of the instrument,
to which to-and-fro motion is to be communicated, I place loosely pins, held
between top and bottom plates. These pins and plates form a two-sided rack,
into which the teeth on the wheel gear. A stud projects from the bottom of
the under plate at each end, and on the pins and plates being shifted from one
side of the frame to the other, these studs follow guides in or on the bottom of
the frame. Upon rotary motion being imparted to the shaft, and the double-
sided rack being in gear therewith, the toothed wheel drives the rack and
consequently the whole instrument forward until the last pin in the rack is
presented to the wheel, when tho wheel, revolving in fixed bearings, turns the
rack over, gears into the pins or teeth on the opposite side thereof, and drives
it and the whole instrument in the direction opposite to that in which it had
been first propelled, and so on continuously.
When applied to the forcing of plastic substances, the shaft of the pug mill
may be prolonged into a frame beneath, fitted with the aforesaid appliances;
pistons or plungers being connected to cach end of the instrument, and
suitable cases for containing the plastic materials, with dies or moulds in the
face thereof being provided and being fed from the pug mill, the to-and-fro
motion imparted to the pistons would cause them alternately to press the
plastic substance through the dies.
In the Drawings annexed I shew my method of converting rotary into
reciprocating motion, applied at the bottom of a pug mill to the forcing of
plastic substances through moulds.
Figure 1 is a sectional elevation of my apparatus and of a pug mill; and
Figure 2 is a sectional plan of the motive parts with pug mill removed. A is
a covered box, capable of to-and-fro motion in the case B. Arms C, C, project
from each end of the box A, and are furnished with moulding pistons D, D.
E is a rack, shewn separately in side elevation at Figure 3. The two end
pins a, a, forming part of the rack, project downwards through and beyond the
bottom plate b, and travel against the guide pieces c, c, fixed on the bottom of

page_text: the box A, and shewn partly in dotted lines in the plan; Figure 2. d, d, aro
abutments, against which the ends of the plates forming the rack aro
alternately carried to propel the box. The rack itself is caused to move in the
manner herein-before stated by the rotation of the toothed wheel F fixed on
the bottom of the shaft G, which revolves in a fixed bearing HI, and which,
being prolonged upwards, forms also the pug mill shaft, to which the blades e, e,
I is a bevelled toothed wheel for communicating rotary motion to
the shaft G and toothed wheel F; K, K, are spouts for the passage of the
clay from the mill into the case B in front of the moulding pistons D, D. The
moulds are held at the ends of the case at L, L.
And having now described the nature of my said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, I declare that I claim the converting of
rotary into reciprocating motion by means of a toothed wheel acting upon a
double-sided shifting rack, in the manner herein-before described, and repre-
sented in the Drawings annexed.
In witness whereof, I, the said Joseph Wheeler, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twentieth day of May, One thousand eight hundred
and fifty-soven.
JOSEPH WHEELER. (L.B.)