Improvements in Wind-mills or Air Rotated Apparatus.
Year: 1893

page_text: Date of Application, 1st Feb., 1893
Complete Specification Left, 1st Nov., 1898-Accepted, 2nd Dec., 1893
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.
· Improvements in Wind-mills or Air Rotated Apparatus.
We WILLIAM Roberts MathER of Cliff Road, Matlock Road, Matlock
Bath, in the County of Derby, Machinist, and ALFRED ERNEST MATHER
of 47 Cottenham Street, Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, Traveller, do
hereby declare the nature of this invention to be as follows :-
Our invention relates to the sails of wind mills or to the parts which receive the
impelling force of winds or moving air in prime movers operated by wind and has
for its object to obviate the necessity for changing the position of the wheel when
the wind ohanges its direction of movement.
We employ a wheel revolving upon a vertical axis and provided with three or
more sets of vanes or boards which are arranged to feather automatically so as to
offer little resistance to the wind whon moving toward the wind. These vanos are
each hinged by one edge and are arranged in pairs the corresponding vanes in the
pairs being connected together by means of rods or links or by suitable means so
that they move in unison upon their hinges. The two sets are also so connected
together as that the vanes in one set are compelled to move in a direction contrary
to those in the other set.
Supposing for example that each arm or frame carries horizontal vanes hinged
or mounted to turn upon horizontal axes the upper vane in each pair would always
move upward when the lower vane moved downward. The two vanes in each pair
would have a common axis of movement or the axes of their hinges would be
parallel and near together so that the two vanes could be brought face to face
together in horizontal positions so as to offer a minimum of resistance to the wind.
When separated the vanes might be moved until the edge of au upper rage in one
pair would meet or nearly meet the edge of a vane in an adjoining pair and would
then offer the maximum of resistance to the wind. In one arrangement which we
consider to be suitable the upper vanes would be connected with one end and the
lower vanes with the other end of a lever which would bo mounted upon a fulorum.
As the wheel would revolve the pressure of the wind when blowing upon the front
edges of the vanes would tend to open tho shut pairs and when blowing upon the
-backs would tend to close the open pairs.
To assist this action we may connect the sets of vanes which are on opposite
sides of the common vertical axis so that the closing of the vanes on one side
of the axis would assist the opening of the vanes on the other side. This would
be more particularly applicable to wheels having an equal number of arms or
frames.
..
The vanes and other parts would be adapted to balance each other so that the
vanes would open and close with a light wind. Means would be adopted for limiting
the opening movements of the vanes and for varying the extent of such movements
to suit the power which would be required to be developed. This could be done by
hand or be effected by the action of a governor.
An ordinary or suitable governor would be connected with a stop wheel or cam
which by being turned would constituite a varying stop for the aforesaid lovers or
for some moving parts connected with the vanes.
We may employ buffer springs to act as stops to the movements of the levers or
means may be used to control the speed of movement of the lovers or parts con-
pected with the vanes in order to prevent the movements of the vanes when opening
'ánd closing from being too sudden and noisy. To obtain lightness of construction

page_text: we may make the arms or frames principally of piping and connect them together
by means of tension rods.
4
E. K. DUTTON & Co.,
5, John Dalton Street, Manchester, Agents,
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in Wind-mills or Air Rotated Apparatus.
We WILLIAM ROBERTS MATHER of Cliff Road, Matlock Road, Matlock
Bath, in the County of Derby, Machinist, and ALFRED ERNEST MATHER
of 47 Cottenham Street, Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, Traveller, do
hereby declare the nature of this invention and in what manner the same is to be
performed to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement and accompanying drawings :—
Our invention relates to the sails of wind mills or to the parts which receive the
impelling force of winds or moving air in primo movers operated by wind and has
for its object to obviate the necessity for changing the position of the wheel when
the wind changes its direction of movement.
We employ a wheel revolving upon a vertical axis and provided with three or
more sets of vanes or boards which are arranged to feather automatically so as to
offer little resistance to the wind when moving toward the wind. These vanes are
ench hinged by one edge and are arranged in pairs the corresponding vanes in the
pairs being connected together by means of rods or links or by suitable means so
that they move in unison upon their hinges. The two sets are also so connected
together as that the vanes in one set are compelled to move in a direction contrary
to those in the other set so that the vanes are opened and closed by the pressure of
the wind.
We will describe our invention more fully with referance to the attached
drawings wherein
Fig. 1 represents a vertical section of a set of or part of a set of vanes mounted
in accordance with our invention.
Fig. 2 being a front clevation, the vanes being represented as broken in the
centre of their length in order that the view might show the vanes both in the open
and in the closed positions.
In the said figs, a a are upper vanes or boards and bare the lower vanes.
These vanes are mounted in pairs each pair consisting of an upper and a lower
vane. Each vane is hinged by one edge to a rod c which extends horizontally
from the centre post d to the side upright e. The two vanes may be hinged to
two rods close together or be otherwise suitably hinged so that they 'will fold
together.
There may be three four or more sets of vanes arranged around the central
parte and there may be two three or any suitable number of pairs of vanes in
each set.
In the example each vane is supposed to be a board strengthened by means
of metal straps which are adapted to serve as hinges. The outer end of one strap
upon each vane is extended beyond the vane and is adapted to be jointed to a
connecting rod g. In the example the lower vanes bare connected with the rod g
to the left hand in Fig. 2 and the upper vanes to the rod à to the right hand in
the fig. The lower ends of these rods are connected with the two ends of a lever i
which is mounted to rock upon a fulcrum at j.
It will be seen that of the two rods g, & one will always be moving upward when
the other is moving downward owing to the connection with the lever.
When the lever would be in the- position indicated by the full lines the vanes
would be open as shown to the loft of Fig. 2 but when the lever would be in
the position indicated by the dotted lines the vanes would be closed as shown to

page_text: When open the outer edges of the vanes nearly meet so that a large surface is
opposed to the wind but when closed the vanes are brought face to face so as to
offer only their edges to the wind. This opening and closing is effected automatically
by the force of the wind.
In
It will be seen that when the wind is blowing upon the back of the vanes in the
direction indicated by the arrow in Fig. 1 the wind will tend to close the vanes
but when blowing in the contrary direction the tendency will be to open them.
place of the single lever a pair of connected bell-crank lovers might be used as
indicated by the diagram 3.
In the case of a wheel having an even number of sets of vanes-say for example
four sets each set would be in line with another set on the other side of the vertical
axis of motion. In such a case the sets in line might be connected so that the
closing of the vanes on one side of the axis would assist the opening of the vanes
on the other side.
The diagram Fig. 4 illustrates a method of effecting this connection.
The vanes and other parts would be adapted to balance each other so that the
vanes would open and close with a light wind. Means would be adopted for
limiting the opening movements of the vanes and for varying the extent of such
movements to suit the power which would be required to be developed. This
could be done by hand or be effected by the action of a governor.
An ordinary or suitable governor may be connected with a varying stop for the
aforesaid lovers or for some moving parts connected with the vanes.
We may employ buffer springs to act as stops to the movements of the levers or
means may be used to control the speed of movement of the levers or parts
connected with the vanes in order to prevent the movements of the vanes when
opening and closing from being too sudden and noisy. To obtain lightness of
construction we may make the arms or frames principally of piping and connect
them together by means of tension rods.
We do not confine ourselves to the horizontal vanes turning upon horizontal
rods e as such rods might be vertical or otherwise stated the axes of motion of
the vanes when opening and closing might be vertical instead of horizontal.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of our said inven-
tion and in what manner the same is to be performed wo declare that what we
claim is
1. The vanes constituting part of a wind motor mounted in pairs and connected
with levers so as to have concerted opening or separating and closing or
approaching movements substantially as set forth and indicated.
2. In a wind-mill or wind motor the vanes a, b each hinged at or near one edge
all the vanes a in a set being connected and all the vanes in a set being connected
and the two sets of connections being connected by a lever or set of levers so that
the two sets of vane connections movo in opposite directions substantially as and
for the purpose set forth and indicated.
3. A wind-mill wheel constructed to revolve upon a vertical axis and carrying
vanes or boards each hinged by one edge to the wheel frame the vanes being
arranged in pairs the vanes in a pair being hinged so that they will fold together
and open out and being connected by levers and parts so that they move in concert
toward and from each other when folding together and opening out substantially as
and for the purpose set forth and indicated.
4. In a wind-mill of the indicated nature the connection of the vanes on one
side of the vertical axis with the vanes in line on the other side so that the
closing vanes on one side help to open the vanes on the other side as set forth.
E. K. DUTTON & Co.,
6, John Dalton Street, Manchester, Agents.