A NEW METHOD OF CONSTRUCTING TIME-PIECES OF MUCH MORE SIMPLICITY THAN HATH HITHERTO BEEN IN USE, WHICH SIMPLICITY DEPENDS UPON EMPLOYING SECTORS OR RACKS, OR LEVERS, INSTEAD OF WHEELS, SCAPEMENTS INSTEAD OF PINIONS, ROUGHENED CIRCUMFERENCES INSTEAD OF TEETH, FIXED STUDS OR PINS INSTEAD OF AXES, CIRCLES WITH VERNIER'S DIVISIONS INSTEAD OF HANDS, AND OCCA- SIONALLY CENTRIFUGAL HYDRAULIC MACHINES INSTEAD OF BALLANCES
Year: 1773

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, WILLIAM
SMALL, of Birmingham, in the County of Warwick, Doctor of Physick,
send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date the
Twenty-second day of July, in the thirteenth year of His reign, give and grant
unto me, the said William Small, His especial licence that I, the said William
Small, during the term of years therein expressed, should and lawfully might use,
exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed,
and also within all His Majesty's Colonies and Plantations abroad, my Inven-
tion of "A NEW METHOD OF CONSTRUCTING TIME-PIECES OF MUCH MORE SIMPLICITY
THAN HATH HITHERTO BEEN IN USE, WHICH SIMPLICITY DEPENDS UPON EMPLOYING
SECTORS OR RACKS, OR LEVERS, INSTEAD OF WHEELS, SCAPEMENTS INSTEAD OF
PINIONS, ROUGHENED CIRCUMFERENCES INSTEAD OF TEETH, FIXED STUDS OR PINS
INSTEAD OF AXES, CIRCLES WITH VERNIER'S DIVISIONS INSTEAD OF HANDS, AND OCCA-
SIONALLY CENTRIFUGAL HYDRAULIC MACHINES INSTEAD OF BALLANCES;" in which
said Letters Patent there is contained a provisoe obliging me, the said William
Small, under my hand and seal, to cause a particular description of the nature
of my said Invention, and how the same is to be performed, to be inrolled in
His Majesty's High Court of Chancery within four 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 provisoe, I, the said
William Small, do hereby declare that my said Invention of a New Method of

page_text: Constructing Time-pieces of much more Simplicity than have hitherto been in
Use, which Simplicity depends upon Employing Sectors or Racks, or Levers,
instead of Wheels, Scapements instead of Pinions, Roughened Circumferences
instead of Teeth, Fixed Studs or Pins instead of Axes, Circles with Vernier's
Divisions instead of Hands, and occasionally Centrifugal Hydraulic Machines
instead of Ballances, is described in the manner following (that is to say) :-
The pendulum is mounted upon an axis, the extremities of which are
cylindrical, and rollen surfaces so curved that by this rolling all the vibrations
of whatsoever lengths are rendered either accurately or very nearly isochronal;
or the extremities of the axis are so varied from the cylindrical form that,
although they roll on plain or on curved surfaces, the effect is still the same.
The number of wheels and pinions is lessened by employing sectors or levers
instead of wheels, and scapements instead of pinions. The scapements are fixed
to the sectors or levers, and deriving a reciprocal motion from teeth or pins in
wheels or in other sectors, or in bars or pieces of other forms, communi-
cate reciprocal motion to the sectors. In some cases the scapement is moved
only in one direction by the clock; and is returned back by its own weight or
by another weight, or by a spring. To exhibit the motions of heavenly bodies,
or other slow or irregular incommensurable motions, or unequal or very large
portions of time, roughened parts of wheels or of sectors or of axes are con-
tinually pressed close to roughened parts of other wheels, or sectors, or axes,
by which means the requisite motions are communicated from the one to the
other. These motions are at any time to be rendered slower or quicker in any
proportion, by moving the centers of motion nearer to or farther from each
other. The number of hands or fingers is lessened, or the time is shewn
without hands or fingers, by useing, instead of two or more hands, one
circular revolving plate, with Vernier's or Nonius's divisions. The stricking
and repetition are performed by scapements, which actuate hammers in the
following manner:-During the portion of time that is to be struck a sector
or piece of other form, furnished with teeth or pins, is moved by the watch
part into a certain position, in returning from which its pins or teeth act upon
a scapement that works an hammer. Its return is caused either by weight or
elasticity. A similar sector or piece, in returning from a position into which it
has been pulled or pressed, produces the repetition in like manner; or the
striking is otherwise performed by a wheel, or a bar, or piece of other form,
which has on one side teeth or pins that act on a scapement that moves an
hammer, and on the other side teeth or pins that move the watch part. Blank
spaces are left on one side of the wheel wherever there are teeth or pins on
the other. The heighth to which spiral springs in time-pieces are to be wound

page_text: is to be regulated by a piece adapted to slide at, or nearly at, right angles
backwards or forwards on a flatened or an angular part of one of the extremi-
ties of the arbor; through one end of this slider a pin is put, or part of the
slider is so bent as to take into a spiral groove formed on one end of the
spring box. The arbor, being turned round, turns the slider round until the
pin or bent part of the end stops against the termination of the spiral groove.
The ballances of time-pieces, instead of a verge, are to be mounted on a flat
spring extended, which, by twisting and untwisting, acts both as an axis and
pendulum spring. The motions of some time-pieces are to be governed by
immersing the whole or part of the machine into a liquid, such as water,
or alcohol, or acid spirits.
In witness whereof, I, the said William Small, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Fifteenth day of November, One thousand seven
Inrolled the Nineteenth day of November, in the year last above
mentioned.