IMPROVEMENTS IN MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS
Year: 1865

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to William Brookes, of 62, Chancery Lane, in the
County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer and Patent Agent, for the Invention
of "IMPROVEMENTS IN MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS."-A communication from
abroad by Pierre Louis Gautrot, ainé, of Paris, in the Empire of France,
Manufacturer of Brass Musical Instruments.
Sealed the 8th September 1865, and dated the 16th March 1865.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William Brookes at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 16th
March 1865.
I, WILLIAM BROOKES, of 62, Chancery Lane, in the County of Middlesex,
Civil Engineer and Patent Agent, do hereby declare the nature of the said
Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS," (communicated to me
from abroad by Pierre Louis Gautrot, ainé, of Paris, in the Empire of France,
Manufacturer of Brass Musical Instruments,) to be as follows:-
The Invention relates to a new system of pistons which the Inventor calls
"equitonique," giving the perfection of justness in instruments with four
pistons, as the basses or euphonions.
It is well known that with the ordinary system of pistons the following
notes F, E, Eb, D, and Db, in the lower octave of those instruments are
always bad and almost impossible to be obtained because the slides of the
three pistons are not in the right proportion to the extra length given to the
instrument when the fourth piston is put in motion. The improvement

page_text: obviates this inconvenience. The equitonical pistons are provided with two
passages of air and two sets of slides. When you play in the medium and
upper notes of the instruments you have only to use the three pistons, as in all
the regular brass instruments, and the air coming from the mouth-piece tube
passes in its regular way, but when you have to play in the low notes of the
instruments, and when you use the fourth piston, the air passes in the two
columns of air and in the two sets of slides, and by that means the notes
above mentioned have in the instrument their proper length, and consequently
may be obtained perfect in tune.
This system may be applied to various brass instruments either with pistons
or with rotary valves, and the pistons may be provided also with three
columns of air and three sets of valves instead of two.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said William Brookes in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
15th September 1865.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, WILLIAM
BROOKES, of 62, Chancery Lane, in the County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer
and Patent Agent, send greeting.
.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Sixteenth day of March, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and sixty-five, in the twenty-eighth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and, successors, give and grant unto me, the, said
William Brookes, Her special licence that I, the said William Brookes, my
executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said William
Brookes, 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 "IMPROVEMENTS IN MUSICAL
INSTRUMENTS," (communicated to me from abroad by Pierre Louis Gautrot,
aine, of Paris, in the Empire of France, Manufacturer of Brass Musical
Instruments,) upon the condition (amongst others) that I, the said William
Brookes, my executors or administrators, 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 Invention, and in what manner the same
was to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent
17r
1.
སཐ ཿན མཐུས ས པ -
1

page_text: Office within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the
said Letters Patent:
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said William Brookes, do hereby declare
the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and' by the follow-
ing statement thereof; that is to say:―
The Invention relates to a new system of pistons which the Inventor calls
"equitonique," giving the perfection of justness in instruments with four
pistons, as the basses or euphonions.
It is well known that with the ordinary system of pistons the following
notes F, E, Eb, D, and Db. in the lower octave of those instruments are
always bad and almost impossible to be obtained, because the slides of the
three pistons are not in the right proportion to the extra length given to the
instrument when the fourth 'piston is put in motion. The improvement
obviates this inconvenience. The equitonical pistons are provided with two
passages of air and two sets of slides. When you play in the medium and
upper notes of the instrnments you have only to use the thrée pistons as in all
the regular brass instruments, and the air coming from the mouth-piece tube
passes in its regular way, but when you have to play in the low notes of the
instruments, and when you use the fourth piston, the air passes in the two
columns of air and the two sets of slides, and by that means the notes above
mentioned have in the instrument their proper length, and consequently may
be obtained perfect in tune.
This system may be applied to various brass or other metal instruments
either with pistons or with rotary valves, and the pistons may be provided.
also with three columns of air and three sets of valves instead of two.
In order to have a complete knowledge of the system, and of its advantages,
it is necessary to say a few words of the application or rather the use or the
part of the pistons' in the ordinary systems of instruments as well as in' thosë'
lately improved.
The part of the piston is to transpose the instrument, and, as it were, to
supply it with another instrument tuned oh another tonic, and if the perfection
of justness was to be wished and realized 12 pistons tuned on every one of the
12 tonics would be required for obtaining the chromatic scales. Those'12
pistons' would form a mechanism which should present such a 'difficulty for
the fingering and such a heaviness that every one of the brass instrument
makers have renounced that idea as impracticable, and three pistons only
have been used for all the high keyed instruments and those of the medium,
and four and sometimes five for the basses and contra basses, but it is easy to
J

page_text: understand that only five or six real accords were to be obtained, the talent
and the lips of the performers completing most imperfectly by some factitious
fingerings the perfectness of the chromatic scales.
Various systems have been invented, many improvements have been lately
realized for arriving to the perfect justness in the brass instruments provided
with more than three pistons, but without success. This Invention being
more particularly applicable to the basses and contra basses, I will first describe
the improvements provided for that class of instruments.
It is generally known that all the brass instruments, from the soprano to the
baryton, do not go in the low at lower than the F sharp, that compass, quite
sufficient for the instruments just named, was insufficient for the saxhorn
bass, and from the F sharp to the low C the five half notes so much wanted
and used in those instruments were not to be obtained, then a fourth piston
was imagined; that fourth piston being put in motion was intended to com-
plete the lower octave of the instruments, that is to say, to obtain the F, E,
Eb, D, and Db, but those notes were always bad, and some of them, as
it were, impossible to be had on account of the difference between the length
of the instrument itself, increased by the extra slide and the length of the
slides of the pistons. Everybody knows that the more you increase the length
of a brass instrument the length of the additional tubes applicated to the
pistons must be increased proportionally, viz., the slides of the pistons are
larger in the saxhorn bugle than in the soprano, larger in the saxhorn tenor
than in the bugle, larger in the saxhorn bass, for instance, the additional
tubes being made in proportion to the length of the instrument with three
pistons are too short when the fourth piston is pressed down, thence the
unavoidable imperfectness of the last notes of the low octaves, F, E, Eb,
D, and Db. This new equitonic system obviates that inconveniency. The
Drawings will show that in that system the sets of pistons are provided with
two and even three passages of air and two or three sets of slides. I shall
speak at first of the instrument with two columns of air.
The Figure No. 1 represents a bass in Bb, the air coming from the
mouth-piece tube L, goes through the three pistons Nos. 1, 2, 3, crosses
after the 4th one, and goes immediately in the cell. We see that if one, two,
or the three pistons are pressed down the air has to go in the additional slides
A, A, A, which are made in proportion to the main tube of the instrument, and

page_text: may be obtained quite just and perfect in tune, but when you want to have
the other notes completing the low octaves, viz., F#, F, E, E, D, and Db,
and when pressing down the fourth cylinder B, the air coming from the
mouth-piece tube goes at first right throngh the three pistons A, A, A, comes
down to the fourth one B, runs in its additional slide C, and crosses after the
three pistons by the lower passage of air X, which corresponds with the
second set of slides D, D, D, and further goes to the bell. Thus when you
have to play in the lower octaves of the instrument the notes above mentioned
may be obtained quite perfect in tune, because every one of them has its
corresponding and proportional length with the three slides D, D, D. The
blue line M, N, indicates the passage of air when the 4th piston is not pressed
down, and the red line O, P, indicates the same passage when the 4th
piston is used.
Figures 3 and 4 represent the set of equitonic pistons (full size) in which
the two passages of wind may be clearly perceived. The blue line indicates
the passage when the fourth piston is not pressed down.
Figures 5 and 6 represent the same set of slides (full size) when the
fourth piston is pressed down. The red line indicates the passage of the air
through the pistons.
Figure No. 2 shows another instrument of this equitonic system provided
with three columns of air and three sets of slides. That instrument has
by the peculiarity of its two transposing cylinders and its nine slides A, A, A,
D, D, D, E, E, E, as it were eleven pistons, which form with the notes of
the main tube of the instrument twelve notes perfect in tune, representing the
twelve tunes of the chromatic scale, accorded every one with a special tube
and quite independent one from the other. The extent of the instrument
is not increased by that addition of a third passage of air, but I merely show
the improvements that are to be obtained in perfectness of tone with this
equitonic system, and which are impossible to have with the other instruments
unless they are provided with 12 pistons.
Figures 7 and 8 show a cornet in Eb and Bb. of my equitonic system.
Figure No. 8 represents the instrument when the 4th piston B is most
pressed down. The blue line M, N, indicates the passages of air.. It comes
right down the lower part of the three principal pistons and goes to the bell.
In Figure No. 7 the 4th piston B is pressed down, and the air following
the red line O, P, goes at first in the lower part, and the lower slides of the
instrument, and from there goes through the upper passage and slides, which
have the exact length for being perfect in justness and tune when the performer
plays in Bb.

page_text: By this Invention there are not really two instruments for one in the same
hand capable of being played with the same mouth-piece, but there is an
immense advantage to all high-keyed instruments; as the cornet or the bugle.
It is generally know that in the brass instruments with mouth-pieces the
shorter is the main tube of an instrument the more difficult it is to obtain the
high notes, thus, for instance, with the same mouth-piece it will be easier to
obtain the upper G on a French horn in Eb than the upper C on the French
horn in Bb. Taking another example, the upper Bb. represented by the
upper G of the bugle soprano in Eb will be had more easily with that instru-
ment than the same Bb. represented by the upper C of the cornet.
These instruments having the two keys of Eb and Bb, when the performer
shall have to do on the second of those instruments, the Bb, the following
notes, viz., G, G, A, Bb, B, and C, it will be more easy to leave up the fourth
piston and do with the tonality, of E, the corresponding notes D, D, E, F,
F#, and G.
The equitonic system may be applied to all instruments with pistons.
In' witness' whereof, I, the said William Brookes, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Fifteenth day' of September, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-five.
WILLIAM BROOKES. (L.s)