IMPROVE- MENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF TYRES FOR RAILWAY AND OTHER CARRIAGE PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION OFOPS AND RINGS, AND IN MACHINERY EMPLOYED THEREIN
Year: 1859

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Thomas William Plum, of Blaenavon Iron Works,
in the County of Monmouth, Ironmaster, for the Invention of "IMPROVE-
MENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF TYRES FOR RAILWAY AND OTHER CARRIAGE
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Thomas William Plum
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on
the 17th December 1859.
I, THOMAS WILLIAM PLUM, of Blaenavon Iron Works, in the County of
Monmouth, Ironmaster, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention.
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF TYRES FOR RAILWAY AND OTHER
CARRIAGE WHEELS, AND OF HOOPS AND RINGS, AND IN MACHINERY EMPLOYED
THEREIN," to be as follows:-
This Invention relates to the making of iron. and steel tyres for carriage,
wagon, and truck wheels for railway and other purposes, and of other metallic
hoops and rings by any of the ordinary modes now in use by forging and
rolling, but at any convenient point short of the completion of the bar, that is
to say, before it has been brought to the finished section. The ends are
prepared for welding, being cut (by a circular saw or saws, or by a rotating
cutting machine now used for cutting hot iron, or partly by a saw and partly
by such cutting machine) into one or other of various known forms of scarfing.
The tyre or other bar is then (with or without reheating) bent in the usual
manner, except that the scarfed ends are at the same time brought together
ready for welding. The tyre or ring is then reheated, and at the proper point
the welding is effected by rolling (with or without previous hammering); this

page_text: rolling together with the further rolling to the required finished section is
effected by a machine similar to an ordinary bending machine modified in the
construction and mode of working the rollers by which it is adapted to the
purpose described.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Thomas William Plum in the Great Seal Patent Office
on the 16th June 1860.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
WILLIAM PLUM, of Blaenavon Iron Works, in the County of Monmouth,
Ironmaster, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her. Letters
Patent, bearing date the Seventeenth day of December, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-nine, in the twenty-third year of
Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto
me, the said Thomas William Plum, Her special licence that I, the said
Thomas William Plum, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such
others as I, the said Thomas William Plum, 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 THE MANUFACTURE OF TYRES FOR RAILWAY
AND OTHER CARRIAGE WHEELS, AND OF HOOPS AND RINGS, AND IN MACHINERY
EMPLOYED THEREIN," upon the condition (amongst others) that I, the said
Thomas William Plum, 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 Office within six calendar months next and
immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Thomas William Plum, do hereby
declare the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to
be performed, 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 :-
My Invention consists in preparing "scarf" joints on the ends, or in scarfing

page_text: the ends of bars of metal, which ends are afterwards to be brought together
and welded to form tyres for railway carriage and other wheels, hoops, and
rings. I take a railway wheel tyre bar forged or rolled in the ordinary
manner, and while hot at any point of the manufacture before the bar is
brought to its finished section I prepare the ends for welding by scarfing or
cutting them into correspondingly zig-zag or irregular forms to make a scarf
joint. The machinery I employ is a circular saw or a rotatory or other
suitable cutting apparatus, while the bar is in a cold or a hot state as found
most convenient, I then reheat or not the bar and bring the scarfed ends
together ready for welding, and bend and shape the bar in the ordinary
manner. I bring the ends of the bar to a welding heat and weld the ends
together by hammering and rolling, or either, when rolled, I make use of
a machine similar to that used for bending and blocking tyres and make the
rollers sufficiently strong and drive them at a speed suitable for completing
the weld and bringing the tyre to its finished section.
Figure 1 of the accompanying Drawings is a side view of part of a bar of
metal showing the ends of the bar scarfed or cut into a zig-zag form in the
manner before described; Figure 2 is a view of the same bar (on a smaller
scale) bent into the form of a tyre with the ends brought together ready for
welding as before described.
And baving now described the nature of my said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, I declare that I do not limit myself to
the form of scarf shewn, nor to any particular form of scarf, so long as the
ends of the bar to be united are cut of any irregular or zig-zag line, but what
I claim is,
First, preparing a scarf or cut of an irregular or zig-zag figure upon the
ends of bars for the pupose of welding when the bar is bent and the ends
brought together and welded to form tyres for wheels, and hoops, and rings.
Second, the employment in the manufacture of such tyres, hoops, and rings
of tyre bending and blocking machines in which the rollers are strengthened
and driven at a quick speed suitable for finishing the weld.
In witness whereof, I, the said Thomas William Plum, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Fifteenth day of June, One thousand
eight hundred and sixty.
THO
THO. W. PLUM. (L.D.)