IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MECHANISM OF ELECTRIC METERS AND IN THE METHOD OF ACTUATING THE SAME, PARTS OF WHICH IMPROVEMENTS ARE APPLICABLE TO ELECTRIC CLOCKS
Year: 1883

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Philip Jolin, John Parsons, and
Marmaduke Francis Purcell at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents on
the 14th March 1883.
PHILIP JOLIN of the City and County of Bristol, JOHN PARSONS of the same
place, and MARMADUKE FRANCIS PURCELL of Dublin in the County of Dublin,
Ireland, "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MECHANISM OF ELECTRIC METERS AND IN THE
METHOD OF ACTUATING THE SAME, PARTS OF WHICH IMPROVEMENTS ARE
APPLICABLE TO ELECTRIC CLOCKS,"
This invention relates to improvements in electric meters for measuring,
indicating and registering, by means of clockwork apparatus placed in the direct
circiut of the meter and actuated by an electro magnet, the amount of current
passing, either direct or by a shunt according to the ampere power of the current,
through a conductor to be utilised in producing light or as a motive power or for
other purposes. A counter is attached to the apparatus for the purpose of indicating,
when desired, the length of time during which a current of definite and constant
ampere power is passing through the meter, or the counter may be used for
measuring a variable current, and the register in the latter case is based upon a
given unit of current.
Parts of the said improvements are applicable to clocks to be wound up or
actuated by electric currents.
The said invention consists, first, of an electro magnet coiled with wire in various
ways and employed to actuate the winding mechanism of the clock work which,
by means of the counter aforesaid, measures, indicates and registers the amount of
current passing. According to one method of coiling, one wire only is used and is
coiled around a cylinder or tube forming part of the frame of the electro magnet
and having a vertical slot therein above the coils of the wire to permit the vertical
oscillation of an arm connected, at one end, to a rod or spindle placed within the
said cylinder or tube, and, at the other end, to a disc centered on an intermediate
shaft of the clockwork mechanism. Upon the same centre as the said disc, but
free to rotate independently thereof, is a ratchet wheel upon which bears a spring
pawl fixed to the disc. At the lower end of the spindle placed vertically within
the aforesaid cylinder or tube, is the core of the electro magnet which, acting as a
weight suspended to the said spindle tends to draw it downwards until it is checked

page_text: by a stop or stud formed on the spindle, a rest being fitted into the cylinder or
tube to receive the said stop or stud. As, in the motion of the clockwork, the
circuit of the current is broken and made by a commutator or other device, or a
short circuit is established and destroyed across the wire, the core of the electro
magnet falls and rises within the coil and, as the spindle is raised, the arm connected
to the disc of the clockwork causes the disc to rotate on its centre through a
certain space, so that the pawl aforesaid being pressed backwards becomes
disengaged from the tooth of the ratchet wheel with which it is engaged and takes
into a tooth beyond. As the core falls, the ratchet wheel is carried round corre-
spondingly by the pawl and the spring of the clockwork being attached to the same
centre as the ratchet wheel, it is kept continuously wound up.
According to a second method of coiling, two wires are employed, one wire
being first coiled round the cylinder or tube containing the core, and the other being
coiled upon the first and in the saine direction, or a layer of coils of each wire may
be made alternately.
Under a third method, two wires are coiled together and in. the same direction.
According to a fourth method, two wires are coiled separately and in opposite
directions, the wires being coiled either separately throughout or in. alternate
layers.
When, under either of the last three methods of coiling, the circuit is broken and
made in one of the wires by the action of the clockwork mechanism on a commu-
tator, or a short circuit is established and destroyed, the winding gear is operated as
herein before described with reference to the first method of coiling.
The commutator employed to break and make the circuit to the electro magnet
by which the clockwork is wound up, or to establish and destroy a short circuit,
may be in the form of a drum of conducting material having vacant spaces on the
face thereof, or the spaces may be fitted with vulcanised fibre or other insulating
material. A brush or spring bearing on the surface of the drum maintains or
breaks the circuit or establishes and destroys a short circuit according as, in the
revolution of the drum, the vacant spaces or the strips of vulcanised fibre or other
insulating material, or the surface proper of the druin are presented to it. Instead
of employing this form of commutator, the desired effects may be produced by
means of the following arrangement of mechanism :—
A lever conveniently pivotted to the frame of the meter, is so placed with
relation to the spindle of the electro magnet that as the said spindle rises and falls,
one end of the lever is brought into contact with stops or studs formed on or
attached to the spindle, by which means the lever is made to oscillate on its pivot
in such manner that as the core of the electro magnet rises, the opposite end of the
lever is depressed and makes contact with the wire through which the current
passes, and as the core falls the contact aforesaid is broken. A weight may be
attached at the centre of the lever to assist the oscillation thereof over the dead
points, or, for the same purpose, a V shaped. bearing piece may be attached to the
underside of the lever, at or near the centre thereof, and may rest on a similarly
shaped piece formed on a spring attached to the framework of the meter, the lever
in both cases being part of the short circuit or the circuit of the wire to be made
and broken.
In applying the meter where a parallel circuit is employed for lighting or for
other purposes and where the rate of motion of the clock work is required to be
varied, either of the above described arrangements and forms of construction may
be adopted, or fine wires may be used in the construction of the electro magnet
coiled after either of the above described methods and having a resistance
sufficiently high, to place the electro magnet in the parallel circuit. Under this
arrangement, the clockwork mechanism is pivotted upon a spindle attached to the
frame and moves to and from the said electro magnet by the influence of an
additional electro magnet the spindle of the core of which is connected to the
clockwork mechanism, the rate of motion of which is thus controlled according to
the amount of current passing.

page_text: In the same application of the apparatus, the clockwork mechanism may be
pivotted, and influenced by an additional electro magnet, as above described, but
instead of a ratchet wheel and pawl, a disc and spring are employed, the spring
bearing upon the side of the disc and moving it at different rates of speed according
as the position of the spring is nearer to or further from the centre of the disc.
The action may be controlled by a lever pivotted above the spindle of the electro
magnet employed to wind the clockwork, one end of the lever being connected to
the additional electro magnet, and the other end being so situated that the spindle,
in its upward stroke, impinges thereon, and the degree to which the clockwork
mechanism is required to be wound is thereby varied and governed.
Instead of winding up the clockwork by the descent of the core of the electro
magnet, as herein before described, the same effect may be produced by the ascending
stroke of the core, the pawl and ratchet wheel being arranged accordingly.
A further modification of the method of registering a varying current consists in
attaching to a spindle of the clockwork a flat plate in the form of a "V," towards
the apex of which rests one end of a lever, the other end of which extends back-
wards between the limbs of a fork and is connected to the pawl of the counter. The
centres forming the fulcrum on which the lever oscillates are carried by the limbs
of the said fork which is pivotted, at the end opposite to the spindle of the
clockwork, to an arm connected in one direction at its outer end to the spindle of
the core of the additional electro magnet, and in the opposite direction to a spring.
According as the rate of motion is increased, the lever moves by the action of the
additional electro magnet towards the base of the V shaped plate, and a greater
degree of oscillation being imparted to the lever, the pawl connected thereto
operates to move the counter proportionately.
A variable current may also be measured by adapting the counter to be influenced
by an additional electro magnet in some of the ways described with reference to the
methods of altering the relative position of the clockwork mechanism with respect
to the electro magnet by which it is wound up, to attain the same object.
In any or all of the foregoing arrangements, the additional electro magnet may
have the whole or part of the total current to be measured passing through it.
When the ineter is being employed in measuring on a parallel circuit, the counter
may be attached direct to a spindle of the clockwork mechanism, and the rate of
motion of the latter being proportional to the amount of current passing, the latter
is indicated on the dial of the counter.
In the application of the apparatus to employment of the current in series,
where the current is constant as regards its ampere power, the clock-work is wound
up by the action of the electro magnet as aforesaid the core thereof being of a
given weight and lifted at intervals. The meter which thus becomes a time-
measuring instrument has a counter attached, actuated by an electro magnet which
constitutes a suitable resistance shunt to the point of employment of the current.
The circuit of the electro magnet which actuates the counter is broken and made
by a contact breaker or breakers carried on a spindle of the clockwork, and the
indicator of the dial of the counter indicates the time or number of hours during
which the current is passing multiplied by the number of lamps or other appliances
actuated by the said current.