A NEW OR IMPROVED METHOD OF COMMUNICATING A REGULAR OR IRREGULAR MOTION FROM ONE AXLE TO ANOTHER WITHOUT THE AID OF AN UNIVERSAL JOINT
Year: 1812

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JOHN
RAPSON, of Penryn, in the County of Cornwall, Millwright and Machine
Maker, send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Fifth day of August,
in the fifty-second year of His reign, give and grant unto me, the said
John Rapson, my exors, adññors, and assigns, His especial licence, full power,
sole priviledge and authority, that I, the said John Rapson, my exors, admors,
and assigns, should and lawfully might, during the term of years therein
mentioned, make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and the
Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention of " A NEW OR IMPROVED
METHOD OF COMMUNICATING A REGULAR OR IRREGULAR MOTION FROM ONE AXLE
TO ANOTHER WITHOUT THE AID OF AN UNIVERSAL JOINT;" in which said Letters
Patent there is contained a proviso that if I, the said John Rapson, shall
not particularly describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention, and
in what manner the same is to be performed, by an instrument in writing
under my hand and seal, and cause the same to be inrolled in His Majesty's
High Court of Chancery within two calendar months next and immediately
after the date of the said Letters Patent, that then the said Letters Patent,
and all liberties and advantages whatsoever thereby granted, shall utterly cease,
determine, and become void, 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 proviso, I, the said
John Rapson, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention, and
the manner in which the same is to be performed, are particularly described
in manner following, that is to say :-

page_text: I do fasten or fix upon each of two axles, placed at any angle or inclination
with regard to each other and from one to the other of which it is or may be
desired to communicate motion either regular or irregular, a wheel or circular
piece of metal, or other fit material of the nature of a wheel or pinion, and I do
make the said wheels or pieces severally of such dimensions, whether equal
or unequal, as that the teeth or locking pieces of the nature of teeth or other
parts intended and applied to serve-the purpose of teeth, which are to be
formed or fixed in or upon the same, shall duly take or apply into or to each
other, in order that the driving wheel may propel or give motion to the other
wheel. And further I do so form and fashion the surfaces of my said wheels
out of or upon which the said teeth or locking pieces or other parts shall or
may be conceived perpendiculary. to. arise or. to be fixed, as that the said
surfaces shall pass nearly in fair contact with each other during the time of
revolution, and consequently that if the plane or planes of either or both of
the said wheels were so situated as that it or they would if extended pass
the center of the other or opposite wheel or wheels, then the said surface or
surfaces of such wheel or wheels would be cylindrical or very nearly so,
and also that if the said plane or planes were so situated as that it or they
would not if extended pass thro' the center of the other opposite wheel or wlieels,
then the said surface or surfaces of such wheel or wheels would be level or
nearly conical. And further, that instead of making the teeth of my said
wheels by equal cuts, separations, or divisions, at right angles to the direction
in which the periphery or surface of the said wheels "do 'niove, I do make
the said teeth or locking pieces, or parts intended and applied to serve the
purpose of teeth, by cuts, separations, or divisions, obliquely across the said
direction in any desired angle or inclination, but varying in the several
teeth or pieces or parts aforesaid in different parts of the circumference,
according to the effect intended to be produced; and I do give to the teeth
of the opposite wheels respectively that obliquity which shall or may be
fit and suitable to the accurate and fair action of the 'said wheels upon each
other, and by this means the said oblique teeth, when passing thro' or between
the teeth of the opposite wheel, do propel or give motion thereto (or may
contrarywise be propelled), whether the axles be respectively at right angles
to each other or any other angle of inclination: And I do farther declare,
that the said 'inclined teeth or locking piece or parts will give motion by
driving the opposite wheel to the right or the left of the plane of the
driving wheel, accordingly as the inclination of the said teeth shall be made
either way, and more slowly the less the inclination or obliquity shall or
may be with regard to the direction of the motion wheel at the surface
'

page_text: containing the teeth. And farther, that the velocity of the said motion
may be varied regularly or irregularly in different parts of the same revolution
by varying the said inclination or obliquity, and the driving or propelling wheel
may even be made to remain quiescent or motionless by means of teeth or
pieces or parts lying in the very direction of the said motion of the driving
or propelling wheel; or the motion of the driven or propelled wheel may
be reversed by reversing the said inclination of the teeth of the driving or
propelling wheel, and the same may be done respectively as often as may be
required during one and the same revolution.
And, lastly, I do declare that my said method of communicating a regular
or irregular motion from one axle to another placed at any angle by means
of wheels constructed as aforesaid, is capable of great variation as to the
inclinations and positions of the axis, the relative sizes of the wheels, the
figure of the teeth, and obliquities thereof, the nature of the materials and
other particulars, which must in all cases be governed and determined by the
end and purpose intended to be produced, and may with facility be effected
by any competent mechanical workman accustomed to wheel work.
moreover that my said Invention is applicable to all the several descrip-
tions of mills, machines, engines, and instruments wherein wheel work is
commonly used, whether the same be of large dimensions for work of great
power, or of any other dimensions, down to the combinations used for the
delicate operations of chronometry or the like.
And
In witness whereof, I, the said John Rapson, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Seventeenth day of August, in the year of our
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Seventeenth day of August, in
the year of our Lord 1812, the aforesaid John Rapson came before our said
Lord the King in His Chancery, and acknowleged the Specification afore-
said, and all and every thing therein contained and specified, in form above
written. And also the Specification aforesaid was stampt according to the
tenor of the Statute made for that purpose.
Inrolled the Seventeenth day of August, in the year of our Lord One