CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF VESSELS FOR CARRYING GOODS OR PASSENGERS ON WATER, ALSO CERTAIN IMPROVED ARRANGEMENTS OF MACHINERY POR COMMUNICATING MOTION TO SUCH VESSELS
Year: 1844

page_text: DAVIES, of Norbury, in the County of Stafford, Engineer, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date
at Westminster, the Twenty-fifth day of January, in the seventh year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant- unto me,
the said Henry Davies, Her especial licence, full power, sole privilege and
authority, that I, the said Henry Davies, my executors, administrators,
and assigns, and such others as I the said Henry Davies, my executors,
administrators, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and no others, from
time to time and at all times during the term of years therein mentioned,
should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England,
Wales, the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, and in all Her Majesty's
Colonies and Plantations abroad, and in the Islands of Jersey, Guernsey,
Alderney, Sark, and Man, my Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE
CONSTRUCTION OF VESSELS FOR CARRYING GOODS OR PASSENGERS ON WATER, ALSO
CERTAIN IMPROVED ARRANGEMENTS OF MACHINERY POR COMMUNICATING MOTION TO
SUCH VESSELS;" in which said Letters Patent is contained a proviso obliging
me, the said Henry Davies, by an Instrument in writing under my hand and
seal, particularly to describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention,
and in what manner the same is to be performed, and to cause the same to
be inrolled in Her Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six calendar
months next and immediately after the date of the said in part recited

page_text: Letters Patent, as in and by the same, reference being thereunto had, will
more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Henry Davies, do hereby declare, that the nature of my said Invention, and
the manner in which the same is to be performed, is particularly described
and ascertained in and by the following description thereof, reference being
had to the Drawings hereunto annexed, and to the letters and figures marked
thereon (that is to say):---
These improvements are comprehended under three heads :-
Firstly, in the peculiar construction of that part of a vessel which is
immersed in the water, consisting of a channel or way for the flow of a current
of water through the hull, under the deck, from head to stern.
Secondly, in the adaptation of rotary curved plates or paddles within the
internal channel or waterway through the hull or lower part of the vessel. And,
Thirdly, in the means of connecting vessels one to another, for the purpose
of forming a train or series of passage boats to be worked on canals or rivers.
In the accompanying Drawings, Fig. 1 represents a longitudinal section
of one of my improved construction of vessels, taken vertically through the
middle, from head to stern. Fig. 2 is a plan or horizontal view of the same,
as it would appear when looking down upon the deck, the machinery below
being represented by dots, in its true position, as it would be seen if the deck
were removed. Fig. 3 is a transverse section of the vessel, taken vertically
near the prow; and Fig. 4 is a similar section taken near the middle of the
vessel. I prefer to construct the whole of the framing of these vessels of plate
iron, with wrought-iron bracings or standards, but I do not purpose to confine
myself thereto; and the internal fittings may be of wood, or any other materials
that might be found suitable. In constructing any of these improved vessels,
I should first form a shell for the lower part, resembling the hull, by connecting
plates of iron by rivets, in the manner usually adopted in building ordinary
iron boats. The bottom of my improved vessel must be formed in a straight
horizontal line a, a, a, from end to end, and the sides b, b, parallel to each
other. The deck c, c, c, which floats upon the water, I construct in like
manner of iron plates riveted to the sides, laying it upon a slight inclination
downwards from the head and stern towards the middle, in order to give the
vessel buoyancy; and a portion of the deck in the middle I make horizontal,
and parallel to the bottom a, a, a. The ends of this shell I leave open to
afford a free waterway quite through, in a longitudinal direction below the
deck. The deck and sides may then be firmly connected by rivets, and braced
together by standards and transverse bars if necessary, and the gunwales and

page_text: fittings upon the deck be made as the character of the vessel may require.
The precise angle of depression of the deck toward the middle must depend
upon the length and breadth of the vessel, in order to give it any required
degree of buoyancy; and by the depression of the deck in the middle that part
of the waterway or channel below becomes contracted. Such is the improved
construction of vessel which constitutes the first head of my Invention, the
particular object of which I shall explain hereafter. There are represented in
the sectional Fig. 1 a series of longitudinal shafts d, e, f, extending through
the waterway of the vessel under the deck, and these are connected at their
ends by universal joints 9, 9, in order to enable them to revolve together at
any required angle to each other. There are two series of these shafts
arranged parallel to the sides of the vessel, as will be seen by the dotted line
in the plan view, Fig. 2, and also in the transverse sections, Figs. 3 and 4.
These shafts are supported by standards h, h, h, having bearings in which the
shafts are enabled to turn freely. Upon these longitudinal shafts there
are affixed curved plates or inclined paddles k, l, m, and n. These paddles
are severally formed to the figures of two half coils of a double-threaded screw
of considerable pitch, placed opposite to each other. The diameter of the
plates or paddles must be as large as possible, in order to fill the waterway as
nearly as may be, and the shafts must be as near together as will allow of the
paddles revolving clear of each other, in the manner shewn at Figs. 3 and 4.
The pitch of the screw, giving the inclination of the curved plates or
paddles k and n, may be stated at five feet, the diameter being three feet six
inches, in which case, with the proportion of contracted waterway shewn
in the middle part of the vessel at Fig. 1, the paddles and m, of two feet
eight inches diameter, must have a greater inclination of the curved plates,
say a pitch of six feet six inches. The object of this is, that the capacities of
the spaces contained within the length of the pitch of the dissimilar paddles
or screws k, l, m, and n, shall be as nearly as possible equal to each other; and,
therefore, in changing the obliquity and diameter of the paddles, this principle
must be kept in view. I would here remark that, having found it convenient
to place my paddles in the inclined parts of the waterway, as seen in Fig. 1,
it may be necessary to form their peripheries in the curve of a frustrum
of a cone, in order that they may work as near the sides of the channel as
possible, and thereby be fully acted upon by the whole current of the water.
Having now described the construction of my improved vessel, and also my
improved machinery for communicating motion to such vessels, I proceed
to explain the principles upon which I employ these improvements in aid of
passing vessels along canals, rivers, and other waters, first observing that these .

page_text: vessels may be propelled by steam power with ordinary paddles or other
propelling apparatus, or by towing or other means commonly employed for
that purpose. Supposing the vessel represented in longitudinal section, at
Fig. 1 in the Drawing, should be towed by a horse, or propelled by any other
ordinary means through the water, a partial vacuum in the water would neces-
sarily take place toward the stern or after part of the vessel, and a pressure of
the water against the prow or fore part. The vacuum and pressure thus
produced will cause a current of water to pass in an opposite direction to the
way of the vessel, to fill up the vacuum or space left by the progress of
the vessel. This effect, it is well known, takes place in all cases where
a vessel moves through the water. If a vessel be constructed with a longi-
tudinal channel through the middle of its hull, as represented in the Drawings,
and described above, the said current of water would pass through that channel;
and if there were placed within the channel a series of four pairs of screw
paddles k, l, m, n,' upon two continuous series of shafts, as exhibited, the
current would cause those paddles to revolve. Now the central part of the
channel being contracted, the current of water; as the vessel passed along,
would necessarily be accelerated in that contracted part of its course. It is
from this cause that the pitch of the second pair of screws 7 is required
to be made greater than that of the first pair of screws k, in order to carry on
the increased velocity of the water through the contracted part of the channel.
When the current has passed through the contracted channel it is met by the
third pair of screws m, which diminishes its velocity, and being then met by
the fourth pair of screws n, they take up the remaining portion of the velocity;
hence, between these last-mentioned two pairs of screws or paddles m and n,
the pressure of the water toward the hinder part of the channel is made
exactly equal to that in the fore part, and the effect of the impeding vacuum at
the stern of the vessel becomes annihilated, the power thus obtained being
through the shafts transmitted to the two first pairs of screw paddles k and l.
The improved mode of connecting boats together to form a train is shewn
at Figures 5 and 6, the former representing a side view of two boats connected
at their ends by means of a trough, the latter being a plan or horizontal view
of the same. The trough a, a, is made of wood or iron, as may be found most
convenient, having a flat bottom of about sixteen feet in length, with rectangu-
lar sides, corresponding, and nearly equal in breadth and depth, to the outside
width and height of the boats intended to be connected. A vertical partition b
is placed in the middle of the trough to keep the two ends of the boats asunder,
and to prevent a current of water passing through it. The ends of the boats
being inserted into this trough, as shewn, the two boats are attached together

page_text: by a rope or chain, or any other contrivance, as shewn at c. When the train
of vessels as they are passing through the water are required to turn at any
angle from the straight line, the curved parts of their prow and stern turn
in the trough (in the manner shewn by dots at Fig. 6) to the required angle.
The object of this mode of connecting a series of boats by means of such
troughs is, in order to prevent the several boats producing separate displace-
ments in the water, and causing them to form one continuous uninterrupted
line of displacement in the water as if they were one vessel.
Having now described my improvements in the construction of vessels, and
in machinery for communicating motion to such vessels, I desire it to be
understood that I do not intend to confine myself to the precise form of vessel
shewn in the Drawing; but I claim any variety of construction in which the
sides and bottom of the vessel, in the direction of its length, shall be parallel
to a central line drawn through the middle of the vessel from end to end, such
vessel having a contracted waterway or waterways through it, in a longitudinal
direction, for the purpose of giving it the required buoyancy, the extremities of
which waterway shall be equal in area to the external transverse section of the
vessel as far as it is immersed. Nor do I intend to confine myself to the precise
form of paddles or screws employed for regulating the passage of the current
through the contracted waterway; but claim any variety of form of apparatus
which shall be capable of regulating the current of the water through the
channel, so that the pressure at the entrance and exit shall be equal. And,
lastly, I claim the construction of trough by which I connect the ends of
vessels together, in manner and for the purposes above stated.
In witness whereof, I, the said Henry Davies, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twenty-third day of July, in the year of our Lord
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the same Twenty-third day of July,
o in the year above mentioned, the aforesaid Henry Davies came before our
Lady the Queen in Her Chancery, and acknowledged the Specification afore-
said, and all and every thing therein contained, in form above written. And
also the Specification aforesaid was stamped according to the tenor of the
Statute in that case made and provided.
5
Inrolled the Twenty-fifth day of July, in the year above written.