IMPROVEMENTS IN OR CONNECTED WITH APPARATUS OR MEANS FOR THE PRODUCTION, COLLECTION, OR STORAGE AND DISTRIBUTION OF ELECTRICITY, PARTS OF WHICH IMPROVEMENTS ARE ALSO APPLICABLE TO OTHER SIMILAR PURPOSES
Year: 1881

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by John Henry Johnson at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 15th October 1881. A communica-
tion from abroad by Ernest Ulysse Parod, of Paris, in the Republic. of France.
JOHN HENRY JOHNSON, of-47, Lincoln's Inn Fields, in the County of Middlesex,
Gentleman. "IMPROVEMENTS IN OR CONNECTED WITH APPARATUS OR MEANS
FOR THE PRODUCTION, COLLECTION, OR STORAGE AND DISTRIBUTION OF ELECTRICITY,
PARTS OF WHICH IMPROVEMENTS ARE ALSO APPLICABLE TO OTHER SIMILAR
PURPOSES." A communication from abroad by Ernest Ulysse Parod, of Paris, in
the Republic of France.
This Invention relates to improvements in or connected with apparatus or means
for the production, collection, or storage and distribution of electricity, and it
consists in the employment as hereinafter described, and in combination with the
condensing conductors for which Letters Patent were granted to Ernest Ulysse Parod,
dated November 19th, 1878, No. 4686, of accumulators or magazines of electricity
in order to collect and store up the electricity generated in excess.
Also in the employment as hereinafter described of automatic apparatus for
the purpose of placing the said accumulators in communication with the condensing
or other conductors, or with the electrical generators.
Also in the employment as hereinafter described of automatic apparatus for
regulating and controlling the intensity of the distributed currents and in the
employment as hereinafter described of automatic apparatus for throwing dyuamo
or magneto electric machines in or out of gear and for automatically operating the
inlet or outlet valves of hydraulic motors or the valves of steam engines and for
other similar purposes.
In the Specification to the said former Letters Patent relating to the employment
for transport into a distance and distributing electricity of condensers of all
description in lieu of the wires and cables ordinarily employed.
It is stated that each of the metallic armatures of the said condensers may be
connected with a second armature in direct contact with the first, and consisting of
water acidulated or saturated by any metallic salt with or without resin or any
other suitable substance forming a permeable mass in which the electricity supplied

page_text: by the metallic armatures in excess of the quantity discharged at the outlets is
accumulated in readiness to be drawn off as required when the quantity of the
electricity supplied to the metallic armatures is diminished.
By these means a conductor is obtained acting also as a magazine in which the
electricity is accumulated throughout its entire length.
As this combined conductor and magazine may require to extend in other than
horizontal directions to considerable distances, the mass acting as an electric
accumulator is supported and divided according to this Invention by impermeable
transverse partitions connected to the sides of the arinatures and of the protecting
envelope or outer casing in order to prevent the liquids from gravitating to the
lower part of the magazine, and tending burst the casing at this point, the spaces
between the partitions being filled up with the permeable mass and with the
exciting liquid when such is employed.
This Invention also relates to another improved arrangement consisting in the
addition of portable or nonadhesive accumulators to the first armatures of the
conductor, the said accumulators being arranged in steps or sections along the
condensing magazine or conductor, with the armatures of which they are connected
by their electrodes, and to the employment of detached, or portable, or other
accumulators thus arranged along the said conductors, whether the latter are
constructed with single armatures or provided with second accumulating armatures
or other accessories of any description.
In order to ensure a uniform tension of the fluid in the condensing conductor,
provided or not with accumulators, it. is preferred to employ a duplicate series or
battery of accumulators. One series being empty or discharged, is employed to
receive and collect the fluid occasionally generated in excess of the demand, whilst
the other series, having previously received its charge of excess fluid from the
condensing conductor, restores to the said conductor when from any cause the
supply to the latter is decreased below certain limits the energy which it has thus
received.
In order to produce this effect in a regular manner and at the proper time it is
necessary to employ an automatic arrangement, and for this purpose an automatic
reversing commutator hereinafter described is employed, the same being also
applicable for charging or discharging accumulators or series of accumulators of all
descriptions or systems, and constituting a species of differential galvanometer
capable of being employed in connection with condensing conductors or with
ordinary wires or cables, and in all cases in which it is necessary to control or
regulate an electric current.
This improved apparatus is composed of a disc of ebonite mounted on a vertical
axis, and upon which is fixed an armature, which may be made of a semicircular
form, and wider or thicker at the centre than at its extremities, in such a manner
as to represent two taper or conical bands of iron with their bases in opposition.
This armature is simultaneously exposed to the action of an electro magnet arranged
at one side of the disc, being excited by a derivation of the current in the condensing
conductor, and to the action of a permanent magnet arranged on the opposite side of
the disc of the same strength as the electro magnet when the current in the
condenser is at its normal tension,
The disc is provided with a crank pin, which imparts motion by the intervention
of small nonconducting connecting rods to the extremities of two metal levers
pivoted on two pillars communicating respectively with the armatures of the
condensing conductor. The whole of this mechanism is mounted upon an insulated
base or stand. Facing one side of each lever there are provided contact pieces
communicating respectively with the poles of a series of empty or discharged
accumulators, and facing the other sides of the levers there are two other contact
pieces similarly connected with the poles of a series of charged accumulators. The
levers are jointed at one extremity to the connecting rods herein before described,
and are provided at the opposite extremities with contact pieces which oscillate
between the fixed contact pieces communicating with the accumulators. It results

page_text: from this arrangement that when the condensing conductor is charged to its normal
tension, the electro magnet and the permanent magnet being then of equal strength,
exert an equal attraction on the armature on the disc, consequently the connecting
rods retain the levers in an intermediate position or at an equal distance from
the fixed contact pieces, but when the quantity of fluid supplied by the generator
is in excess of the quantity actually required the tension is increased, and the
consequent increase in the tension of the current passing to the electro magnet
causes the latter to attract the armature and crank pin on the disc following the
motion of the armature actuates the levers in such a manner as to cause the contact
pieces at their extremities to make contact with the fixed contact pieces communi-
cating respectively with the + and -poles of the series of empty or exhausted
accumulators into which the excess of electricity in the condensing conductor is
thus discharged. When on the other hand the tension decreases in the condensing
conductor below certain limits, the armature being attracted in an opposite
direction by the permanent magnet, brings the levers into contact with the
corresponding contact pieces connected with the charged accumulators, which then
supply a current of sufficient power to compensate for the deficiency in the conductor
and restore the normal tension in the latter.
When one series of accumulators is charged the excess is allowed to overflow into
another series which has been previously exhausted, and for this purpose the fixed
contact pieces, hereinbefore described, may be connected with these sets by means
of a reversing commutator, worked by hand or automatically.
In lieu of the automatic arrangement hereinbefore described, other self acting
devices capable of producing a similar effect may be employed without affecting
the principle of this Invention.
The tension in the condensing conductor being thus rendered uniform, the
regularity with which the current is delivered may be completed by means of a
small automatic regulating apparatus constructed in a similar manner to the
reversing apparatus or commutator hereinbefore described, but having one lever
only, which is carried upon the axis of the disc, and is caused to travel over the
coils of a rheostat arranged in such a manner that when the fluid in the condenser
is at its normal tension and the attraction of the electric magnet balances that of
the permanent magnet the lever rests on one extremity of the helix of the raeostat,
and acts in such a manner as to introduce resistance into the circuit, only when the
tension increases in the condensing conductor beyond certain limits, whereby the
armature of the regulating apparatus is attracted with superior force by the electro
magnet and introduces a proportional number of the coils of the rheostat into the
circuit.
The employment of the galvano metric reversing apparatus hereinbefore described
for actuating a small electric motor for the purpose of throwing one or more
dynamo or magneto electric machines in or out of gear automatically, or for acting
upon the valves of hydraulic steam or other engines, constitutes another feature of
this Invention. This or similar apparatus may also be employed to transmit to
distant establishments in which dynamo electric machines are used the signals for
throwing the machinery in or out of gear, or even for acting from a distance
directly upon the machinery, as herein before described.