A CERTAIN IMPROVEMENT OR CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MAKING OR MANUFACTURING OF AXLETREES AND OTHER CYLINDRICAL OR CONICAL SHAFTS
Year: 1835

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JAMES
HARDY, of Wednesbury, in the County of Stafford, Gentleman, send greeting.
WHEREAS His present most Excellent Majesty King William the
Fourth, by His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain,
bearing date at Westminster, the Fourth day of April, in the fifth year of
His reign, did, for Himself, His heirs and successors, give and grant unto
me, the said James Hardy, His especial licence, full power, sole privilege
and authority, that I, the said James Hardy, my executors, administrators,
and assigns, or such others as I, the said James Hardy, my executors,
administrators, and assigns, should at any time agree with, and no others,
from time to time and at all times during the term of years therein expressed,
should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England,
Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention of "A CERTAIN
IMPROVEMENT OR CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MAKING OR MANUFACTURING
OF AXLETREES AND OTHER CYLINDRICAL OR CONICAL SHAFTS;" in which said
Letters Patent is contained a proviso that I, the said James Hardy, shall
cause a particular description of the nature of my said Invention, and in
what manner the same is to be performed, to be enrolled in His Majesty's
High Court of Chancery within six calendar months. next and immediately
after the date of the said in part recited 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
James Hardy, do hereby declare that the nature of the said Invention

page_text: and the manner in which the same is to be performed, is particularly
described and ascertained in and by the Drawing hereto annexed, and by the
following explanation thereof, that is to say:
My improvements in the making or manufacturing of axletrees and
other cylindrical or conical shafts, consist,―
First, in giving to bars of iron, in a heated state, peculiar shapes, by
means of rolling, in order that a series of such bars, when combined în
close lateral contact, shall form a cylindrical figure.
Second, in combining, in a way similar to that technically called faggotting,
a series of such peculiarly-shaped bars as segmental portions of a cylinder,
and after heating such combined series of bars in an air furnace to the
proper welding heat, passing them between rollers, for the purpose of
bringing the particles of metal into a state of perfect cohesion.
Third, in working such combined bars between cylindrical swages or
dies under a tilt hammer or metal helve for the purpose of condensing and
hardening the metal and perfecting the cylindrical figure, and also in applying
the same method of swaging between the dies under a tilt hammer or metal helve
to bars of iron, prepared in any of the ordinary modes either of cylindrical or
conical forms for axletrees, cart arms, and shafts, applicable to various purposes.
In order to render the advantages of my improvements evident, I would
first observe, that the principal qualities requisite in shafts applicable to the
paddle wheels of steam packets, to axles for locomotive engines and carriages,
to piston rods, to constructing the shanks of anchors and other similar
uses, are tightness of material, with stiffness, tenacity, and strength, and
capability of resisting the strain, tension, or pressure to which they may be s
subjected. These qualities depend upon the purity of the iron of which
the shafts are made, and the manner in which the portions of the metal
are brought together and caused to adhere. The ordinary method of
producing iron shafts are by piling together bars of puddled iron and
rolling them at the mill into cylindrical forms, or by reducing scrap
iron into blooms or slabs under the forge hammer, and piling these
blooms or slabs upon each other, which when heated are welded into one
mass under the hammer in a square figure, and afterwards its angles are
reduced and rounded under the hammer. Thus by repeated heating and
hammering the fibres of the iron become considerably injured and distorted, 3
and the form of the shaft is rendered more or less irregular, dependent on the
skill of the workman. The shafts or shanks of anchors, round, flat, or square
bars of rolled iron are faggotted together, and the mass being heated in
portions the parts are progressively brought into cohesion by the operation of

page_text: hammering, which sometimes causes imperfect union or faulty parts to occur
in the mass between the several heats.
Having now set out the ordinary methods of producing iron shafts, I shall
proceed to explain my improved mode of effecting that object. I first procure
the best scrap iron, and cleanse it from rust and other impurities. This I work
into bars in the ordinary way, and then cut down and pile the bars according
to the length and substance required. These are then, in an air furnace,
brought to welding heat, in order to be shaped between groved rollers. Now
commences the first part of my improvement. A cylindrical shaft, of a
given diameter is required to be made. I describe a circle something larger
in diameter than the required shaft, and divideo that circle into six, eight, ten,
or any other number of equal segments, as at a, a, a, Figure 1, in the
Drawing, which represents a section cut transversely through one of my
improved shafts. I then describe a concentric circle b. This concentric
circle represents a cylindrical rod of rolled iron, which is to constitute the
central part of the shaft. The sectional figure of the segmental pieces a, a, a,
being thus found, as shewn at Figure 2, I then prepare grooved rollers
capable of producing that figure, as shewn at Figure 3, and proceed to roll
out the heated bars before mentioned into straight lengths, having radial sides
and segmental upper and under surfaces, as at Figure 2. I now combine
eight or any other proper number of these radial-bars in the manner called
faggotting, as at Figure 1, having a central rod b, if the shaft is intended to
be solid, or without the central rod 6 if the shaft is intended to be hollow. I
now place one or more iron hoops at a little distance from each end of
the faggot for the purpose of holding the bars together, and then, after intro-
ducing the ends successively into the furnace and raising the metal to welding
heat, I weld them under tho helve or tilt hammer, and then knock off
the hoops. The faggot of bars now firmly united at its ends is again, intro-
duced into the air furnace, and when raised to a welding heat passed between
O rollers having a semi-cilindrical groove formed in each, as the ordinary rollers
for producing cylindrical rods. This operation of rolling brings all the sur-
faces of the segmental bars which are in contact into cohesive union, that is,
welds them together. This constitutes the second feature of my improvement.
I now bring the shaft immediately under the operation of the tilt hammer or
5 metal helve which holds the dies or swages for the purpose of perfecting the
figure of the shaft and giving greater density to the metal. The precise form
or construction of the tilt hammer or helve is of little consequence, but the
dies or swages must be made to suit the size and figure of the intended
shaft. Figure 4 is a front view of the dies or swages c, c, held in the
°

page_text: stocks d, d, shewing the manner of fixing the one to the tilt hammer
or helve and the other to the anvil block. Figure 5 is a sido view of
the same with the shaft g under operation.
Fig. 6 represents the face or horizontal appearance of one of the dies or
swages, which are held in the stocks d, d, by means of their dovetailed-sides;
and their positions in the stocks may be adjusted by fixed screws cast into
the smaller end of each die, as shewn at e, e, which screw passes through
brackets f, f, and are drawn up to their bearings by nuts, with soft washers
intervening, to prevent the jar of the hammer loosening them. The dies
or swages are made with corresponding recesses or grooves formed as seg-
ments of. about nine tenths of the radius of a semy-cylinder, the diameter of
which must be about one tenth larger than the intended diameter of the
shaft, in order that the opening may admit the shaft before its substance is
condensed under the action of the tilt hammer or helve and reduced to its
desired dimensions, which is done by turning the shaft round in the dies in
order to present a different surface of the metal at every blow, the shaft
being at the same time progressively advanced through the dies as the portions
acted upon become finished..
о
Having described my improved method of manufacturing shafts, I proceed.
to explain that part of my improvements which applies to the making of
axletrees under the tilt hammer or metal helve. The ordinary way of pre-
paring by hammering at the forge the rough shafts for axles, technically called
cart or waggon arm moulds, one of which is shewn at Figure 7, is well under-
stood; I shall, therefore, only say that, having prepared an arm mould in the
ordinary way, while in its heated state I make the incisions in the arm mould
with a cold chisel at those parts which will be subjected to the greatest friction
against the box of the wheel when the axle is in use. I drive into those
incisions wedge-shaped pieces of steel. The arm mould is then replaced in
the air furnace, and when sufficiently heated to weld the iron and steel
together I then subject it to the operation of the tilt hammer or metal helve
by placing its conical or cylindrical end in the larger of the two grooves h of
the dies shewn at Figure 8. I here subject the arm to the same sort of
hammering operation described before. The iron and steel. by these means
becomes perfectly welded together, and the surface of the arm is rounded to
the proper figure; and to render it still more perfect the arm is then placed in
the smaller groove i, where it receives a few more strokes; and the rounding
of the arm becomes finished. When axletrees with collars, as at Figure 9,
are required to be made, dies with a suitable groove or recess, as shewn in the
plan or horizontal view, Figure 10, and in section at Figure 11, are employed;

page_text: the operation is performed in the way last described. It will of course be
understood that grooves of every required variety of size, either of a cylindrical
or conical form, must be provided, and which may be attached to and
detached from the blocks with facility. In connection with the operation of
rounding the shafts or axles under the dies I apply a strong current of wind,
urged by a blowing apparatus, and directed by a jet along the lower die, for
the purpose of blowing away the scales which may be disengaged from the
surface of the metal while under the hammer. And in order to cool the dies,
and more effectually to obtain a clear and smooth surface, I apply also a jet
of water, which may be occasionally projected along the heated.metal under
operation, for the purpose of disengaging the tenacious parts of the scale.
The advantages of this mode of rounding the axle arms are the smoothness
and equality of the surface produced, which obviates the necessity of turning
them, and also gives to the surface a hardness which renders it capable of
resisting in a greater degree the injurious effects usually produced by friction
on polished surfaces.
In witness whereof, I, the said James Hardy, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twenty-ninth day of September, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and thirty-five.
WILL. HERON,
Sol, Manchester.
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Twenty-ninth day of Sep-
tember, in the sixth year of the reign of His Majesty King William the
Fourth, the said James Hardy came before our said Lord the King in His
Chancery, and acknowledged the Instrument aforesaid, and all and every
thing therein contained and specified, in form above written. And also the
Instrument aforesaid was stamped according to the tenor of the Statute made
in the fifty-fifth year of the reign of His late Majesty King George the Third.
Inrolled the Third day of October One thousand eight hundred. and
thirty-five.