IMPROVEMENTS APPLICABLE TO TRAPS FOR PIGEON AND OTHER SHOOTING
Year: 1867

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Frederick Render, of Manchester, in the County
of Lancaster, Corn Merchant, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS
APPLICABLE TO TRAPS FOR PIGEON AND OTHER SHOOTING."
Sealed the 19th June 1868, and dated the 24th December 1867.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Frederick Render at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
24th December 1867.
1, FREDERICK RENDER, of Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, Corn
Merchant, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IM-
PROVEMENTS APPLICABLE TO TRAPS FOR PIGEON AND OTHER SHOOTING," to be as
follows:
My Invention consists in applying electric force to the purpose of opening
traps used in pigeon and other shooting.
In carrying out my Invention I employ electro-magnets or other apparatus
acting by electricity upon bolts or other such ordinary fastenings. The con-
ducting wires from the several traps and connected to a galvanic battery I
place within a casing provided with a moveable part acting as a commutator.
This part upon being pressed brings one of the wires into connection with the
battery and a certain trap is opened, but as the operator cannot know the

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said Frederick Render in the Great Seal Patent Office on
the 24th June 1868.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, FREDERICK
RENDER, of Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, Corn Merchant, send
greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-fourth day of December, One thousand
eight hundred and sixty-seven, in the thirty-first year of Her reign, did,
for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said
Frederick Render, Her special license that I, the said Frederick Render,
my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said
Frederick Render, my executors, administrators, and assigns, should at any
time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all times there-
after during the term therein expressed, should and lawfully might make,
use, exercise, and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "IMPROVE-
MENTS APPLICABLE TO TRAPS FOR PIGEON AND OTHER SHOOTING," upon the condition,
amongst others, that I, the said Frederick Render, by an instrument in
writing under my hand and seal, should particularly describe and ascertain
the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same was to be
performed, and cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office
within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said
Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Frederick Render, do hereby declare
the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement and accompanying Drawings, that is to say :-
My Invention consists in the employment of electro-magnets for the purpose
of regulating the opening of traps used in pigeon and other shooting.
In the accompanying Drawing Fig. 1 represent in vertical section the
construction of trap 1 employ; Fig. 2 is a plan view of the bottom of the trap;
and Figs. 3 and 4 detached views.
The front and back are at 1-2, the former being hinged at 3 to the

page_text: bottom 4, as usual. The top is at 5 provided with a door 6, through which.
the bird is placed, and the whole is jointed so as to fall over in separate parts,.
as in ordinary traps. To the back are attached brackets 7, 7*, the former of.
which carries a fast pin 8 and the latter another pin 9; this one however
being capable of turning in the bracket 7*. Upon these two pins is mounted
the forked ends of a lever 10, it being loose upon the pin 8 but fast upon the
other pin 9. Each of these pins extends into a barrel 11, and is provided.
with a slotted part 12, 12*, which embraces an end of a spiral spring 13.
When therefore the lever 10 is turned upward, as in Fig. 1, the said spring
is held fast by the slot 12 at one end, while it is coiled by the pin 9, and the
end of the said lever being connected by a chain 14 to the trap the force for
pulling it over is obtained. Beneath the bottom of the trap is a chamber
formed by a casing 15, and within this chamber is an electro-magnet 16, the
keeper for which is at 17 mounted so as to turn upon a centre 18 carried by
a bracket 19. On the back of the trap is a projecting piece 20 situate
according to the positions shewn beneath a catch 21 mounted on a centre 22,
on the other side of which centre is a catch within which is a second catch 23
mounted on a centre 24 and carrying a tail piece 25 situate above a finger 26,
which projects from the keeper 17. Suppose a current of electricity to be
passed through the magnet 16 by aid of a galvanic battery or other ordinary
electrical apparatus the keeper 17 will be drawn thereto and will turn upon
its centre 18, and in so doing will cause the finger 26 to strike the tail
piece 25, thereby causing it to turn upon its centre 24 and withdraw the
catch 23 from the notch of the other catch 21, and this being no longer held
the charged spring 13 will turn the trap over upon the centre 3 as usual. If
it be required to use one trap only two simple wires making a communication
between the battery and the magnet may be employed and the current may
be established or broken in any ordinary manner; and in the case of two or
more traps being used similar means may be employed, there being a separate
battery for each trap. But I will now proceed to describe an apparatus I use,.
by means of which one battery will serve for several traps, and by which the
person who liberates the bird cannot bimself know which trap he is about to
open; and I will suppose that five traps are to be employed.
Fig. 5 is a top view of the apparatus, the cover being removed; Fig. 6, a
vertical section; and Fig. 7 a view looking upward, the bottom being remove:!."
At 30 is a wood casing around which are arranged five pairs of binding
screws 31, 31, 31, 31°, 31ª, answering to the five traps, and one other pair 32
which carry the wires leading to the poles of the battery. Within the casing 30
is a partition 33, in which are mounted five boxes of ivory or other insulating,

page_text: material 34 containing coiled springs 37 confined at bottom by a screw 36
and bearing at top against a piston 38 formed upon a rod 39, which carries at
its upper end a nob of metal 40, and the ivory boxes are surmounted by
metallic caps 41. The nob 40 is therefore pressed upward by the spring 37,
but may be forced on to the cap piece 41, there being the same arrangement
in all the five parts. In the centre of the casing is a spindle 42 projecting
into a tube 43 and against a piston 44, forced upward by a spring 35, and
the said spindle is therefore also carried upward. Upon the spindle 42 is a
pinion 45 of ten teeth and beneath it is a pin 46, when therefore the said
spindle is pressed down against the force of the spring 35 it cannot pass
beyond a certain distance unless it is turned in its bearing until a space
between two of the ten teeth is over the pin 46, and then being at liberty to
move downward it brings a cross bar 47 to bear upon one of the nobs 40 and
In the
presses it so as to establish a communication with the cap piece 41.
plan view, Fig. 5, the said cross bar 47 is seen bearing upon the nob 40, but
if it be turned a tenth part of a revolution then the cap piece 41* may in like
manner be pressed down, and so on throughout the series, and it is by making
contact between one of the nobs 40 and cap pieces 41 that the battery and
the electro-magnet 16 of one of the traps are connected. It will be seen that
the apparatus above described is enclosed within a case provided with a
cover 48, and the person who is to liberate a bird cannot therefore see the
position of the cross bar 47, he has therefore to turn the spindle 42 until a
space between two of the teeth 45 will allow the said spindle to descend, and
he is unable to choose which trap shall be opened.
Having described the use of the apparatus I will proceed to point out how the
connexions are made between the battery and the parts above described, and in
order to do this clearly I shall refer to the Diagram, Fig. 8, in which the nobs 401
and parts connected therewith are shewn in a right line instead of being disposed
in a circle, and I shall describe the connexion of one nob 40 only, the others
being mere repetitions. For the sake of convenience the wires which form con-
munications between the apparatus above described are formed into a cable 50
of ten wires, five leading from the positive pole of the battery and five from
the negative pole, but these several wires are of course insulated. The nobs 40
and cap pieces 41 which break and make the electric current are denoted by
similar letters of reference, as in Figs. 5, 6, 7, as are also the rods 39, and the
circles 31, 81, 31, 31, 31d, represent the binding screws of the previous
Figs. the two other binding screws 32 which, as before stated, represent the
battery are also denoted by circles with the same numbers of reference, and I
will now trace the course of the current through one trap, that shewn at 5, the

page_text: arrangement for the others being mere repetitions. The positive pole of the
battery is connected to the binding screw 32, from whence a wire, shewn in
red color, proceeds to the binding screw 31, after which it passes to one of the
wires in the cable 50, and from thence to a pole of the magnet in the trap;
the wire from the other pole of the magnet returns along the cable, issues
from it, as shewn by the blue line, and is connected to the spindle 39, through
which the current passes, and is thus conducted to the cap piece 41 (the
nob 40 being now in contact therewith); from which it proceeds, as shewn by
the blue line, to the negative pole of the battery. In the foregoing descrip-
tion the magnet has been described as liberating a catch by which the trap is
beld closed, but the magnet may take the place of the catch and act upon a
keeper attached to the trap so as to keep it closed, in which case the current
of electricity will of course be broken iustead of made when the trap is to be
opened.
Having thus described and ascertained the nature of my said Invention,
and the manner in which the same is to be performed, I desire it to be under-
stood that I claim as secured to me under the above in part recited Letters
Patent, the use of electro-magnets acting by an electric current for the purpose
of opening or holding down traps used for pigeon and other such shooting.
In witness whereof, I, the said Frederick Render, have hereunto set
my hand and seal, this Twenty-third day of June, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-eight.
FREDERICK RENDER. (L.S.)