IMPROVE- MENTS ON LOCKS FOR SAFES AND OTHER SECURE RECEPTACLES
Year: 1877

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Lionel Varicas at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 26th September 1877.
A communica-
tion from abroad by Milton Adolphus Dalton, of the City of Cincinnati, County
of Hamilton, State of Ohio, one of the United States of America.
LIONEL VARICAS, of 162, Euston Road, in the County of Middlesex. "IMPROVE-
MENTS ON LOCKS FOR SAFES AND OTHER SECURE RECEPTACLES." [A communica-
tion from abroad by Milton Adolphus Dalton, of the City of Cincinnati, County of
Hamilton, State of Ohio, one of the United States of America.]
This Invention relates to such locks or fastenings for safes and other secure
receptacles, which consist of or include a time lock or time attachment adapted to
prevent the opening or unlocking of the safe door by ordinary exterior manipulation
for any predetermined period of time.
The gravest objection urged against the use of time locks is the danger of a lock out
by reason of the accidental stoppage of the clockwork of such a lock before the hour at
which it is to cease its guarding action on the door of the safe; for all time locks
heretofore known depend primarily upon their clockwork for advancing some part
or parts of the lock a determined distance from the position occupied at the hour
when the lock begins its guarding action before the lock can automatically unlock
itself or assumes the condition admitting of the unlocking of the door of the safe in
the usual way.
The principle object of my Invention is to so construct the mechanism of a time
lock or time attachment, that it shall cease to be of service in guarding the door or
train bolts or non-time lock of the safe (according as it may be applied) whenever
its clockwork stops, whether such stoppage be caused by accident or by design.
To this end I altogether discard the principle of advance above alluded to, and
depend simply upon the motion of the clockwork for the effectiveness of the guarding
or dogging devices of the time lock. This general principle I have embodied in
various forms.
In time locks intended to automatically unlock as well as lock or dog, I interpose
a mechanism, which may be termed a controller, between the clockwork and the
guarding or dogging devices, which controller while kept in motion by the clock-

page_text: work maintains the effectiveness of the said guarding or dogging devices, but retracts
or renders them inoperative on ceasing motion.
In time locks designed to simply put themselves automatically in the condition
admitting of the unlocking of the safe at the appointed hour or at any time
before that on an accidental stoppage of the clockwork, the controller may be
one of the clock wheels or some moving or movable means combined there with,
which must first be locked on to or by the clockwork before the guarding or
dogging devices can be unlocked.
In some cases I provide that this moving or movable controller shall automati-
cally become fixed immediately on the stoppage of the clock work.
In others the stoppage of the clockwork merely provides for fixing the controller
by manipulation of the guarding or dogging devices from the exterior of the safe.
In still others I provide an addition to either of said methods a means for auto-
matic locking of the controller for determined periods of time by the going clockwork
so that the latter may run for any length of time without stopping, and still enable
the time lock to periodically guard and release the safe door.