CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF WHEELS FOR CARRIAGES
Year: 1830

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE: PRESENTS' SHALL COME, I, WILLIAM
HOWARD, of Rotherhithe, in the County of Surrey, Iron Manufacturer, being
one of the people called Quakers, send greeting.
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WHEREAS His late most Excellent Majesty George the Fourth; by
the grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
King, "Defender of the Faith, by His Letters Patent, under the Great
Seal of Great Britain, bearing daté at Westminster, the'Twenty-seventh
day of February, in the eleventh year of His reign; did give and grant unto
me, the said William Howard; my executors, administrators, and assigns;
His espécial licence, full power, sole privilege and authority, that I, the said
William Howard;"my executors, administrators and assigns, and every of
them; by myself "or themselves, or by my' and 'their deputy or deputies,
servants or agents, or such others as I; the said William Howard, my'.
executors, administrators, and assigns," "should" at any time agree with, "and
no others, from time to time, "and at all times thereafter during. the:-term
of years therein expressed," should and lawfully might make, use, exercise,
and vend, my Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF
WHEELS FOR CARRIAGES," within that part of the United Kingdom-of:"Great
Britain" and "Ireland called "England, "His said late Majesty's Dominion of
Wales, and Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, in such manner as to me; the

page_text: said William Howard, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or any of
them, should in my or their discretion seem meet, and that I, the said
William Howard, my executors, administrators, and assigns, should and
lawfully might have and enjoy 'the whole profit, benefit, commodity, and
advantage from time to time coming, growing, accruing, and arising by reason
of the said Invention for and during the term of years therein mentioned;
to have, hold, exercise, and enjoy the said licence, powers, privileges, and
advantages therein-before, granted or mentioned to be granted unto me, the
said William Howard, my executors, administrators, and assigns, for and
during and unto the full end and term of fourteen years from the date of
the said grant of Letters Patent, according to the Statute in that case made
and provided, to the end that I, the said William Howard, my executors,
administrators, and assigns, might have and enjoy the full benefit, sole use and
exercise of the said Invention; in the said Letters Patent there is contained a
proviso obliging me, the said William Howard, under my hand and seal, to
particularly describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention, and in
what manner the same is to be performed, by an instrument in writing, and
cause the same to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery
within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the
said Letters Patent, as in and by the same (relation being thereunto had)
may more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE that, in compliance with the said proviso I, the said
William Howard, do hereby declare that my Invention of Certain Improve-
ments in the Construction of Wheels for Carriages consists in providing
a remedy for the defects of the ordinary carriage wheels, as usually manu-
factured by that class of artizans called wheelwrights.
In the ordinary mode of constructing cart and other carriage wheels for
travelling on the common road, the connection of the spokes or radii to the
felloes or wooden periphery is very unstable, and renders the wheel liable to an
earlier derangement or dislocation of its parts than by my improved method of
connecting these parts, which has besides the advantage of more freely uniting
the spokes or radii to the centre or nave of the wheel.
A further advantage I conceive arises from my said improvements in the
adaptation of a continuous iron ring. in lieu of the ordinary jointed wooden
felloes, by which that part of the wheel, and in consequence the other parts
of the wheel, are rendered stronger, and more durable, owing to the, wooden
felloes being liable to much earlier decay, besides becoming loose in their
sockets or mortices, from the alterations of form produced by the expansion
and contraction of the wood according to its state of dampness or dryness.

page_text: Having thus stated the object of my said Improvements, I proceed to
describe the means I adopt to carry the same into effect; and in order that
my mechanical arrangements may be fully and clearly understood, I annex to
my said description such Drawings as are necessary, for clucidation of which
the following is an enumeration, namely:―
:
Figure 1 represents an elevation of a cart or waggon wheel with my
improvements combined, on a scale of about one inch to the foot.
- Figure 2 exhibits a perspective view of the principal part of a metallic box
which I denominate a spoke shoe.
Figures 3 and 4. represent two countersunk rose-headed rivets, which
are employed to fasten the spoke shoes to a metallic ring which I call the
shoe ring.
Figure 5 is a perspective view of a plate of wrought iron which fits into a
corresponding cavity represented in the spoke shoe by Figure 2.
Figures 6 and 7 are representations of two long countersunk rivets for
fastening the plate Figure 5 to the spoke shoe Figure 2, by rivetting them
at the back of the latter.
Figure 8 is a plan of the back of the spoke shoe, and exhibits the last-
mentioned rivets rivetted: Figure 9. exhibits a transverse section of Figure 8
in the direction of the line thereon marked a. Figure 10. represents a
longitudinal section of Figure 8, including its connection. to: the- shoe ring
and the tire.
N.B. All similar letters of reference introduced into the several Figures
indicate corresponding parts in each Figure.
Having explained cursorily the principal features of my improvements, as
delineated in the above-mentioned Drawings, I proceed to specify. in detail the
construction and application with more particular reference to the Drawings.
In the Drawing marked Figure 1 the centre or nave and the radiating
spokes are represented as of the common form and kind,. and, as they form no
part of my Invention, will not require any explanation of their construction.
My improvements consist wholly in the addition and application of a series of
metallic boxes marked b, a, b,. which, as before mentioned, I denominate spoke
shoes (as they receive the ends of the spokes), and they are connected to the
shoe ring (before mentioned) shewn at C, C, C, &c., by which arrangement,
combined with the wedges or keys herein-after described, the component parts
of the wheel are brought into solid contact, and rendered more firm and.
durable than by the ordinary mode of construction. This Figure (1) being
drawn to a scale of only one inch to. the. foot (and being five inches in
diameter, represents a wheel of five feet in diameter), is merely intended to

page_text: shew the application of my improvements to an ordinary wheel; but the scale
being too diminutive to render very manifest the precise structure of the
novel. parts, or those which constitute-my-Invention, I have in all the other
Drawings, namely, Figures 2 to 10, exhibited the various parts of the full or
real size I use them in a wheel of five feet in diameter, and having a breadth
of five, of three and a half; or four inches, which-I now proceed.to describe.
Figure 2 is a perspective view of the principal part of a spoke shoe (which
may be made of any metal or-alloy, but I give the preference to cast-iron),
the cover plate a (represented of the full size at. Figure 5.) being detached to
shew the cavity for the reception of. the spoke. A series of these..spoke
shoes, consisting of a similar number to that. of the spokes required for
the wheel to be made, are fixed equidistantly by the strong rivets..repre-
sented at Figures 3 and 4 to- the internal surface of awrought-iron
ring (called the shoe ring). .--One of the edges of this ring, is exhibited at.
C, C, C, &c., in Figure 1. The rivets are put through the holes d; d,
(Figure 2); and are rivetted in holes in the. shoe- ring, as represented at d,.d,
in Figure 10. When the several shoes have been firmly-secured: by, these; or
other well-known means, and the, spokes have áll.-been driven into the nave,
and the outer ends of the spokes-prepared to fit tightly into the sockets. of
the shoes, they are all put or forced..therein sideways, the plates. asta, being
detached for that purpose... The last-mentioned operation is performed in such
a manner as to leave a series of nearly uniform spaces of about half an inch
(more or less) between the ends of the spokes and the..ends.of the sockets of
the shoes (marked e, in Figures 2, 8, 19, and 10). The latter-form. abutments
for the action-of wedges, which I will now describe.
...
....
I place against the end of the spoke-flatways a rectangular-picce of plato.
iron (marked f, Figures 9 and 10); of about the same dimensions as the
end-g of the spoke, which serves to protect the latter from being bruised
by the subsequent wedging... The wedges I prefer-are of two kinds, the
larger of good sound oak, and the smaller of wrought iron. The larger,,
as shewn at h, his, of sufficienti dimensions to fill up the hole. or:space.
left, as: before mentioned in 4Figures. 9 and 10. This wedge tis. very little
tapered before driving sin, but sufficiently so for the foremostend.toupass
through, the rectangular hole i, shewn at Figures 2, 8, and 9. It is driven, as
far as it will go;: when the part which has passed outwards at the back is cut
off flush with the metallic surface of the shoe. Thus much of the process, by a
proper attention to dimensions, would generally wedge:.up-the-spokes pretty
firmly between -the nave and the shoes, but the force of contact is materially
increased by the addition of a sharp and narrow wrought-iron wedge driven

page_text: into the middle of the wooden wedge,.as represented at kin Figures 9 and 1.0.
By means of one or more, of, these wedges, according to circumstances,.I pro-
duce a junction of the component parts of a wheel, as solid as if it were of
one body. The spokes are thereby kept home in the mortises of the nave, and
by using the wood and iron wedges of appropriate sizes I can compensate
for any slight accidental differences in the lengths of the spokes or thicknesses
of the other parts, and with great facility make the shoe ring conform precisely
to a circle described from the centre of the wheel, which is an object or
property of the utmost importance to a rolling body, especially, when it can be
thus easily obtained. It is to be understood that the wedging and other. fitting
of the spokes in the shoes are performed'.on..the open side, or that where
the plate is taken off. Every part being, brought to its true bearing, the
plates a, a, are fastened down into their places by the long rivets shewn at
Figures 6 and 7, which, passing through the holes 1, 1, in the plate and corre-
sponding holes m, m, in the shoes, are rivetted on the backs of the latter (as
shown at Figure 8) whilst the rivets are in a red-hot state; consequently," by
their contraction in cooling they compress very firmly any slight portion of the
wood which might project beyond the plane of the metallic faces n, n. The
wheel is now complete except with respect to the tire shown at 'o, o, in
Figure 10, which may be put on in separate streaks (or stripes) or in a single
ring, and be "shrunk on" in the usual manner, that is, by heating the tire hoop
so as to enlarge its circle sufficiently for it to be slipped over the circumference
of the shoe ring, when it afterwards by.cooling-shrinks and binds, the wheel
with great force. This latter method I give a decided preference to. In some
cases, however, I propose to cast the spoke shoes and the shoe ring in one
entire piece, instead of forming them separately in the first instance and subse-
quently uniting them, as already explained.*
C
Having now described the form of the parts, and the process of making a
wheel upon my improved construction of the size and kind specified, by taking
that as an example, every competent wheelwright will be able to determine the
proportions of the parts for wheels of other sizes and kinds, and to construct
them from the foregoing directions.
I limit my claim of invention to the before-mentioned metallic boxes, which
I have denominated spoke shoes, and to the method of keying or wedging
them up as described; but I do not confine myself to the employment of any
particular substances or materials in the construction or application of my said
improvements, nor do I limit myself to the precise proportions or size or form
of the parts delineated or described, as these may and will necessarily in

page_text: many cases be variously modified to adapt them to peculiar circumstances,
without, however, departing from the principle or chief characteristic of my
Invention.
In witness whereof, I, the said William Howard, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twenty-third day of August, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and thirty.
W (L.S.)
HOWARD.
Signed, sealed, and delivered, in the
presence of -
WM..MURRAY,
. 5, London Street.
J.-W. BRISTOW,
His Clerk.
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Twenty-third day of August,
in the year of our Lord 1830, the aforesaid William Howard came before
our said Lord the King in His Chancery, and acknowledged the Speci-
fication, and all and every thing therein contained and specified, in form!
above written. And also the Specification aforesaid was stamped according
to the tenor of the Statute made for that purpose.