INVENTION OF CONSTRUCTING A STEAM ENGINE BY WHICH MIGHT BE WORKED MILLS FOR GRINDING, ROLLING, CUTTING, TURNING, OR ANY OTHER SORT OF MACHINE THAT COULD BE WROUGHT BY WATER WITH THE GREATEST DEGREE OF UNIFORMITY, BY A NEW INVENTED FIGURE CALLED THE SUB-SUPRA, AND OTHERS CONNECTED THEREWITH, BY WHICH MEANS SUCH ENGINE WOULD HAVE A SUPERIOR POWER ABOVE ANY OF THE COMMON CONSTRUCTION
Year: 1791

page_text: Parliament.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JAMES
SUMMERS, of Lawrence Hill, in the Parish of Saint George, in the County of
Gloucester, Wheelwright, send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third, by His
Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at West-
minster, the Sixth day of October, in the thirty-first year of His reign, did give
and grant unto me, the said James Summers, my executors, administrators,
and assigns, His special licence, full power, sole privilege and authority, that
I, the said James Summers, my executors, administrators, and assigns, during
the term of fourteen years from the date of the said Lotters Patent, should
and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and
the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my "INVENTION OF CONSTRUCTING A STEAM
ENGINE BY WHICH MIGHT BE WORKED MILLS FOR GRINDING, ROLLING, CUTTING,
TURNING, OR ANY OTHER SORT OF MACHINE THAT COULD BE WROUGHT BY WATER
WITH THE GREATEST DEGREE OF UNIFORMITY, BY A NEW INVENTED FIGURE CALLED
THE SUB-SUPRA, AND OTHERS CONNECTED THEREWITH, BY WHICH MEANS SUCH
ENGINE WOULD HAVE A SUPERIOR POWER ABOVE ANY OF THE COMMON CONSTRUCTION;"
in which said Letter Patent is contained a proviso that if I, the said James
Summers, should not particularly describe and ascertain the nature of my said
Invention, and in what manner the same was to be performed, by an instru-
ment in writing under my hand and seal, and cause the same to be inrolled in
His Majestie's High Court of Chancery within one calendar month next and

page_text: immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent, that then the said Letters
Patent, and all liberties and advantages whatsoever thereby granted, should
uttorly coase, determine, and become void, as in and by the said recited Letters
Patent, relation being thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said James Summers, in compliance with the
said proviso in the said recited Letters Patent contained, do hereby declare
that the nature of my said Invention, and the manner in which the same is to
be performed, is heroin-after and in the Plan or Section hereunto annexed,
and which I refer to as part of this my Specification, described and ascertained.
I have adapted my Invention to be worked by two cylinders or steam
vessels, one on each side of the fulcrum or middle center of the lever beam,
and one boiler which supplies both vessels with steam. 1st, I affix double
and alternate changing valves in the eduction pipe appertaining to each steam
vessel, the one to open upwards and the other to open downwards. These
valves are fixed so that when the top one is shut the bottom one is open, and
when tho bottom one is shut the top one is open, by a little iron rod and joints,
as seen, Figures 18 and 14, which, by the operation of the air, open and shut
so as to exclude the injected water and retain the clastic steam coming from
the boiler, No. 12. From No. 2 to Figure 15 is an open metal figure, which I
call a sub-supra, preferable to wheels or cranks, having greater power by
constantly acting on the horizontal extrenuity of the inscribed sun wheel. The
sub-supra is about six inches wide, and twenty-four inches long, for an engine
of small size, and is to be increased in size nearly in the same proportion for a
larger engine, the two sides whereof are parralel to each other, and the ends
circular. It hath teeth or cogs around it, at equal distances on its inside edge,
capable of receiving the teeth and driving a wheel (which I call the sun wheel)
in its cavity, hercin-after mentioned. On one side of the sub-supra a piece of
metal is made or fastened, which I call a shifting bridge; see Figure 16. This
shifting bridge rises with a projection on each side of the sub-supra, about onc
inch above the side of the sub-supra, which constantly runs round two retro-
duction wheels, after mentioned. Within tho sub-supra is a wheel I call a
sun wheel, Figure 17, from No. 1, with teeth around on its outside edge, to be
drove in its geering by the sub-supra. Tho axis or shaft of the sun wheel is
fastened to the woodwork or framing of the engine. On one end of the axis is
a fly-wheel, and on the other the apparatus for most of the rotative work pro-
posed to be done. The sub-supra is fastened at its upper end to a spring box,
Figure 18, from No. 3, and is joined to a connection rod of the lever beam,
Figure 9, by a rolling joint, to lessen the friction in the work, which connection
rod is also joined, as described in the said place or section. In the Plan

page_text: or Section, Figure 1, from No. 1, are two retroduction wheels, fastened
to the framing of the engine on its axis at a little distance apart, so as to
admit the edge of the sub-supra to pass alternately in and out without friction,
as may be seen at Figure 19, against which retroduction wheels one side of
the shifting bridge noves on the ascent thereof with the sub-supra, and the
other side moves on the descent of the shifting bridge and sub-supra,
by means whereof the teeth or cogs of the sub-supra are at each ascent and
descent shifted from one side to the other side of the inscribed sun wheel, and
the sun wheel kept in one rotative and regular motion being constantly in its
geering. To the lever beam of the engine I adopt three several perpendicular
centers of action in iron framings, with joints and wheels upon a mechanical
principle and proportion, by fixing the three several centers of action between
the different curve lines, as seen at Figure 20, which centers are proportion-
ably divided to act in the constant perpendicular lines in Figures 21, 22, 23,
from 24, 25, 26, the centers of action; for as the top centers on the lever
beam is carried in a curve line to the main center 27, the bottom centers
28, 29, 30, are carried in a curve line in a contrary direction by the running
wheels, Figure 9, fixed on the parrallel frame at No. 29, which runs in the
circular curve plates No. 31 and 31, and keeps the three connecting rods in a
perpendicular and steady motion in the alternate ascent and descent of the
lever beam. A cavity for the piston rod in the vibration of the lower joints is
seen in Figure 9, and the wheels on the pivots or axis of the same. The
steam that arises in the boiler No. 12, is conveyed therefrom by one steam
pipe to the two cylinders or steam vessels Figures 5 and 6, by valves or cocks,
as seen at Figures 2 and 3, leading from the pipo into each steam vessell,
which alternately open and shut in the ascent and descent of the lever beam
and governor, Figure 4, which strikes constantly against the hand bars
No. 39 and 39, which alternately and successively change the valves or cocks
for the steam and injection water in like manner, so that the vacuum is formed
in one of the steam cylinders whilst the steam is filling the other, which
constantly reverses in each cylinder. In some cases I find it necessary to
apply an hydraulic machine, to regulate the motion of the engine is to be
applied to a little water pump, which pump is wrought by two little wheels
and a line, one wheel on the fly shaft belonging to the engine, the other on a
small crank axle, which is connected to a lever which has the pump rod and
plunger on the other end to work the pump. This pump injects water in the
new-invented machine called the hydraufical index or steam regulation, for which
it is intended, and fills the box of the machine up to the cock placed at the
top to discharge the water as fast as the pump brings it up, except when the

page_text: engine loses the burden, which is often the case in rolling iron, copper, brass,
lead, &c., in which case the motion of the engine, for want of an equal burden
to its power, as the motion of the engine is increased the pump is increased
likewise, and thus injects more water into the machine than can run through
the cock in the said time, in consequence of which the water flows up into a
polished tubo, whero there is a sliding piston, water and air tight, which, when
the water is forced up under it, gives way to make more room for the water
to riso upward, on which piston is fixt at lever beam, which communicates by
iron rods and joints to a steam floating gage, to open and shut in the steam
pipe in the same proportion as the water is forced up the tube, and so keeps the
motion of the engine as regular as possible.
In witness whereof, I, the said James Summers, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Fourth day of November, in the year of our Lord
One thousand seven hundred and ninety-one.
Signed, and sealed, and delivered by tho
within-named James Summers, being
first duly stampt, in the presence of
JAMES SUMMERS. (L.s.)
THIO. HEELIS.