AN IMPROVED DEVICE FOR PREVENTING THE DISPLACEMENT OF WEDGES USED FOR SECURING RAILWAY-RAILS IN THEIR CHAIRS
Year: 1881

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by John Bland at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents on the 4th August 1881.
JOHN BLAND, of Harley Street, Cavendish Square, in the County of Middlesex.
"AN IMPROVED DEVICE FOR PREVENTING THE DISPLACEMENT OF WEDGES USED
FOR SECURING RAILWAY-RAILS IN THEIR CHAIRS."
The object of my Invention is to provide efficient means for preventing the
displacement of the wooden wedges or keys which are employed to fasten railway-
rails in their chairs, and which for this purpose are driven in between the side of
each chair and the rail.
Numerous contrivances have been suggested and adopted for obviating the
difficulty arising from the effect of vibration whereby these wedges are loosened
and displaced, so that the rails become insecure in their chairs, thus rendering the
permanent way unsafe for the traffic and necessitating constant supervision and the
cost of frequent driving and renewal of the wedges. But hitherto no contrivance
adopted for this purpose has proved satisfactory, and the slackening and
displacement of the wedges in their chairs are still a cause of great annoyance
and expense on railways.
By my Invention, however, I provide means for overcoming this difficulty, and I
will now proceed to explain in what manner I accomplish this result.
I may use a wooden wedge of any suitable kind, provided it is so shaped as to
have the required taper or inclination to ensure its binding the rail securely when
properly driven into the chair.
I prefer that the wedge should be long enough to extend through and project at
both ends beyond the chair when tightly driven into the same. And I provide
the chair with a simple and inexpensive but efficient device for securing the
wedge against accidental displacement, as follows, that is to say:-In any
convenient part of the chair at the side in which the wedge is driven I
form a hole extending entirely through the metal forming the said side, and I
pass through this hole a sharp pointed steel or iron pin, or similar implement,
which has a head at its outer end, and is so formed that when properly forced into
its place its point will project into the wooden wedge or key sufficiently to fasten
Pris 017

page_text: the same in its place so tightly that no amount of vibration caused by the traffic
or otherwise will cause its displacement. On the other hand, at any time when it
is necessary or desirable to remove or adjust the wedge the said pin may be easily
drawn out of the hole in the chair, thereby leaving the wedge free to be driven in more
tightly or driven out and replaced by a new wedge, and when the wedge has been
thus adjusted or replaced the said pin may be easily and quickly reinserted in the
hole in the chair.
It is obvious that although one hole will be generally sufficient for the purpose
of my Invention, I may provide each chair with any number of holes for the
insertion of the pin or pins, and that I may use, instead of the said pin, a screw,
nail, or spike of the proper size to pass through the hole in the chair and enter the
wedge or key, as above set forth.
It is obvious that my Invention may be adapted to railway systems in which
the wedges or keys are driven either on the inner or outer side of the rails,