IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR ASCERTAINING THE NUMBER OF REVOLUTIONS PERFORMED AND DISTANCES TRAVERSED BY THE WHEELS OF CARRIAGES, BICYCLES, AND OF OTHER SUCH-LIKE VEHICLES.
Year: 1877

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Owen Alexander Rumble at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 3rd October 1877.
OWEN ALEXANDER RUMBLE, of the Borough and County of Newcastle-on-Tyne,
Civil Engineer.
" IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR ASCERTAINING THE NUMBER
OF REVOLUTIONS PERFORMED AND DISTANCES TRAVERSED BY THE WHEELS OF
CARRIAGES, BICYCLES, AND OF OTHER SUCH-LIKE VEHICLES.".
The object of my Invention is to simplify and improve the means of ascertaining
distances travelled or traversed by cabs, broughams, bicycles, and other wheeled
conveyances.
.
Hitherto the means employed to meet the requirements of cab proprietors, owners
of broughams, and bicycles have never been fully met; either the appliances used have
been expensive and uncertain, or so arranged as to prevent its universal application
to all classes of wheeled vehicles, thus reducing its utility within the radius of a
limited circle of the public.
To obviate the above defects is the object of my Invention, for which
employ a short staff-like case, containing a system of reducing gear. This case is
purpose I
suspended from or near its upper extremity by a short spindle or pin, which is
secured by any suitable means to the spoke of the vehicle whose distance travelled
it is desired to ascertain. Being thus suspended and attached to a carriage wheel,
the apparatus always assumes a perpendicular position, and revolves round the said
spindle or pin when the carriage is in motion.
At the inner extremity of the spindle is an arın, or, if preferable, a small cogged
wheel, which, engaging with a system of reducing gear, indicates on dials or indices
suitably displayed the distance travelled by the carriage wheel.
In order that my apparatus may be equally applicable to small and large wheels,
I introduce among the gearing a surface friction wheel of such diameter as shall,
when actuated from or near its centre or perimeter by a smaller wheel placed at the
desired point of the radius, give a speed of revolution in accordance with the diameter
of the carriage wheel; thus, by ascertaining the diameter of the carriage wheel and
regulating the position of the small friction wheel.upon the radius of the larger one,
the apparatus will register a distance in accordance with the diameter of the carriage
wheel.

page_text: The above indicator, although much preferred by me, has one objection, viz., that
it can be tampered with or so tied to the carriage wheel as to prevent its working.
To obviate this evil is the object of my second indicator, which, although somewhat
alike to the one previously described, it is nevertheless in many cases entirely of a
different construction, since the box does not revolve as in the former indicator, but
is attached rigidly to any suitable part of the wheel or spoke. The internal gear
of
this indicator is worked by a weight, thus:-My apparatus being firmly fixed, say,
to the wheel of a cab, and on the said wheel making one revolution it causes a
weight suspended from the centre of my apparatus to make one revolution likewise,
on completing which it comes in contact with a driving wheel working two small
friction rollers. One of the small friction rollers is made to work a large friction
wheel or disc (this small friction wheel can be adjusted, as in the former indicator,
to meet the requirements of different size carriage wheels to which my apparatus
may be fixed) which is in connection by means of an arm to a wheel suitably divided,
and which wheel points, by means of a broad arrow, to the distance travelled by the
wheel of the vehicle.
There are other wheels in this indicator, which, although they have not yet been
described, are worked by the same weight, but quite independently of the before-
mentioned gear. This however requires the accompanyment of a table for
the purpose of ascertaining the distance travelled due to the relative number of
revolutions performed.