An Improved Toy, being a Combined Vehicle and Mechanical Walking Animal.
Year: 1893

page_text: Date of Application, 17th Oct., 1893
Complete Specification Left, 17th July, 1894-Accepted, 18th Aug.. 1894
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.
An Improved Toy, being a Combined Vehicle and Mechanical
Walking Animal.
I, JAMES WISHART, of 21 Hertford Road, Bootle near Liverpool in the
County of Lancaster, Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of this invention to
be as follows
:-
This invention relates to a toy consisting of a vehicle and an attached horse or
other animal, and the object is to impart to the legs of the horse or other animal,
by a suitable mechanism operated by the rotation of the wheels of the vehicle as
it is drawn along, a motion resembling that of a walking animal drawing the
vehicle.
For the purpose of description, I will assume that the toy consists of a horse
and a two wheeled cart.
Each leg of the horse has three joints, one connecting the upper portion to the
body,
one connecting the hoof to the lower portion, and a third connecting the
upper and lower portions, the position of the joints corresponding to those in
the living horse. The upper and lower portion of each leg are formed on two
links which roughly correspond to the two main bones of the leg; the upper part
of the upper link is pivotted to the body of the horse, the lower end of the lower
one is pivotted to the hoof and the two links are flush jointed to form the knee
joint. I provide a sliding piece on these links adapted, when over the knee joint,
to stiffen the latter so as to prevent bending. The sliding piece is connected by a
light rod to the hoof so that the motion of the former along the links rotates the
hoof, to a limited extent, about its pivotal attachment to the lower link. The
sliding piece is also connected by a light rod to a rocking lever in the body of
the horse.
It will be seen that to imitate the walking movement of a horse, each leg as a
whole must be given a to and fro movement, and further that, during this
to and fro movement, the lower portion must move pivotally relatively to the
upper one about the knee joint and the hoof relatively to the lower portion.
The to and fro movement is obtained by connecting a point in the prolongation
of the leg, above the top pivot, to a revolving crank by means of a connecting rod
and the motion of the lower portion and the hoof is obtained by providing a pin
on a prolongation of the connecting rod last mentioned, which pin, by working in
a suitable shaped slot in the rocking lever beforementioned, gives the latter the
required vibratory motion. As before described the rocking lever is connected to
the sliding piece and the latter to the hoof by light rods so that the rocking lever
by means of these light rods-whose function resembles that of sinews-operates
the hoof pivotally about the lower link and the latter pivotally about the upper
link as well as, at the appropriate time, stiffening the knee joint and so straightening
the leg through the action of the sliding piece.
The pivotting of the links, the length of the rods and the disposition and pivotting
of the rocking levers are of course arranged to suit the special requirements of
each case.
Each leg is operated by its own connecting rod and there is a crank for each, or
one crank may serve for two legs. The cranks or equivalent eccentrics are

page_text: preferably formed on the one shaft, and this shaft is operated by the rotation of
the vehicle wheels, by suitable gearing which may consist of belts and pulleys or a
pitch chain and chain wheels. The chain or belt as the case may be, passes from
the cart to the horse either along the shafts of the former or through the tail of
the latter, the object being to hide the mechanism as much as possible.
If desired, motion may, of course, be also given to the head and tail of the
animal.
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SLOAN & LLOYD BARNES,
Castle Chambers, Castle Street, Liverpool, Agents for the Applicant.
An Improved Toy, being a Combined Vehicle and Mechanical
Walking Animal.
I, JAMES WISHART, formerly of 21 Hertford Road, but now of 75 Balliol Road,
Bootle near Liverpool in the County of Lancaster, Engineer, do hereby declare
the nature of this invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be
particularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement:-
This invention relates to a toy consisting of a vehicle and an attached horse or
other animal, and the object is to impart to the legs of the horse or other animal,
by a suitable mechanism operated by the rotation of the wheels of the vehicle
as it is drawn along, a motion resembling that of a walking animal drawing the
vehicle.
For the purpose of description, I will assume that the toy consists of a horse
and cart.
In the accompanying drawings, which illustrate my invention, Fig. I is an
elevation of the horse and cart, the lower portion of the body of the horse and the
near legs being shown in section; Fig. II is a plan, the upper portion of the body
of the horse being removed; Fig. III is an elevation showing the details of the
mechanism of two legs; Fig. IV is an end elevation of the hind leg looking rear-
ward, the two parts of the leg and the hoof being in section.
Fig. V is a section on the line A. A. of Fig. IV; and Fig. VI shows the
relative positions of the cranks.
Throughout the drawings similar parts are indicated by the same figure of
reference, and in the case of the section, the direction in which it is viewed is
indicated by the small arrows placed adjacent to the letters denoting the plane of
section.
It will be observed in the figuring that the several parts of the fore legs are
distinguished from the analogous parts of the hind legs by an accent over the
figure, and further that the cranks operating the left legs are distinguished by the
letter a and those operating the right legs by the letter b.
The
The body part of the horse is preferably made in two portions, an upper portion 1×
and a lower portion 1; in the drawings the upper portion 1x is shown inade of wood
and it is adapted to be removed so as to give easy access to the mechanism.
lower portion of the body which carries the mechanism is rigidly attached to the
shafts and the legs protrude through the four openings as shown.
Each leg has three joints formed by the pins 2, 3 and 4 connecting respectively,
the upper part 5 to the body, the middle part 6 to 5, and the hoof 7 to 6.
The pins 2 and 3 are also connected by a link 8 and the pins 3 and 4 by a link 9,
and these links are flush jointed at the knee joint. I provide a sliding piece 10
which slides on the links 8 and 9 and which, when over the knee joint, stiffens the
latter and prevents bending there; the sliding piece is slotted as shown for the
pin 3.

page_text: The sliding piece is connected by a light rod 11 to the hoof, the lower end being
connected to a pin 12 in the hoof; the upper end is connected by a light rod 13 to
a rocking lever 14 pivoted to the body of the horse by the pin 15.
It will be seen that to imitate the walking movement of the horse, each leg, as a
whole, must be given a to-and-fro movement and further, that during this to-and-fro
movement the part 6 of the leg should move relatively to 5 about the pin 3, and
the hoof 7 should move relatively to the part 6 about the pin 4.
As
The to-and-fro movement is obtained by connecting a pin 16 in the prolongation
of the leg above the joint 2 to a revolving crank 17 by means of a connecting
rod 18. There is a crank and connecting rod for each leg, and the cranks are
formed on a crank shaft 19 which is rotated from the axle of the cart by means of
the two pulleys 20 and 21 and a belt 22. The rotation of the crank oscillates the
leg as shown in Fig. III, and the required secondary motions of the lower part of
the leg and hoof are obtained by giving the rocking lever 14 a suitable vibratory
motion which is preferably obtained from a pin 23 carried from a depending portion
of the connecting rod 18, which pin works in a slot in the rocking lever 14.
before described the rocking lever is connected to the sliding piece by the rod 13
and the sliding piece to the hoof by the rod 11. The function of the rods 11 and 13
resembles that of sinews and an inspection of Fig. III-where two legs are shown
in three positions will show how the vibration of the rocking lever, while the leg
as a whole has a to-and-fro movement, gives the appropriate secondary motions to
the middle part of the leg and the hoof, and how, at the appropriate time, the
sliding piece serves to stiffen the knee joint and so straighten the leg. It will also
be evident from an inspection of Fig. III that the upper part 5 of the leg occupies
the same position for the top and bottom positions of its crank; but, that owing to
the different angle of the connecting rod in these two positions, the rocking lever
will be differently situated accordingly, and consequently the part 6 of the leg, and
the hoof 7, will have a different position relatively to the upper part 5 for the top
and bottom positions of the crank. In order however to avoid confusion, the
position of 6 and 7 are only shown for the mean position of 5 when, in the case of
the fore leg, it is making its forward stroke and in the case of the hind leg, it is
making its backward stroke.
The positions of an individual leg are lettered to correspond with the similarly
lettered positions of the crank of that leg, and the relative positions of the cranks
in the example illustrated are shown in Fig. VI; the positions of the fore and
hind legs shown in Fig. III in full lines are those occupied simultaneously by
these legs.
In some cases the holes in the ends of the rods 11 and 13 or in the sliding piece
may be slotted to more nearly reproduce the movements of the living animal, and
stops are provided to limit the pivotal movement of the hoof about the pin 4, so
that as the sliding piece is lifted by the rocking lever it first rotates the hoof about
the pin 4 to the limiting stop and then bends the leg at the knee joint.
The lengths of the rods and swinging levers, and the curvature of the slots in
the latter, are, of course, modified to produce the desired movement in any special
case; but the proportions shown in the drawings have been found to reproduce
very accurately the movements of a walking horse.
Chain wheels and a pitch chain may be substituted for the pulleys and belt
shown, in order to avoid slip, and, for the same reason, the wheels of the vehicle
which operate the mechanism are provided with rubber tyres 24.
In order to
more effectually hide the belt or pitch chain, it may be led, between the pulleys,
through the shaft of the vehicle, which in this case is made hollow.
Instead of adapting the mechanism described to be operated by the wheels of
the cart as it is drawn along, it may be operated by a spring or other motor
carried either in the body of the horse or in the cart, in which case the toy may be
self propelling.
Motion may also be given from the crank shaft to the head and tail of the
animal.

page_text: Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my said
invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that what
I claim is,
1. The herein described improvement in mechanical walking animals, which
consists in imparting to each leg, as a whole, a to-and-fro movement by means of a
crank shaft, and imparting to the lower portion of the leg and the hoof, secondary
motions by means of a rocking lever operated by the said crank shaft; substantially
as described.
2. The herein described improvement in mechanical walking animals, which
consists in imparting to each leg, as a whole, a to-and-fro movement by means of a
crank shaft, and imparting to the lower portion of the leg and the hoof, secondary
motions by means of a rocking lever operated by the said crank shaft and articulated
to the hoof and to a sliding piece adapted to intermittently stiffen the knee joint,
substantially as described.
3. In combination with a jointed and pivoted leg having a to-and-fro movement,
the links 8 and 9, the sliding piece 10 and the rods 11 and 13 operated by the
rocking lever 14 and adapted to intermittently stiffen the joint and to impart
secondary motions to the lower part of the leg and the hoof, substantially as
described.
4. In combination, the jointed and pivoted legs, the crank shaft 19 having
cranks 17 operated by the rotation of the vehicle wheels, the connecting rods 18,
the links 8 and 9, the rocking levers 14, the rods 11 and 13 and the sliding pieces 10,
substantially as described.
5. The improved toy, being a combined vehicle and mechanical walking animal,
substantially as described and illustrated in the drawings.
Deted this 16th day of July 1894
SLOAN & LLOYD BARNES,
Castle Chambers, 26 Castle Street, Liverpool, Agents for the Applicant.