IMPROVEMENTS IN MARINE ENGINE REGULATORS
Year: 1878

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Edward Flicker at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 9th October 1878.
WILLIAM EDWARD FLICKER, of 7, Belgrave Road, London, in the County of
Middlesex, Accountant. "IMPROVEMENTS IN MARINE ENGINE REGULATORS."
The object of my Invention is to prevent the possibility of any marine screw
engine racing when the screw is raised from the water, by causing such raising
action to shut off the steam from the engine in part or wholly before any racing
or increase of speed shall have occurred. To effect this I insert a tube or water
passage into the stern of the ship, one end of which issues downwards near the
keel, and the other end bent round issues at the after part of the ship at any con-
venient point. There is thus no opening into the interior part of the ship.
Into this water passage I insert my improved float electric valve, which makes
and breaks two alternative currents of electricity in its highest and lowest positions,
that is to say, when the immersion of the stern of the ship is at a predetermined
minimum and any greater depths of immersion.
My valve does not thus follow the motion of the water as a float, but so long as
it is immersed in water it keeps the upper alternative electric current closed and
the lower one broken. This position of the float valve assures full and unrestricted
passage of the steam to the engine, as at such time the screw is fully immersed.
When however the stern of the ship rises to the predetermined position of minimum
immersion, viz., to that point at which racing becomes possible, the float valve falls,
breaks the upper alternative current, and closes the lower current, thus causing the
steam to be shut off from the engine instantaneously and before racing can occur.
The apparatus I employ for regulating the engine by two alternate currents of
electricity is as follows:-The two currents, which are generated in any convenient
form of battery, are each conducted through a wire round a bent bar of soft iron,
so as to render these bars powerful electro-magnets when the current is closed.
Each of these electro-magnets attracts to itself an armature, which operates an easy
moving or equilibrium steam valve at either side of an auxiliary cylinder.. The
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page_text: movement of these valves makes either end of this auxiliary cylinder respectively
to be in communication with live steam, and the other end respectively with the
exhaust, and thus to cause its motion up and down alternately, according to which
current is closed and operated, or these two currents may be made to operate a
single valve in opposite directions so as to produce the alternate motion up and
down of the auxiliary cylinder.
The motion of this cylinder may be then caused by suitable rods to operate a
throttle or equilibrium cut-off valve on the engine, by which racing may be abso-
lutely prevented.
When the float valve is at its highest position and the auxiliary cylinder has
been so operated that the steam has unrestricted admission to the engine, or in
other words, so long as the screw is fully immersed, the current which has just
effected the motion is broken by the valve lever or other convenient part, so that the
current need not continue in action any longer until variable action of the ship or
the water is resumed.