A NEW AND USEFUL IMPROVEMENT IN FEATHERING PADDLE-WHEELS
Year: 1864

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to George Tomlinson Bousfield, of Loughborough
Park, Brixton, in the County of Surrey, for the Invention of "A NEW
AND USEFUL IMPROVEMENT IN FEATHERING PADDLE-WHEELS."-A commu-
nication from abroad by William Robinson Manley, residing at the City.
of New York, in the United States of America.
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION filed by the said George Tomlinson Bousfield
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition and
Declaration on the 6th February 1864, pursuant to the 9th Section of
the Patent Law Amendment Act, 1852.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, BE IT
KNOWN, that I, GEORGE TOMLINSON BOUSFIELD, of Loughborough Park,
Brixton, in the County of Surrey, 'do hereby declare the nature of the
Invention for "A NEW AND USEFUL IMPROVEMENT IN FEATHERING PADDLE-
WHEELS," communicated to me from abroad by William Robinson Manley, a
person resident at the City of New York, in the United States of America,
and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly described
and ascertained in. and by the following statement thereof, reference being
had to the accompanying Drawing, in which Figure 1 represents a face
elevation of a feathering paddle wheel constructed according to the principle.
of my Invention, and Figure 2 represents a side elevation of the same.
The object of the Invention is to distribute the pressure of the paddles upon

page_text: the framework of the wheel which sustains them. Feathering paddle wheels
have usually been constructed with a series of paddles (or buckets, as they
are sometimes called) mounted upon rock shafts carried by a pair of side frames
composed of rims and arms, and with each paddle controlled by a crank arm
fitted with a crank pin that is connected with a frame of rods which revolves
upon a centre that is eccentric to the shaft of the paddle wheel, the series of
controlling cranks, frame of. rods, and excentric centre constituting the
feathering mechanism of the wheel. In such wheels it has been customary to
arrange each paddle with its centre in the axial line of the rock shaft to which
it is secured, or thereabouts, the effect of which is, that the pressure of the
paddle against its supports at the side of the wheel adjacent to the feathering
mechanism is sustained wholly (or substantially so) by the adjacent side frame
of the paddle wheel, while the feathering mechanism is subjected only" (or
substantially so) to the strain which tends to rock the paddles on the axes of
their rock shafts.
The present Invention consists in the combination and arrangement of the
paddle of a feathering paddle wheel with its rock shaft and with the frame-
work of the paddle wheel (including the feathering mechanism) in such
manner that the centre of the paddle is situated at one side of the axial line of
its rock shaft in such position relatively to the journals of the paddle rock
shaft and crank pin of the controlling arm that the pressure of the paddle at
the side of the wheel adjacent to the feathering mechanism is divided equally
(or substantially so) between the adjacent side frame of the paddle wheel and
the frame of the feathering mechanism.
The accompanying Drawings represent the Invention as embodied in a
paddle wheel constructed in other respects substantially like that patented in
the year 1813 by Robertson Buchanan. In this example there are eight
feathering paddles A, A, each of which is secured to a rock shaft B, whose
journals are received in boxes secured to the side frames C, C', of the paddle
wheel. The side frames C, C¹, are constructed of arms and rods secured to
hubs h, which are mounted upon and keyed fast to the paddle shaft D. Each
paddle is controlled by means of a crank arm E which is fastened to its rock
shaft. Each crank arm E is fitted with a crank pin I, and the crank pins of
all the crank arms are connected with the frame K of the feathering
mechanism; this frame K is composed of arms, rods, and a hub similar, to
the side frames of the paddle wheel, and it is arranged to revolve at its centre
upon the fixed centre L, which is eccentric to the shaft D of the paddle
wheel, and is maintained in this eccentric position by the framework of the
paddle box of the vessel to which the paddle wheel is applied.

page_text: In order that the present Invention may be fully embodied in the wheel
represented, the position of the centre of the paddle is determined in the
following manner :-A line a, a', is drawn at the position of the axis of the
paddle rock shaft from the centre. of one journal of the rock shaft to
the centre of the other journal thereof, and the line b, b, is drawn perpen-
dicular to the line a, a', at the middle of its length. A line c, a¹, is drawn in
the plane of the paddle from the centre of the journal of the crank pin I to
the centre of the journal of the paddle rock shaft adjacent the feathering
mechanism. This line is divided into two equal parts at d, and a line a, d, is
drawn from the centre of the journal of the paddle rock shaft furthest from the
feathering mechanism to the said point d, thereby intersecting the line b, b, at e.
The centre of the paddle is placed at the point e; as the radius of the crank
arm E is in this instance in the plane of the paddle, the line a', c, is drawn to
the periphery of the circle, of which the radius of the centre of the crank pin is
the radius as well as to the centre of the crank pin, but if the crank arm bad
been inclined to the plane of the paddle, so that the centre of the crank pin
had not been in the plane of the paddle, the line a', c, would have been drawn
in the plane of the paddle to the periphery of the circle drawn through the
centre of the crank pin in a plane perpendicular to the plane of the paddle
with the axis of the rock shaft as a centre. From this combination and
arrangement of the paddle with the rock shaft and the framework of the
wheel, it results that the pressure of the paddle upon its sustaining mechanism
at the side of the wheel adjacent to the feathering mechanism is divided equally
between the adjacent side frame (C) of the wheel and the frame K of the
feathering mechanism, and that the side frame C¹ of the paddle wheel is
relieved of so much of the pressure of the paddle as is sustained by the frame
of the feathering mechanism. In practice it is deemed best to make the
immersion of the wheel one quarter of its diameter, and to use in that case
four paddles; when, however, the immersion of the wheel is diminished, the
number of paddles should be increased, six or more being used if necessary to
prevent the engines from racing; but in all cases the least possible number
should be employed compatible with this limitation.
The Invention has been described as applied to a paddle wheel of the
Buchanan variety, as an illustration of one mode in which it can be carried
into effect; but the Invention is applicable to other forms of feathering paddle
wheels. The employment of feathering paddles in a paddle wheel is not
claimed, nor the mere arrangement of the centres of the paddles somewhat
out of the axial lines of their rock shafts; but what I claim as the Invention,
and desire to secure by Letters Patent is, the combination and arrangement

page_text: of the paddle of a feathering paddle wheel with its rock shaft and the frame-
work of the paddle wheel in such manner that the centre of the paddle is
situated in such position that the pressure at the end, of the paddle adjacent
to the feathering mechanism is divided equally (or substantially so) between
the adjacent side frame of the paddle wheel and the frame of the feathering
mechanism..
In witness whereof, I, the said George Tomlinson Bousfield, have here-
unto set my hand and seal, this Sixth day of February, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-four.
G²º. T. BOUSFIELD. (L.S.)