US48743A - Improvement in wick-trimmers - Google Patents

Description

UNITI-3D STATES PATENT UFFICI-3.

CYRUS L. TOPLIFF, 0F NEW YORK, N. Y.

VIMPRovEMi-:NT IN wulcK-TRIMMERS.

Specification formingpart of Letters Patent hlm-48,7113, dated July 11, 1865.

To 'all whom it may concern:

,Be it known that I, GYRUs L. ToP'LIFF, of the city, county, and State of New York, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Wick-Trimmers; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description thereof, which will enable others skilled in the art to make and use the same, reference beinghad to the accompanying drawings, forming part of the specification.

In the use of coal-oil, particularly for illuminating purposes, much diiculty and annoyance have been heretofore experienced in the trimming of the wicks of the lamps employed, for the principal reason that they must be trimmed with the utmost-accuracy and evenness to enable the wick to be raised to a sufficient height above its tube as to give the requisite and desired amount of light without in the least degree causing the lamp to smoke, the disagreeable and unpleasant effects of which have been too often experienced by every person using kerosene-oil to need any particular enumeration or mention herein.

Heretofore a pair of scissors have generally been employed for the trimming of coal-oillamp wicks, but with which, as is well known, it was almost impossible, and required much care and experience, aswell as considerable time, to trim them with the proper and requisite evenness to produce the desired llame and light.

Therefore the present invention has for its principal object, and which is secured thereby, ,the production of a simple instrument or device by which the wicks of coal-oil or other similar lamps can be easily, rapidly, and readily trimmed with the necessary evenness to produce a clear llame of the desired size without causing the lamp to smoke. I accomplish this result by arranging within any suitable guiding-frame a cutter or knife-blade in such la manner that when moved by any suitable operating devices connected therewith (after having been rst placed upon the wick-tube in the proper position) will cnt or sever the wick with the requisite evenness and with but little trouble or loss of time, the advantages of which are many and so apparent to all as to need no particular mention herein.

I have also made some other improvements in the general and detail arrangement of the cutter nd its operating devices, which will be hereinafter particularly described.

In the accompanying plate of drawings my improvements are represented, Figure l being a view of the under side' of the same; Fig. 2, a longitudinal section taken in the plane of the line a' x, Fig. l; Fig. 3, a transverse section taken in the plane of the line y y, Fig. 2.

a et in the drawings represent a frame, made of brass, cast-iron, or any other suitable metal or material, and consisting of two side pieces, b and o, connected together at one end by a cross-piece, d.

`fis the knife or cutter-blade, made of any suitable material, and moving in grooves g g upon the inner surfaces of the side pieces, b and o, extending' in the direction of their length. The knife-blade f is sharpened upon its inner end, h, and when moved toward the end piece, d, of 'the frame it first passes over the open space l between it and the same, in which the wick of the lamp is placed, as will be hereinafter described, and then over and upon the fixed plate or cutter-blade m of the end piece, d.

To the knife-blade j, and upon the under side thereof, is hung upon a pivot, n, a connecting-bar or rod, o,- attached and hung by its outer end, p, to an`d in the projecting piece q of the swinging handle, lever, or arm r of the side' piece, b, a corresponding-shaped handle, s, being secured to or forming a part of the opposite side piece, o.

When the implement, arranged as described, is to be used, it is first placed upon the wicktube ofthe lamp so as to bring the space L between the end of the knife-blade and the cross-piece d directly over the wick in the tube, and in such a position with regard thereto that as the wick is raised by the spur-wheel ordinarily employed therefor it shall, as it moves upward, pass with perfect ease through the same, the frame of the implement resting by the shoulder t of its cross-piece d upon the top of the tube'. The wick, after having thus been raised tothe desired height within the cutting implement, as above described, according as it is necessary to cut more or less of it ofi' to produce a clear flame to the lamp, is then severed or cut by simply turning with the hand the swinging handle of theframea,which, through its connecting-bar o, causes the knifeblade f to be moved directly and in a hori- Zontal plane toward and through the wick, severing and cutting that portion of the wick as desired, and with the utmost ease, requiring no especial care or experience, the wick also being cut perfectly true and even,'as is evidentwithoutfurtherdescription. Theknifeblade, after having severed the wick, as described, is then retracted or drawn back and away from the saine by means of the bent spring` Z Z attached at olle end to the handle,

' between which and the lixed handle it is comitin its central and intermediate portion or portions, as is evident.

If in case it should be desired to give a rounding shape to the top of the wick in the tube, it is only necessary to so rnake the cutting-blade as to impart such a form thereto; but I deem it best and have found by experience that if the wick can be trimmed with a perfect even and straight eut it isA much more desirable and effective.

Both handles of the frame may be hung upon pivots and attached to the knife-blade as described for the handle r; but one is sufficient to give the requisite force to the knife-blade to cut the wick.

I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent- 1. The combination of the ixed cutter fm and movable cutter f, arranged in parallel planes, and operating substantiallyin the manner and for the purposes specified.

2. In combination with the aforesaid cutters f and m, the handle r, when so pivoted as t0 C. L. TOPLIFF.

Witnesses:

W. HAUFF, ALBERT W. BROWN.

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