GB Patent: GB-178,101,306
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| Converting Reciprocating Motion of Steam or Fire Engines to Provide a Rotating Motion
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Patentee:
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| James Watt (exact or similar names) - Birmingham, West Midlands County, England |
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Patent Dates:
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| Granted: |
Oct. 25, 1781 |
Espacenet patent
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Joel Havens
Wikipedia biography of James Watt
Patent Specification
Wikipedia bio of William Murdoch
Wikipedia article on Sun and planet gears
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Description: |
| Note: Early English patents were not originally numbered but they were later assigned consecutive numbers that run from GB-1 of 1617 to GB-14359 of September 1852. From Oct 1852 until 1916, patents were numbered by the year and started at patent #1 at the start of each year in January. The patent number used in DATAMP represents the year of issue and the patent number. This patent is #1306 issued in the year 1781.
The Wikipedia bio of William Murdoch says that he is the actual inventor, as does the article on sun-and-planet gearing. I gather that Mr. Watt had a habit of patenting inventions in his own name even when they were the creations of his employees or contractors. And it is believed that Watt's son later went through his father's archive of correspondence and got rid of anything that tended to put his father in a bad light, which included taking credit for the inventions of others; there are large gaps in the correspondence between Watt and Murdoch and as a result certain key inventions such as the sun-and-planet gearing are barely mentioned in there.
"...methods of applying the vibrating or reciprocating motion of steam or fire engines to procure a continued rotative or circular motion round an axis or centre, and thereby to give motion to the wheels of mills or other machines..." This patent covers the sun and planet gear system for converting reciprocating to rotary motion, which was created to circumvent James Pickard's patent, GB-178,001,263, on the use of a crank to achieve the same end. As soon as Pickard's patent expired, in 1794, Watt abandoned the sun and planet gear system in favor of the much simpler crank. |
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