Improvements in Mechanical Cashiers, Registers and Recorders.

摘要

2130. Mills, B. J. B., [Fairchild, C.]. Jan. 27. Receipts, checking and recording.-Relates to the machine described in Specification No. 22,367, A.D. 1898. The complete machine delivers change and indicates, prints, and adds the takings. In the machine as constructed for use with American money, coaxial wheels 13 having peripheral pockets 16 (shown to an enlarged scale in Fig. 1c), to contain single coins or notes are allotted to the different denominations of money, there being four for cents, two for half-dimes; three for dimes, one for quarter-dollars, one for half-dollars, two for dollars (silver and paper), and one each for the two, five, ten, and twenty dollar notes. These pocket-wheels (normally presenting empty pockets to a row of apertures 6 below the glass top 8 of the casing, but having full pockets under a guard 13a) mesh with notched discs 19, which are loose on a shaft 20, but are accompanied by hand-levers 40 for the purpose of turning separately any pocket-wheel in the direction of the arrow, and by clutches 50 (Fig. 3), for the purpose of turning any number of them simultaneously in the opposite direction. Each hand-lever has a rocking anchorshaped handle 29 with index plate 30, which, when pulled, lifts a detent 24 (Figs. 3 and 17), out of one notch of the disc and becomes itself engaged with another to act as a driving pawl as the pull is continued. The feed is limited to one notch by the detent dropping into the next notch, and, if the handle is released before the feed is complete, the extension 26 of the detent being under the lifting-lug 45, Fig. 17, prevents the disengagement which is normally effected by the spring 42. T- headed bars 34, supported by springs 37 on a frame plate 35, serve both as props to the handlevers and as links between them and rockers 83 on a shaft 84, which overlap so that when any one of them is tilted all those between it and the$20 end of the machine are also tilted. The clutches, Fig. 3, consist of fast crutches 48 and included loose arms 50 having radial play to engage lugs 50a upon them in notches in crown rings 90 on the notched discs. Being formed integral with slotted sectors 51, the arms are pinned to shifting rods 87 which rest on rockers 85 on a common shaft. In action, the crutches first strike bell cranks 91 upon the sectors to disengage the detents 24. For the purpose of turning the rockers 85 so as to apply the clutches, subject to the intervention by the. rockers associated with the band-levers, a key action is provided comprising rows of zero and digit keys 93, upper and lower rows of rocking shafts 133 operated by the keys (one shaft by each key), and intermediate paired comb-like horizontal slides 86, 135, which are shifted by selective ribs upon the shafts. The upper shafts extend the whole length of the machine ; the keys actuating them are those of the cents row, and the slides 86, which they shift, strike the clutchrockers. The lower shafts, which are operated by the other rows of keys, are pairs of coaxial tubular shafts, meeting between the dimes and dollars rows, and internal or external shafts extending from the tens-of-dollars keys, slots in the tubular shafts allowing the separate actuation. Each slide 135 shifted by these keys and shafts has a flange under the fellow striking-slide, and is formed with a terminal oblique shoulder so that, when shifted, it rears on the hinder bearing- plate 106 and directs the striking-slide clear of the rocker it would otherwise hit ; or the directing slides are formed with reverse shoulders which lower the striking-slides into action. From one to twelve pairs of slides are provided for individual rockers, and a double rocking comb 137 under the directing slides normally keeps half of them elevated, but the zero dimes-key lets this half down and lifts the other half. The distribution of the ribs upon the key shafts is such that any tens-ofdollars, dollars, or dimes key lifts out of action any striking-slides which would otherwise set up a combination of clutches equal to its value, and a centskey shifts all the striking-slides having a total value equal to the difference of its value from$20. The even tens-of-dollars keys lift the slides for the $10 clutch which are operated by the zero centskey, and the odd tens-of-dollars keys lift a remaining slide for the same clutch operated by the digit keys. If the directing slides have the reverse shoulders, the keys lower into action a set of striking-slides of combined complementary value. The opposite movements of the striking and directing slides reverse the diagonal position of a rocking yoke 111,shown in its normal position. The hand-lever rockers being under the striking-slides, when the money tendered, covering a purchase, has been put into a pocket wheel or wheels, and the corresponding band-lever or hand-levers have been operated, all the slides from the operated handlevers to the twenty-dollar end of the machine are raised, and, the shaft of the rockers being fast to the twenty-dollar one, is turned so that a fin 104 on it shifts a locking-bar 103 clear of a row of keys 94, Figs. 2 and 9, which are allotted to the different departments of a business. The handlever rockers do not recover their disturbed position till re-set in the manner subsequently described. The 25c. hand-lever rocker lifts also the striking-slides of the third and second 10c. clutches and one slide of the second 5c. clutch. Crosswings 127, Fig. 7, on a shaft 125 normally hold up half of certain striking-slides, which are also held up by the vertical wings on the $2 hand-lever rocker, and, if turned through a quadrant, will support the other half. This change is effected if the$5 hand-lever is-operated once, and the initial condition is restored if it is operated twice. The hand-lever prop 34 acts on a cross 128, which jumps with a cross between springs 131. A duplicate arrangement is provided in connection with the 10c. and 25c. hand-levers. On pressing one of the department keys 94, the rows of value keys are left free from an up-locking plate 96 so shifted, and vertical shafts 146, bearing indicating-bobbins 149, are set free to show zeros, under the action of springs 150, because the uplocking plate draws horizontal shafts 138 out of gear with them. The amount of the purchase being then struck upon the keys (for each row of which a down-locking bar 95 is provided), the combination of clutches is set up which has the value of the change to be given. The keys being formed with shoulders x near the ends also strike hinged combs 12x to disengage pawls x1 from ratchet teeth on cylinders 139, which are fast on the horizontal shafts 138 of the indicating-gear. The shafts are accordingly rotated by springs 151 pulling racks 142 above and below pinions 141, and the angles of rotation are proportional to the value of the keys, because the ends of the keys form stops for a spiral arrangement of pins 140 on the cylinders. In this way the indicators are set to exhibit the value of the purchase, and type-wheels, geared to the cylinders from a common shaft, are set for printing with the aid of impression mechanism described in the Specification of U.S. Patent 703,188. The cylinder shafts may also be terminated by ratchet gear and adding wheels. A special slide 86, shifted by the ribbearing shaft of the cents-keys, by striking a bell crank 83, Fig. 4, with. sleeve hub, draws a keeper 79 from a spring bolt 77, which obstructs a crank handle 52, for giving a revolution to an eccentric 58. Pressing in the bolt releases the crank handle, and, on using it, the eccentric imparts through coupled levers 62, 64 an oscillation to the clutch-bearing shaft 20. A crank 110 on the shaft moves in the slotted head 108 of a lever, and, as the half-oscillation becomes complete, makes it thrust a sliding-bar 105 forwards against the rocking yoke 111 of the selecting- slides, so that these are restored to their initial position, bearing the rockers, rods, and clutch sectors free to re-set or release themselves. At the same time, since a shoulder 112 on the resetting slide wipes a deep rocking web 113, the down-locking bars 95 of the keys are disengaged therefrom so that the department key leaves the up-locking plates free to support the numeral keys which spring upon it, and to close up the indicating-gear, the drums remaining held by the pawls which re-engage after the keys have left them. Also a lug 119 on the re-setting slide, acting against an arm on the shaft of the handlever rockers, re-sets them, and the fin 104 on the shaft returns the up-locking bar 103 of the department keys. If the$5 and 25c. hand-levers have been operated only once, a pallet 121 on the re-setting slide strikes noses 122 on the special shafts 125 to reverse them. An arm at the other end of the clutch shaft being connected by a link 160, Fig. 2, to a bell crank 154, rotation is imparted in one direction, through a rack and pinion and pawl and ratchet, to wipers 152, which restore the racks of the indicating-gear, so exhibiting the amount of the purchase. The arm, link, bell crank, and horizontal rack may be replaced by a mutilated wheel on the short shaft of the crank handle and a vertical rack, which it raises and lets down. Instead of the wipers being driven directly, the ratchet gear may wind up a spring motor, which drives at a fixed rate. The winding-shaft 23, Fig. 3f, of this motor makes one revolution in the direction of the arrow, and early in the winding an arm 36 on a disc 28 lifts a detent 32 from a lug 30 on the spring barrel by wiping the pin 37. The disc is formed with a shoulder 34, which passes under the detent, and so utilizes it to prevent reversal of the winding-shaft. During the return stroke of the re-setting lever, the change is discharged into a trough 7 by the rake 65, which is operated either in the manner described in the earlier Specification, or