Patents Hatchway Device

1915

Invention Slides "Strongbacks" Instead of Removing Them

Capt. R. T. Anderson of San Francisco, Cal., has been granted a patent on a device for sliding the "strongbacks" in a hatch to either one side or the other, instead of lifting them out singly and placing them on deck while the cargo is either taken on or discharged.

Under present building plans each of the "strongbacks" is lifted out and laid on deck after the hatch covers have been taken off. This requires some time. Under the Anderson plan these heavy beams are slid back to either one side or the other and then are pulled to position again and pinned in place after the work in the hatch is completed.


Invents Seat for Motorman

Revolves and Can Be Adjusted at Any Angle

A new motorman's seat invented by a Vermont man is said to have an advantage over the ordinary motorman's seat in that it has both a revolving and stationary top. It can also be adjusted at almost any angle by means of a mechanism.

This seat has been in use on all of the cars of the Burlington Traction Company for several weeks and has been found to be satisfactory. It is specially designed for air controlled cars. The work of their manufacture will be begun on a small scale at first, or until a factory can he built or secured.


Here's World's Smallest Saw

Quarter-Inch Diameter and Made for a Purpose.

Probably the smallest "buzz" saw in the world is one that has just been made by Ambrose Thomas, a violin maker. Thomas made the saw blade by hand and it is only one-fourth inch in diameter. The teeth are constructed the same as those on large saws. The blade is attached to a foot-power dentist drill and will saw the hardest of lumber with ease. Thomas uses it for sawing groves in the edge of violins to insert the variegated wood.

On the Antiquity of the Saw

1916

The saw is the earliest tool that has been traced in Egyptian history. It was found first in the form of a notched bronze knife in the third dynasty, or about 5,000 years before the Christian era, and was followed in the fourth and fifth dynasties by larger toothed saws, which were used by carpenters, but there are no dated specimens until the seventh century before the Christian era, when the Assyrians used iron saws.

The first knives on record were made out of flint and were in fact saws with minute teeth. They probably were used for cutting up animals, as the teeth would break away even on soft wood. Rasps, which are but a form of saw, were first made of sheets of bronze, punched and coiled round, but the Assyrians in the seventh century used the straight rasp made of iron similar to the modern type.

In the present day the saw is probably used more than any other tool. It has taken three distinct forms for the working of both wood and metal — the straight saw, the band saw, and the circular saw.