Abstract: A brake mechanism for quickly stopping the drive shaft of an internal combustion engine on a power driven rotary mower.

Abstract: A pressure compensating valve mechanism for a hydraulic control valve, having a port through which excess supply fluid is diverted to tank by the valve element thereof in any metering position of the control valve spool. A pressure control mechanism connected with the excess fluid port of the pressure compensating valve mechanism governs flow of excess fluid to tank and minimizes jet forces on the pressure compensating valve element to thereby assure the desired precise control over the motor governed by the control valve.

Abstract: The choke valve of a small engine, biased towards a closed position, is link connected with an air vane that tends to open it under force of cooling air blown across the engine. The air vane has a lost motion connection with a control shaft that is rotatable between defined hot and cold positions. Shaft position is established by two spirally coiled bi-metal thermostats, one for high temperatures, one for low temperatures, each in a unidirectional torque transmitting connection between the shaft and fixed structure whereby each thermostat imposes force upon the shaft only at temperatures within its own range.

Abstract: Driverless vehicles, confined to motion in one direction along a defined path divided into blocks, receive commands from a central unit in the form of encoded command signals radiated from an elongated radiator. Each vehicle progresses only while receiving signals regularly. The radiator comprises two parallel stretches, each extending all along the path but divided into sections, each section being as long as a block but extending across a block boundary, with a section of each stretch paired with a laterally adjacent section of the other stretch. In each section pair, the segment of one section that lies in one block is shielded, the remainder unshielded; the other section of the pair has opposite shielded and unshielded segments.

Abstract: An engine with an air vane type governor and provision for preventing overspeeding of the engine in the event the governor fails to do so, wherein a normally restrained or loaded spring acts to effect closing adjustment of the throttle valve upon release of its restraint by a tripping device actuated by a centrifugally projected plunger on the engine flywheel. In a modified embodiment, the release of the spring effects closure of an ignition grounding switch.

Abstract: An electrical connector device comprises a disc-like connector element having a hole therethrough. From a face thereof substantially hard contact means projects outwardly, in the form of an annular ridge which tapers outwardly to a sharp or rounded edge and which is concentric to the hole and radially spaced therefrom. An elastically deformable sealing element overlies said face of the connector element and, in the unused device, embeds the contact means. Tightening of a screw through the hole, to secure the device to an object member, forces the contact means through the sealing element and partway into the object member. The annular electrical connection thus formed is durably sealed by the compressed sealing member.

Abstract: A spring-applied, electromagnetically-released brake for electric motors of the type wherein a disc that rotates with the shaft of the motor is gripped between non-rotating jaws, and wherein the grip exerted by the jaws is released by relative rotation between an inclined cam track and a cam follower riding thereon produced by energization of the electromagnet.

Abstract: A card file having a rotor with radiating arms, each of which has a card-carrying tray detachably connected thereto. The rotor is mounted in a housing for rotation about a horizontal axis so that each tray can be brought to a detent-defined viewing position at which the tray is disposed in a substantially horizontal attitude affording ready access to the file cards carried thereby. Inwardly facing ribs on the lower portion of the housing have their edges concentric to the axis of the rotor to be engagable by the outer extremities of the trays as they traverse the lower portion of their orbit upon rotation of the rotor, to thereby prevent detachment of the trays from the rotor arms. The various components of the rotor are held assembled with one another and with the housing entirely without reliance upon screws, bolts, rivets or the like.

Abstract: A system for reducing the nitrogen oxide content of exhaust gas emitted by an internal combustion engine, by introducing exhaust gas from the engine into the fuel mixture being supplied to the engine. A valve that is adjusted by a pressure sensitive actuator responsive to changes in pressure in the engine crankcase proportions the amount of exhaust gas introduced into the fuel mixture to engine speed, and another valve that is controlled by adjustment of the throttle valve prevents introduction of the exhaust gas into the fuel mixture when the engine is idling and when it is operating at high speed and under high loads.

Abstract: A cylinder lock has a socket portion formed integrally with the rear end of its cylinder for connection with a flat stamped shaft. The shaft has an enlarged head at its front end and a medial enlargement defining forwardly facing shoulders. The socket has a cavity in which the shaft head is rotatable, a noncircular bore opening rearwardly from the cavity through which the head can be inserted forwardly into the cavity in one position of shaft rotation, and grooves opening forwardly to the cavity in which the head is receivable upon rearward motion of the shaft in another position of its rotation. A coiled expansion spring reacting between said shoulders and the rear of the socket confines the head in said grooves.

Abstract: An article conveyor comprises a pair of belts, each trained around a pair of pulleys, with straight stretches between said pulleys. The four straight belt stretches are coplanar and parallel. One pulley for each belt is so driven that the belts move in opposite orbital directions. Corresponding stretches of the two belts are confined to lengthwise motion, as by additional freely rotatable pulleys or by a rail-like member for each of said stretches having a groove in which the belt is slidingly received. Each article carrier has belt engaging portions with long, laterally oppositely opening grooves in which said belt stretches are received, so that said stretches support and drive the carrier.

Abstract: A pan-like spilled fuel diverter overlies the fuel tank of a small engine and has the filler neck on the top of the tank projecting through a hole in the bottom wall of the diverter with a liquid-tight connection therebetween. A portion of the diverter projects laterally beyond a side of the tank remote from the engine cylinder and has a downwardly projecting discharge spout spaced from the tank. A downwardly and outwardly slanting deflector at the bottom end of the spout directs spilled liquid that is caught by the diverter away from the tank.

Abstract: An automatic armature production line comprising an assembling machine by which the component parts of an armature core assembly are assembled, a bank of armature winding machines by which the armatures are wound, a welding machine by which the wire leads connecting successively wound coils are physically and electrically connected to the terminals of the commutator, a testing station at which the completed armatures are tested for electrical continuity, and a transfer system by which the armature core assemblies and then the wound armatures are quickly moved from one work station to another, the transfer system comprising a plurality of identical cylindrical carriers that have axial cavities into which the armature core assemblies and the wound armatures are inserted and which roll along downwardly inclined tracks that lead from station to station, and which carriers have a flat surface spaced from their axes of rotation to coact with flat surfaced guides at the different work stations to hold the carriers i

Abstract: A workpiece such as an electronic component, comprising a body and leads that project in one direction from the body, has its body coated by immersing it in a fluidized bed while the workpiece is vibrated. Immersion depth is such that the uppermost surface of the body is at or just slightly below the top surface of the fluidized bed. Vibration of the workpiece during immersion ensures a uniform thickness coating all over the body and prevents "pants legs" on the leads.

Abstract: Leaf tobacco or the like in a substantially airtight enclosure is cured and dried by circulating through the enclosure air that is controllably heated by a forced air fuel burner located in an elongated vertically oriented duct outside the enclosure. The outlet end of the duct is communicated with the enclosure at the bottom thereof, and its upper inlet end is controllably communicable with the enclosure at the top thereof and with the ambient atmosphere. The air intake port of the fuel burner receives only air flowing through the duct. Air circulation is effected by an electric motor driven fan near the inlet of the duct, and a restriction in the duct produces a pressure drop across the burner that prevents back-drafts through it.

Abstract: In a magnetically actuated switch such as is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,586,809, the armature stop against which the armature engages in its switch-open position has a pair of vibratile members attached to its tip, in vibration transmitting relation to it and extending lengthwise from it. The two vibratile members are tuned to different frequencies, both lower than that of the armature stop. They so control vibration of the armature stop as to quickly stop the armature at its switch open position. Similar vibratile members on a relatively stationary contact member eliminate contact rebound upon switch closure.

Abstract: Various items of information are transmitted to a body moving above the surface by a pulsed fan-shaped beam of radiant energy having a flatwise angular sweep. Each such item can comprise two or more kinds of data, e.g., beam angle data and beam identification data. To each different item to be transmitted is assigned a unique whole number. Every interval between successive beam pulses has a duration equal to a non-characterizing time period of invariant duration plus a stepwise variable characterizing time period measurable in a whole number of short, uniform time units. The number of such time units in the characterizing time period of an interval corresponds to the number assigned to an item of information to be transmitted during that interval. At the body, clock pulses are generated at a steady rate such that a whole number thereof are issued per time unit, and are counted during the characterizing period of each interval, for decoding the then-transmitted item of information.

Abstract: Lock mechanism comprising a key operable cylinder rotatably mounted in a lock body, and characterized by internal and external weather seals for the cylinder. The external seal comprises annular sealing means encircling an enlarged head on the front of the cylinder. The internal seal comprises a keyhole shutter confined in a cavity in the front of the head.

Abstract: A semi-trailer has two multi-wheeled undercarriage assemblies, at opposite sides of its longitudinal centerline. Each comprises a first laterally extending beam medially pivotally connected to a longitudinally extending beam which can be raised or lowered relative to the trailer body, a pair of second beams, one transverse to each end of the first beam and each medially pivotally connected to the first beam, and at least one wheel rotatably mounted on each end of each second beam. The pivotal connections of the beams with one another and with the body enable all wheels to share equally in supporting the load.

Abstract: An electroacoustical transducer element comprises a piezoelectric disc flatwise bonded to a metal diaphragm, the bond being at the plane of neutral stress. The transducer element defines the front wall of a sealed chamber that serves as an infinite baffle. In front of the element is a resonant acoustical cavity that matches impedance of the element to that of the ambient medium and comprises concentric axially short large and small diameter cylindrical chamber portions, the small diameter portion providing a front outlet from the large diameter one.