Abstract: The housing of an electronic taximeter has a first fixed section including the rear and bottom walls which are fixedly secured to and sealed to the chassis of a taxicab, and a removable second section which may include the front, top and side walls of the housing and has grooves engaging portions of the bottom wall. The entire second section removable to enable adjustment or repair of the basic taximeter apparatus which is mounted on the first section. The second section is formed as a modular element which contains many of the operating elements of the taximeter, including actuating elements such as push-buttons or the like, all of which may be simply removed as a one-piece unit.

Abstract: A keyboard assembly includes a U-shaped carrier member and a plurality of key members connected thereon by resiliently yieldable legs having detent portions which engage cooperating recesses provided in the bottom wall of the U-shaped carrier member with snap action. Each key member has an upper and a lower housing port which are snap-fastened to each other, and an actuating shaft axially movable to energize an electrical component mounted below the carrier member. A locking member is also provided to lock the shaft in a down actuating position.

Abstract: In the disclosed frequency converter, a pulse shaper receives pulses at the input frequency and changes their pulse widths to a predetermined value. An integrator integrates the reshaped pulses. An ultra high resistance triggering stage applies the voltage output of the integrator to a monostable multivibrator which is fired each time the voltage output of the integrator exceeds a predetermined value. The multivibrator forms pulses which turn on a discharge circuit that rapidly resets the integrator with each multivibrator output pulse. The multivibrator output pulses appear at the attenuated frequency which is established by, and can be infinitely varied by, stepless change of the predetermined pulse widths.

Abstract: In a device for recording vehicle speeds on a record carrier, the carrier includes a recording layer of a suitable colored paste and is combined with a lid as a unit which is removably mounted on the device housing. The recording layer is located between the lid and the record carrier. The circumferential periphery of the lid and of the record carrier are interconnected. In this arrangement at least the record carrier is transparent.

Abstract: An arrangement for resetting a coin operated parking meter is disclosed. By the use of a sensor to monitor a parking space, it can be determined when a vehicle leaves the parking space with parking time remaining. A resetting device within the meter clears the meter of remaining parking time. The resetting device includes an electric motor, a cam disk affixed to the motor shaft and a coupling member arranged between the cam disk and time indicating portion of the meter. The coupling member returns an indicator of the time indicating portion to a defined initial angle position. The resetting device is responsive to an electrical signal received from the sensor.

Abstract: In a printer where a card or record carrier is inserted for printing on one of a plurality of lines, a device is provided for determining the line to be printed. The device consists of a setting assembly and a stop and rest part. The setting assembly includes a card guide element surrounding and spaced radially outwardly from a setting shaft. The stop and rest part is positioned on the setting shaft and is radially adjusted by a spring against the internal surface in the guide element. The guide element has sensible markings for indicating the line selected to be printed.

Abstract: In a setting device for presettable counters, a number of indicating rollers are arranged with symbols on their circumferential peripheral surfaces. Connected to each indicating roller is a ratchet wheel and an adjusting wheel. A switching device for each roller permits it to be moved in a step-by-step manner and otherwise to be locked in position. The switching device includes a switching pawl for engaging the ratchet wheel and moving the roller, a fixing lever for locking the adjusting wheel and roller in position, a control pawl and a key for displacing the control pawl. The control pawl is spring-biased against the actuating movement of the key. The control pawl displaces the switching pawl and the fixing lever in response to its displacement by the key.

Abstract: A data-processing machine having a single operator station is provided with a printer comprising a supply holder on the front of the machine next to the operator station for holding a form band, a support on the machine next to the station with an upwardly concave surface, and a receptacle on the back of the machine below the support for catching the printed form band. A guide and a transport device is provided for guiding the band up from the supply holder in the front of the machine, over the surface of the printing station and down to the receptacle. A printing head which is vertically displaceable above the upwardly concave surface is displaceable horizontally along the surface to print the band. A guide slot extending down toward the supply is pivotal between a down position for normal operation of the machine and a raised position for threading a new form band in and a detent is provided for holding it in the up position during reloading.

Abstract: The diagram carrier bears a plurality of graphs of different formats in different respective tracks. A scanning station includes a plurality of scanning elements arranged in a row. The diagram carrier is moved in the direction of its tracks and perpendicular to the row of scanning elements. In synchronism with the movement of the diagram carrier, the individual scanning elements of the row are read in succession, to determine which elements are graph-line-activated. A programmed storage subdivides the row of scanning elements into sectors corresponding to respective tracks. During each reading of the row of scanning elements the first and last activated scanning elements in each sector are distinguished from the other activated scanning elements in the same sector. During each reading of the row of scanning elements, the location-numbers of the first and last activated scanning elements in each scanning element sector and the total number of activated elements in each scanning sector are registered.

Abstract: A keyboard assembly includes a U-shaped carrier member and a plurality of key members connected thereon by resiliently yieldable legs having detent portions which engage cooperating recesses provided in the bottom wall of the U-shaped carrier member with snap action. Each key member has an upper and a lower housing port which are snap-fastened to each other, and an actuating shaft axially movable to energize an electrical component mounted below the carrier member. A locking member is also provided to lock the shaft in a down actuating position.

Abstract: A taximeter housing is securable to a vehicle part in such a manner that only two seals are required to prevent unauthorized tampering with the input connections, the interior components of the taximeter and the taximeter mount, and that only a single seal need be broken when it is necessary to gain access to the interior components to readjust the taximeter for a tariff change.

Abstract: The output of an operational amplifier is connected to a bridge having as its diagonal two push-pull, complementary-symmetry, output stages, the servo motor being connected between the emitters junction of the one stage and the emitters junction of the other stage.

Abstract: A digital taximeter provides a visual read out of a first and a second multi-digit number. Instead of a plurality of discrete one-digit illuminated-digit display units arranged together to be capable of displaying multi-digit numbers, use is made of a single multi-digit illuminated-digit display unit having a row of equal-size digit zones. One or more of the middle ones of the digit zones are blocked from view to form a first and a second group of digit zones respectively adapted for the display of the first and the second multi-digit numbers and located to either side of the digit zones which are blocked from view. Although the digit zones are actually all of the same size, those of the first group are made to appear larger than those of the second group, in correspondence to the greater importance of the fare indication compared to the extra-charge indication.

Abstract: The record carrier is made of a material which can be caused to assume a dark state by passing a magnetic field through the record carrier normal thereto. It can be caused to assume a light state by establishing in the general plane of the record carrier two magnetic fields which are oriented generally perpendicular to each other. The recording apparatus which incorporates the record carrier is provided with means for effecting record carrier transport past an erasing unit and a writing unit. The writing unit forms a recording trace on the record carrier during such transport by generating a radial field lying in the general plane of the record carrier. Because this field is radial it is comprised of field components which are oriented generally perpendicular to each other and which furthermore are oriented at angles to the record carrier transport direction.

Abstract: A mounting and demounting arrangement for an electric taximeter permits a mechanical-to-electrical converter to be slidably received into electrical contact with a socket provided in the taximeter housing or, at the option of a user, the mechanical-to-electrical converter is mounted at a location remote from the housing in order to protect a flexible shaft mechanically coupled to the converter from severe flexing.

Abstract: A testing switch is activated manually by the taxi driver or automatically at the end of a trip. When the testing switch is activated, a preselected plurality of pulses is applied to the computing means of the electronic taximeter. If the taximeter is in proper working order, the indicating means of the taximeter will successively and in unison display the numerals from 0 to 9 at the rate or about one per second. If the numerals do not appear in the proper sequence, or if the driver perceives that they appear at a rate markedly different from one per second, or if some or all do not appear whatsoever, he knows that the electronic taximeter is not in proper working order.

Abstract: The recording system has a plurality of recording elements pivotally mounted to make marks in a direction substantially perpendicular to the direction of transport of the record carrier receiving the marks. Each recording element has a rigid electrically conductive L-shaped supporting member and an electrode mounted on the supporting member. The supporting members are mounted in recesses in a base of an electrically insulating structure. Specifically one leg of each supporting member has two supporting edges separated by a recess. The two edges are accommodated in corresponding openings in the base. An eccentric drives a drive arm having a plurality of plugs. A spring keeps the supporting member of each recording element in contact with the corresponding plug throughout the pivoting of the recording element.

Abstract: A cassette for tape-shaped record carriers having optically viewable recordings has a housing provided with a pair of opposite but spaced end walls and a pair of opposite but spaced side walls which connect the end walls and one of which is transparent. A pair of tape hubs is rotatably mounted in the housing and a tape is convoluted on and extends between the hubs for travel from one to the other thereof. One of the end walls is provided with an opening through which a recording device has access to the tape so as to provide recordings on the same. A guide arrangement in the interior of the housing guides the tape so that when it travels from one to the other of the hubs it must first pass the opening and thereupon must travel past the transparent side wall so that, when the cassette is inserted into an optical readout device, the recordings on the tape are visible through the side wall.

Abstract: Coins inserted into a parking meter are tested as to diameter, the presence of one or more holes and the content of ferromagnetic material. In the latter test, the coins are transported through a coin transport channel extending intermediate a coin-insertion location and a coin receptacle. The channel has a breadth which exceeds the thickness of the coins to be processed by an amount permitting coins passing through the channel to shift in direction transverse to the direction of their travel. A magnet arrangement attracts magnetically attractable coins into contact with a wall of the channel as such coins pass through the channel. A sensing arrangement controls the setting of a parking time in dependence upon whether coins passing through the channel are attracted into contact with the wall.

Abstract: A parking meter includes a timing unit, a coin receiver which can receive coins of different diameters, and a first and a second normally blocked lever which are biased for movement in mutually opposite directions about a joint axis of rotation into detecting engagement with a plurality of angularly spaced points on the circumference of the coin in the receiver, so as to detect the diameter of such coin. A manually operable arrangement serves to unblock the levers for their movement, and for subsequent joint angular displacement through a distance which is dependent upon the detected coin diameter. A control arrangement on one of the levers sets the timing unit to an interval whose length is a function of the aforementioned distance.