GB355566A - Improvements in or relating to automatic steering devices for dirigible craft - Google Patents

Abstract

355,566. Automatic steering gear. HILLIER, A., 15, Victoria Street, London. -(Sperry Gyroscope Co., Inc. ; Manhattan Bridge Plaza, Brooklyn, New York, U.S.A.) Oct. 9, 1930, No. 30274. [Classes 4 and 114.] Automatic steering gears for dirigible craft having a compass such as a gyro compass for controlling the steering-gear include contact members comprising contact rings and trolleys, the rings being concentric and having live and dead spaces so that adjustment of the relative positions of the rings provides for a variation of the dead space. A repeater motor 10 actuated from a master gyroscopic compass through gearing 11, 12 actuates the contact differential 15, the shaft 16 of which is adapted to move the trolleys T, T<1>. These trolleys are pressed by a spring S into engagement with contact rings A, B, A<1>, B<1>, these rings being subdivided by insulation segments 21, 22 and they are mounted in parallel planes on the same axis. For varying the effective width of the dead portion Z the contact rings A, B, A<1>, B<1> are mounted upon carriages C, C<1> provided with annular gears 58, 59 which can be moved in opposite directions by a hand-wheel 60 operating through suitable gears. In order to cause the trolleys to act with a follow-up motion there is interposed a differential 17 driven by a rack and pinion gear 30 from a lever system pivoted at 52, an arm 51 of which being adjustably connected with and adapted to be rocked by a lever 50 on a shaft coupled to the shaft 32 of the rudder motor M. This coupling provides for lost motion by reason of cone-engagement 34, 33, the extent of engagement being controlled by a cam member 41 from a hand-setting device 42. For setting a new course a hand-wheel W is connected by gearing 43, 44 with a primary differential 15. A reading of the course is provided on a dial 75 by a pointer 85 operated through reduction gear 76, 77 from the repeater motor 10.