GB799174A - Improvements in or relating to a safety apparatus of the type acting to prevent persons or bodies dropping into space - Google Patents

Abstract

799,174. Lowering devices. FAUGIER, G., and FERTIER, R. Nov. 8, 1956 [Nov. 15, 1955], No. 34207/56. Class 78 (2). [Also in Group XXXIV] A safety apparatus of the kind that may be used by a person working above ground on a roof scaffolding or the like to prevent himself accidentally falling and comprising a cable 6 to the end loop 8 of which the person attaches himself, the cable 6 being wound around a drum 4 on a spindle 3 which is subject to the action of a coiled spring 5, the outer end of which is secured to a non-rotatable casing member having secured to it a brake drum 2, is provided with a brake mechanism consisting of sector shaped shoes 15, rotatable with the drum 4 and pivotal thereon so that when such drum is rotated at a certain speed, the shoes 15 are centrifugally expanded and are caused by the rollers 19 to wedge friction linings 16 against the brake drum, thus preventing its speed from increasing further. When the falling person has been thus arrested the re-expansion of the spirally wound spring 5 will then act to coil in the cable 6 and assist the return of the person to his original position. In an alternative arrangement, shown in Fig. 4, the brake drum is made rotatable within the casing member through a friction disc brake 22, 23, 24 which may be released by anti-clockwise movement of lever 32 by a second person to allow a controlled lowering of a first person, whose fall has already been arrested, to the ground.