GB951133A - Current collector device - Google Patents

Abstract

951,133. Current collectors. BROWN, BOVERI & CO. Ltd. Sept. 7, 1961 [Sept. 7, 1960], No. 32188/61. Heading B7L. A current collector, e.g. for electrically driven vehicles, comprises two arms 11, 12, Fig. 1, pivotally connected together, which are both maintained at the same slope to the horizontal, but in opposite directions, the lower arm 12 enclosing a shaft 7 and its bearings, the shaft being used to raise and lower the upper arm 11 by means of bevel gears keyed one at each end to the shaft, and lifting means for raising and lowering the lower arm and thus the upper arm through the intermediary of the shaft 7 and bevel gears. The lower arm 12, Figs. 1, 3, is pivoted on fixed axle 2 at one end and its other end is pivotally connected to the upper arm 11 which has two branches joined at their far ends by a bow conductor 20. The structure is supported on insulators 22 and the current flows through a cable (not shown) to the inside of the vehicle. The arms 11, 12 are urged upwardly by the action of springs 18 pulling on chain 17 or ropes or cables fed round and secured to eccentric 16 rigid with the arm 12. A bevel gear 1, Fig. 3, is keyed to the fixed axle 2 and meshes with a bevel gear 6 keyed to a shaft 7. Thus as the arm 12 is raised the shaft 7 rotates and this rotates a bevel gear 10 at the upper end of the shaft, and causes the arm 11 to move upwardly as a bevel gear 10 keyed to axle 9 rigid with the arm 11 is also rotated. The ratio of the gears 1, 6 is one half of the ratio of the gears 8, 10 so that the arms 11 and 12 remain at the same inclination to the horizontal. The box conductor 20 may be manually lowered by use of a pull rope 19. A parallelogram type pantograph may be constructed by coupling two of the devices shown in Fig. 1 arranged opposite to one another, to the bow conductor 20 (Fig. 4, not shown). As an alternative to the springs 18 a pneumatic or electromotor drive may be employed. In the embodiment shown in Fig. 6, the lower arm 12 is raised by a coil spring 18 wound round the shaft 7 and held under torsion between a protuberance 13a fixed to the arm 12 and a lever 27 keyed to the shaft 7. The embodiment shown in Fig. 8 also employs springs 18 held under torsion but in this case, these act on bevel gears 31 which mesh with bevel gears 32 rigid with the lower arm 12. The gears 31, 32 may be such that when the arm is raised the gear ratio between them alters. This is shown in Fig. 9 where the gear 31 is a toothed elliptical segment and the gear 32 is a toothed segment with the teeth cut on a spiral in the axis of rotation. The springs 18 in Fig. 8 may be replaced by torsion rods. In the embodiment shown in Fig. 12, the arm 12 is also raised by coil springs under torsion, 40, and these are disposed on an axle parallel to that on which the arm 12 is pivoted. They rotate an elliptical tooth gear segment 37 which meshes with a complementary segment 38 rigid with the arm 12.