US2307186A - Accounting machine - Google Patents

Description

Jan. 5, 1943'. w. A. ANDERSON ACCOUNTING MACHINE Filed June 29, 1959 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 INVENTOR M4LTER A. ANDERSON W I ATTO RNEY Jan; 5, 1943.

W. A. ANDERSON ACCOUNTING MACHINE Filed June 29, 1939 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 INVENTOR WALTER A. ANDERSON 2% ATTO R N EY Patented Jan. 5, 1943 ACCOUNTING MACHINE Walter A. Anderson, Bridgeport, Conn, assignor to Underwood Elliott Fisher Company, New York, N. Y., a corporation of Delaware Application June 29, 1939, Serial No. 281,774

1 Claim.

This invention relates to accounting machines of the key set, motor operated type, and more particularly to the carriage controls thereof.

It relates to the type of machine that utilizes the movement of the traveling paper carriage as it tabulates from column to column to automatically condition the machine for selectively performing different operations in the various columns. This mechanism includes a plurality of depressible control levers arranged to be depressed by control lugs carried in magazines mounted on a control plate fixed on the carriage. As the carriage tabulates from one column to the next, the lugs depress their corresponding control levers to condition associated mechanisms for performing the desired operation in the instant cycle of the machine. Suitable stop mechanism arrests the magazines in the various columns and holds the carriage in such arrested position for a sufficient length of time to permit the lugs to control the machine during the cycle. However, since it is desirable to release the carriage for tabulation to the next column early in the cycle, to save time. and since certain of the control levers must be held depressed until near the end of the cycle, it is necessary to provide some means to hold the levers depressed.

It is an object of the present invention, therefore, to provide a means independent of the carriage for maintaining these carriage control levers in effective position throughout the entire machine cycle.

Another object of the invention is to provide a mechanism of this character which permits faster tabulation of the carriage than heretofore possible and yet insures a completed operation of the machine functions in a. particular columnar position.

With these and incidental objects in view, the invention consists in certain novel features of construction and combinations of parts, the essential elements of which are set forth in appended claim, and a preferred embodiment of which is hereinafter described with reference to the drawings which accompany and form part of the specification.

In the drawings:

Figure 1 is a perspective view of the carriage control mechanism embodying the present invention, with certain parts in ineffective position,

Figure 2 is a rear elevation thereof with the certain parts in effective position, and

Figure 3 is a detail perspective view of the carriage tabulating escapement mechanism.

This invention is an improvement on the pending application of Oscar J. Sundstrand, Serial No. 581,800, filed December 18, 1931, and issued as Patent No. 2,194,270.

A control plate I fixed to a laterally movable paper carriage (not shown) has secured thereon a series of control magazines such as 2. The inner ends 3 of these magazines are arranged to engage a spring held stop arm 4 of the tabulating escapement -mechanism shown generally in Figure 3, to stop the carriage. Stop arm 4 is connected through a lever 5 to a movable stop plate 6 and, as disclosed in application Serial No. 581,800, arm 4 and plate 6 cooperatively function during each machine cycle to allow a carriage draw spring to advance the carriage from one column to the next. Each magazine 2 carries certain control lugs such as 8 that lie immediately above control levers 9, pivoted on a rod l0 stationary in the machine frame. The opposite ends of levers 9 rest immediately above vertically disposed rods l I that are arranged to condition various trains of mechanism for the performance of the various functions of the machine.

The term functions is intended to include the operations of non-adding, totaling, sub-totaling, register selecting, etc., and function controlling mechanism is intended to include the parts that are necessary to control the machine in performing these or other operations.

Levers 9 carry rollers 12 that are engaged by lugs 8 when the carriage is at rest in a columnar position. Such engagement of lugs 8 with rollers l2 depresses the corresponding control lever 9, as shown in Figures 1 and 2, to move its associated control mechanism to effective position. As the carriage advances from one column to another, control levers 9 are depressed in accordance with the presence of lugs 8 in the several magazines, the levers 9 being restored by suitable spring tension when a lug 8 moves from above its roller l2 incident to tabulation. The foregoing mechanism is similar with that disclosed in the above mentioned patent application.

The cotrol mechanism associated with certain of the levers 9 controls operations that do not take place in the machine cycle until after the time when it is desired to release the carriage. These control levers, therefore, must be maintained in effective position by a means other than the control lugs 8 to insure performance of their respective functions.

The following mechanism is provided for this purpose, Each lever 9 that must be maintained in effective position after the carriage is released is provided with a depending projection l3 having a notch HI in the lower end thereof. A series of bell cranks I5, pivoted on a stationary rod I6,

' are provided at their upper ends with hooks I1 arranged to engage notches I4. Individual springs I8 normally tension the bell cranks counter-clockwise about rod I 6, and a bail I9 pivoted on a rod 20 carries a rod 2| overlying horizontal arms on bell cranks I5 to normally restrain,

them from such counter-clockwise movement. An arm 22 of bail I9 is slotted as at 23 to receive the upper end of a link 24 pivoted at 25 to one end of a lever 26 pivoted at 2! to the machine frame. The opposite end of lever 26 rests in the plane of a roller 28 fixed on a plate 29 secured on the main rock shaft 30 of the machine. Rock shaft 30 is so coupled with the motor drive (not shown) that the shaft (as viewed in Figure 1) is rocked first clockwise, and then counter-clockwise during each cycle of the machine. When the machine is at rest, plate 29 is in the position shown in Figure 1, and in such position roller 28 engages lever 26 and holds this lever and the associated bail I9 in the position shown in Figure l, i. e., with rod 2! bearing down upon the horizontal arms of bell cranks I5 to hold hooks I! away from notches I4. As the machine starts to cycle, roller 28 moves away from lever 26, permitting bell cranks I5 to pivot counter-clockwise about shaft I6 under tension of springs I8, and engage hooks I! with any notches I4 that have been lowered into the horizontal plane of the hooks, as shown in Figure 2. Now, upon operation of the tabulating escapement mechanism,

which, it will be remembered, occurs before the end of the machine cycle, lugs 8 may move from above their corresponding depressed levers 9, without the levers restoring to their ineffective position at this time. The function controlling mechanisms associated with these levers are therefore maintained in effective position during the latter part of the cycle. They are released very near the end of the cycle, when roller 28 engages lever 26 and swings it clockwise, disengagin hooks I! from notches I4.

By this means, the carriage may be released quite early in the machine cycle, allowing it to travel while the machine is cycling, and thereby shortening its time of operation.

It should be noted that the lower ends of projections I3 and the ends of bell cranks I5 above hooks I! are rounded off. This arrangement permits the control levers 9 to be depressed by lugs 8 as the carriage finishes a tabulating movement into a columnar position, even though the machine cycle associated with the previous columnar position has not been completed. In practice, this condition often occurs, because on most of the machines of this type that are in use there are columnar positions requiring the magazines 2 to be very close together, and when so placed, the carriage spring draws the carriage fully into the next position before the instant machine cycle is completed. Inasmuch as the bell cranks I5 are not moved out of the path of the projections I3 until the very last part of a cycle, it is necessary that the parts be arranged to permit the levers 9 to be depressed before bell cranks I5 are operated. This is provided for by rounding off the parts as above mentioned. It might be asked why this condition could not be met by the present mounting of rollers I2 on the bell cranks pivoted on levers 9, as shown in the drawings. These bell cranks, however, are held in their upper positions by springs that are by necessity quite strong, so that if more than two or three lugs 8 attempted to lower their corresponding rollers I2 and levers 9 before a machine cycle was completed, the tension of the abovementioned strong springs would stop the carriage before it reached its next columnar position, and whenever the carriage is stopped at such a point, the draw spring is not strong enough to finish the movement against the normal tension of the carriage controls, even though the bell cranks I5 are in the meantime withdrawn.

While the form of mechanism herein shown and described is admirably adapted to fulfill the objects primarily stated, it is to be understood that it is not intended to confine the invention to the one form of embodiment herein disclosed, for it is susceptible of embodiment in various forms, all coming within the scope of the claim which follows.

What is claimed is:

In a machine of the class described having a general operator, function controlling mechanism including depressible levers, and means to depress said levers, the combination of hooks on said levers, other hooks to engage the first mentioned hooks and normally held ineffective, said hooks being formed to permit engagement at any time, and means, including a bail engageable with all said other hooks, and being under the control of the general operator, for rendering the second mentioned hooks effective after the first mentioned hooks are brought into alignment therewith, and for rendering said second mentioned hooks ineifective upon the completion of an excursion of the general operator.

WALTER A. ANDERSON.

Images