US512169A - Joseph m - Google Patents

Description

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J. NL'EDGARQ' INDICATOR LOCK.

Patented Jan. 2, 1894.

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UNITED STATES JOSEPH M. EDGAR, OF KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI, ASSIGNOR OF ONE-HALF TO JOHN Z. RORABAOK, OF SAME PLACE.

INDICATOR-LOCK.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 512,169, dated January 2,1894.

Appnmion inea May i2. 189s.

To all whom t may concern;

Beit known that I, JOSEPH M. EDGAR, a citizen of the United States, residing at Kansas City, in the county of Jackson and State of Missouri, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Car-Door I-Iasp-Shackles, of which the following is a specification.

My invention relates to an improvement in the class of fasteners employed on the doors of freight cars; not, however, so much for the purpose of preventing a door, to -which the device is applied, from being opened, as to insure detection of the fact of its having been tampered with to permit opening of the door, by its showing evidence of such tampering. The device belongs to an entirely dierent class to any for which patents have been heretofore secured by me. Thoughmy presentimprovement is adapted to have used with it a paper seal, it depends for its function, mainly, on the automatic operation of a register, and is in the nature of a self registering haspshackle, intended to take the place of the ordinary seal-locks, registering or combination locks andpadlocks forthe protection of freight car and other doors.

Of the various features of novelty in my present invention, there are two leading ones, which I desire to claim as being generically new. The rst of these relates to the device forming a receptacle for a desired number (preferably two or more) of blocks loosely fitting therein and provided with characters eX- posed to view in the shackle in its operative position, whence to remove it requires that it be tilted endwise sufficiently to displace the blocks from their indicating positions, which they assume again, on readj usting the shackle into such operative position, but in diiferent relations as to their characters, whereby replacement of the device, after unfastening the door, will cause the shackle to show, by the different relation of the characters, evidence of the manipulation. The other of the leading features referred to consists in the angular and preferably cube form of the blocks, having the several characters on the dierent sides provided with them (and each of the faces is, preferably, thus provided) so arranged that those exposed to view will ap- Serial No. 473,977. (No model.)

pear in upright position while those not exposed to view will be out of suoli upright position.

In the accompanying drawings-Figure l is aperspective view of my improved device showing it, by way of diagram, as operatively applied in securing a hasp over a staple. Fig. 2 is a longitudinal sectional view of the fastening device as it appears in operation, the section being taken at the line 2 on Fig. l and viewed in the direction of the arrow. Fig. 3, is a view in rear elevation of the latchcase with the details it contains removed and in which the shackle is engaged and sealed at its lower end. Fig. 4 is a similar view of the latch-case with the pivotal latch in place. Fig. 5 is a similar View of a keeper for the latch in the latch-case. Fig. 6 is a section taken at the line 6 on Fig. l and viewed in the direction of the arrow. Fig. 7 is aperspective view, enlarged, of one of the character-blocks, or cubes, showing the characters arranged thereon in a manner to accomplish the purpose hereinbefore referred to.

The parts of my device are the shackle, comprising a casing A, forming a receptacle containing blocks B, having characters on their sides exposed through the open face of the casing; a hook ron one end of the casing to be passed, from underneath, through a staple q on a car-door (no-t shown) to fasten a hasp p; a catch o projecting backward from the rear side of a lower-end extension n of the casing provided with an opening m aording a seat for a seal C of some material, such as card-board, which may be readily punctured with a pointed instrument, as a knife, nail, or the like; and a latch covered by the lowerend extension of the casing in engaging the catch o thereon and accessible, for releasing the casing, only through the seal seat m.

The shackle A may be a casting and is formed with an expanded chamber A toward one end (the upper in the operative position of thedevice), from which the forwardprojecting hook 0^ extends. The chamber A opens into an elongated chamber A2, of the form in cross-section, and about the diameter, of a block B, thus rectangular in cross-section if the blocks be cubes, as they preferably are.

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Through the front side of the casing, which should be removable, the blocks B are visible, preferably through openings Z, covered underneath with glass Zt, or other transparent medium, and provided in vertical series, one for each block, and of such size and in such position as to display through each only one corner on a block behind it having the chai'- acters arranged upon it in the manner hereinafter described.

The latch-device D illustrated comprises a housing D', which may be open at its back, and adapted to be secured in place, as on the door or frame of the car, through eyes t; the front side of the housing, however, being covered, and having, in the lower end of its cover, an opening 7i. through which to admit the catch o on the lower-end extension n of the casingA, and, above the catch-opening h, another opening g coinciding with the seal-seat opening m, for a purpose hereinafter explained. Within the housing D is a pivotal latch D2, held in place by a suitable keeper D3, and tending, by gravity, to fall into the position of covering the opening Zt, where it engages the catch o vihen inserted therein, and to release which requires that the seal C be punctured near its lower right-hand corner by any instrument thence passed into the case D through the opening g, where it will enter under the latch D2 and permit the latter to be raised on its pivot to free the catch o. Obviously, however, by puncturing the seal, the latteris so defaced as to show that the shackle has been tampered with. Thus the seal, though a secondary feature in my improvement, forms the primary means of protection against opening the shackle. This primary release of the casing A, however, does not, of itself, unfasten the door, but merely permits the same to be unfastened on turning the casing A endwise upside down to enable the hook r to be withdrawn from the staple q and free the hasp p; but thus inverting or tilting the casing spills or throws the cubes from the chamber A2 into the expanded chamber A and disarranges `them so that, were the device again adjusted into operative position, with a view to covering up the fact of its having been tampered with, the purpose will be defeated by the cubes, in falling by gravity again into the chamber A2, assuming relative positions causing a different series of characters on them to be displayed at the openings Z, which will be detected on comparison with the record kept of the first or authentic series thereof.

The arrangement of the characters (preferablyletters and numbers) on the cube B involves the provision, preferably, of four on each face, one in each corner, placed successively at right-angles to each other, whereby Whichever side of the cube forms its base, the

character on the upper left hand corner, which is the one displayed at an opening Z, will be in an upright position.

What I claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

1. In a register hasp shackle of the character described, the combination of a casing, having an enlarged interior toward 'one end and havingwits narrower interior portion open to the inspection of its contents, and blocks provided with characters on their faces, and fitting in sequence within the narrower` portion, whereby tilting the casing endwise in one direction throws the blocks into the enlarged portion of the interior, thereby disarranging them, and thereby tilting the casing in the contrary direction throws them in sequence into its narrower portion, substantially as and for the purpose set forth.

2. In a register hasp shackle of thecharacter described, the combination of acasin'g containing a block-chamber through a .side of which its contents are visible and opening into another chamber in the device, and means on the casing for fastening it on the securing mechanism of a door, whereby separation from said mechanism of the casing involves tilting of the latter and consequent throwing of the blocks from the block-chamber into and their disarrangement in the said other chamber, substantially as and for the purpose set forth.

3. In a register hasp shackle of the character described, the combination of a casing having an elongated block-chamber toward one end, open to the inspection of its contents, and a wider chamber toward its opposite end, at which is provided a hook i", a catch o on an extension n of the casing, an openingmforming a seal-seat in said extension, and a latchdevice to engage the catch o and fasten the casing and having its latch accessible through the said seal-seat, the whole being constructed and arranged to operate substantially as described.

Il. A block B, for use in a register hasp shackle of the character described, comprising a cube having characters in the corner portions of its faces, arranged, in succession about each face provided therewith, at or approxi- IOO IIO

mately at right-angles to eachother, substan- JOSEPH M. EDGAR;

In presence of WM. ELBERT, JNO. Z. RORABACK.

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