US59757A - Improved tool-handle - Google Patents

Description

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

C. W. BIOREN, OF PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA.

IMPROVED TOOL-HANDLE.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 59,757, dated November 20, 1866.

Y description of my invention sufficient to enable those skilled in the art to practice it.

There are many tools which, like a common screw-driver or gimlet, are turned by the action of grasping with the hand or iin gers the handle of the tool and turning it with a twist, the handle remaining in the position where placed when the grasp of the operator is released and a new hold is taken upon the handle, so that another twist making part of a revolution may be given, and this operation is repeated indenitely in either direction.

The continual action of grasping and releasing the tool-handle is very fatiguing to the muscles, and produces blisters and irritation of the skin, which it is an object to avoid.

The ordinary bit stock or brace is, on account of the continued and rapid rotation which may thereby be applied, the :most effective instrument for rotating tools; but there are many situations where it cannot be used for want of room.

To supplya handle by which tools may be rotated 4in either direction by mere twisting movement of the wrist or ngers, and without releasing-or changing the gra-sp upon the handle, is the object of my invention, which is illustrated in the drawings- Figure l being a longitudinal section of my improved tool-handle; Figs. 2 and 3, elevations of the same, showing positions of the coupling-ring t' different from that seen in Fig. 1. Fig. 4. is a plan of the tool-holding end of the handle. Fig. 5 is areversedplan of the tool-holding end detached; and Fig. 6 is a sectional view of the coupling-ring i.

The tool-holding end of the implement is, for convenience in constructing its ratchet, made of two pieces, a and b, but otherwise operates to all intents and purposes as one integral piece. The piece b has a long shaft or shank, c, extending intol the shank of the ,piece d, on which the lower ratchet is formed shaft c being capable of rotating in either direction and of having a slight endwise play to admit of the teeth of the ratchets passing each other. The piece d is fixed to the handle e, so that the movements of the handle are a imparted to the piece d.

On the shaft c, and between the ratchets formed on b and d, is an intermediate piece,f, with ratchet-formed edges ittin gin the ratchets of b and d.

The three pieces, a, f, and d are splined or slotted, as seen at g g, to admit of,keys h lz., which, secured to the ring i, lock the piece f either to the piece a or to the piece d, when, respectively, the ringiis placed in its eXtreme position toward or away from the tool-socket j, or which lock said three pieces, a, f, and d, firmly together, so that they all move as one 'piece with the handle e when the ring lis placed centrally between pieces a and d. The

ratchet made on a has its teeth inclined in the locked together, and the piece a is turned by f in the direction which causes the vertical faces of the ratchets on each'to abut.

When the ring t' is in the position shown in Fig. 2, then all three of the pieces a, f, and d are locked together and to the handle, and must turn in either direction as the handle is turned.

To keep the ring e' in any desired position friction-springs a may be used, and, if desirable, their ends may slightly catch in grooves or notches made in the cylindrical surfaces encompassed atV suitable places.

The tool-socket is provided with a holdingscrew, by which any desired tool may be fastened, and the groove shown across the ends of a and b is designed to receive and support the bodies of tools, such as screw-driw ers, which are commonly subjected to severe combined and arranged to operate as shown strains. and described.

I claim- GHARLES W BIOREN A tool-handle provided with the stationary ratchet d, the double-faced sliding ratohet- Wifnesses: ring i, and the revolving socket b, having a, J. B. CROSBY7 ratchet on its under face, when said parts are F. GOULD.

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