Joseph Bramah

“ My experience, my Lord, obliges me to allow, that when a pump is introduced, or added to one of Newcomen’s Engines where there is no condenser, a trifling latitude in the size, over and above the real maximum, is of little moment, and may be exercised without much detriment to the Engine; but I find the closer we adhere to the smallest that is sufficient, the less the power of the Engine is impeded by giving it motion. ”

“ James never durst bring any action for infringement; and it was certainly wise in him not to do so, as no patent could stand on such a specification. For, said his Lordship, I think more depends in the composition of a medicine, on the proportion of the drugs, than on their quality; as we find it a fact too notorious, that what even preserves life, taken in too great quantity, will in some cases instantly destroy it. ”

“ Cummings, and no doubt many others, eminent in the theory and practice of the arts, was only to prove what I said, before they acknowledged it, that all condensers do more harm than good; and that when men of better judgement have constructed Engines totally without condensers, as good or better than their own, they have just candour enough to admit the fact, and pride and avarice enough to claim them as their invention. ”

“ Now, my Lord, let it suffice for us, that in this storehouse there are all the materials necessary for the building of a mansion; and it may be said that in this house are many mansions, but none that are ready built or ever will be, without the help of man; or any other object his organizing hand has presented to our views but more especially that master-piece of human invention which has occasioned this communication, the self-moving steam-engine ”

“ How can the expansive force of steam be applied to press down the piston in the manner it is now performed by the atmosphere, which requires the top of the cylinder to be kept open? For suppose steam to be poured on to the top of it instead of air, where is there any footing or butment for the re-action of this expansive element? I clearly perceive, says the enquirer, that the air performs this office by its gravitating power, which requires no butment. But how can any expansive force be employed without it ”

“ In considering the part arranged First in this Specification, I cannot observe that the words there used, create in the mind of the Reader any new idea respecting the construction, proportion, or office, of that part of an Engine, properly called the steam cylinder. Nor do they tend to impregnate the understanding of a person well skilled in the fabrication of common Engines, with any image of an improvement: there being no alteration either proposed, or specified, relative to the various circumstances which constitute this part of a Steam Engine in a working state. ”

“ Hence comes invention, which I conceive to be those efforts of the mind and understanding which are calculated to produce new effects from the varied applications of the same cause, and the endless changes producible by different combinations and proportions. ”

“ Dame Nature confirms it; and the swelling vapour shews a determination to be uppermost, in spite of James Watt, or Mr. Gitty; and will, before compelled to leave its habitation, drive into the open air every drop of water which served to confine it. This, my Lord, I am persuaded will be quite sufficient to shew the impossibility of cleansing the condenser or vacuum in this way. For the air or vapour must here expand itself with a force more than equal to the atmospheric pressure, before one breath can be discharged. ”

“ From the Specification I can say nothing; from the Engines, I learn they have been made in all forms, and that by changing about, and mixing the knowledge of every person in his way for twenty years at least, Mr. Watt has been taught what is the real fact, and what they confessed to be so on the late trial, namely, that no Condensers are necessary. But that which Newcomen calls the eduction pipe, and in which the condensation is performed by a jet of cold water, answers the same purpose equally well. ”

“ The judicious application of an air pump will make every Stream Engine a good one, but this the best.
These are facts, my Lord, which cannot be controverted, and which I am ready to prove by actual experiment, having a Newcomen’s Engine at work, without any condenser or eduction-pipe, which performs its office in a manner superior to any Steam Engine I ever saw on any other plan. And I affirm, that the air pumps used by Messrs. Boulton and Watt, in their Engines, are not on a proper principle ”

“ To work Engines by the partial expansion and condensation of steam. When it is a point long since determined, that there is no intermediate heat, or progressive operation, in the act of water expanding into steam. It must therefore follow, that progression is applicable only to the effect, and not to the act of generation; as whenever the degree of heat is exceeded which keeps water in its dense state, it instantly becomes steam; and when the steam is reduced by any colder body, it then as instantaneously becomes water. ”

“ And farther, if he is a good man, he expects this gain from the quantity occasioned by his monopoly sold at a reasonable rate, and not from an exorbitant profit on each.
Had the Plaintiffs acted conformable to this rule in bringing to market what they actually took a patent for (viz. a method of saving fuel rather than an Engine) they would have stood on the ground of other men; and would have been highly justifiable in fixing one third of the saving as their selling price. ”

“ I think, my Lord, it is evicent so much of this immense saving, they pretend to have made in Steam and Fuel depended on the due proportion, construction, and nature of the materials in these Engines, that it cost them six years (according to their own statement) of extreme study, labour, and an expence so ruinous, as frequently to oblige the patentee to make a stand for reimbursements, before they could organize the Machine so as to accomplish the desired effect. ”

“ It will be necessary to keep in remembrance, the eduction pipe of Mr. Watt’s Engine, which is placed above this condenser, communicates and forms a junction with this vacuum, and into which falls all the condensed water and uncondensed vapour, every stroke the Engine makes. Now suppose that water enters first, or that both these fluids enter the vacuum at the same time, which is the case in these Engines, what will be the issue? Certainly as follows, for the foundation of nature mutt be reversed before it can be otherwise. ”

“ No Steam Engine can possibly be made to work without a pump, if the steam is condensed in any vessel, where the piston does not act; that vessel being separated from the steam cylinder.
Secondly. No Engine can possibly work properly, except the dimensions of the pump much exceed the cavernous parts, into which the steam has access, between the steam cylinder and the pump.
Thirdly. All kinds of condensers, and even eduction pipes, on the principle of Watt’s Engines, impede the working of the Engines, in a ratio as their proportion to the air pump. ”

“ This, my Lord, I assert with boldness, as the whole of it was proved to you both by the Plaintiffs’ evidence and their Counsel. And thus your Lordship must see how the wise shall be ensnared by their own craftiness; the strong things confounded by the weak; and the things which seem the greatest brought to nought by those which seem not to be. ”

“ This the Law, which regulates these monopolies, continued your Lordship, does require, and can take nothing less; and this being the price every inventor is to pay for his patent, none can have a good title deed who wilfully or ignorantly with-hold a part. And as the King held nothing but this specification to guarantee the public in their reversionary right to the benefits of the invention, he could not make a fair account to them if this instrument was defective. ”

“ Thus they have realised, perhaps, the greatest fortune ever made by patents, over and above what would have accrued to any other individual, not artful enough to strike out so cunning and well devised a plan.—For your Lordship must observe this third of saving includes every thing, and excludes nothing. Should an ingenious Engine-keeper, or owner of an Engine, as is often the case, have judgment enough to improve his fire-place, or his boiler, or, in short, make any other improvement, by even wetting his coals, or any other means by which a saving is made ”

“ Here, my Lord, you see clearly that while other men, having patents, sit down contented with the mere profits arising from much more moderate charges from the article only, Messrs. Bolton and Watt have the extreme liberality to exact annually, in addition to this, what is, in many instances, more than fifty times the regular profit of building an Engine!! ”

“ All the methods I have here mentioned to belong to man, I think, are subjects of monopoly; and perhaps some of the principles: but all capable of minute explanation. But Mr. Watt goes a little further back to begin his claim, which he makes without any explanation. He says to the King, I want a patent for my new invented method of saving the consumption of bricks, and consequently of clay and of water in building houses ”

“ And I think it is very evident we can, with much more ease, impress images on the minds of one another by a compound communication through the eyes and ears, than it is possible to do by one only: and especially should we adopt the least perfect, which is the verbal or literal. ”

“ For any others which may have escaped, he requests the Reader’s excuse; assuring him that his only intent is, to open the eyes of the Publick to facts; which, when well considered, will be found of the utmost importance to the encouragement of Genius and the advancement of Knowledge. ”

“ But there is no description of or even, allusion to, an internal application of cold water, for the purpose of condensation, and how this operation finally so essential in other Engines, is to be performed by a new method, it becomes every inventor to declare; and also to shew what condensers are, as I confess I cannot comprehend whether they are Tubes, Boxes, Cisterns, or what else; there being no one sentence to justify a specific conclusion on the subject. ”

“ Or to go one step farther, with your Lordship’s permission, I will stake every shilling I am worth, that not one of them, excepting Mr. Cummings, could even start or set to work again one of the Engines just mentioned, if she chanced to make a spontaneous stand. At the same time, my Lord, I can produce very many men, unable even to read, who, unassisted by any knowledge but that which they have derived from being labourers only to a practical Engineer, will readily perform the whole. ”

“ Vegetable oils are equally inapplicable, and if applied must be injurious to the working of the Engine. As they are composed of volatile and fixed matter, the volatile part would, as in the foregoing case, be at least distilled and go off with the steam into the condenser ”

“ Your Lordship cannot but observe the extreme fairness and liberality of this proposition! They first refuse to sell their method, which, in fact, they have no right to sell—They will prosecute any, who, conceiving they understand it, attempt to use it without their licence. Then what is the consequence? Why the public are compelled to purchase the Engine they call theirs, at any price they chuse to fix, (which is in general very exorbitant) and after all, pay them annually the enormous surplus of one third of the saving made ”

“ To admit the steam into the condenser for the purpose described by Newcomen, would defeat the intended improvement, and even the action of the machine in toto. As before the condenser could be heated to a degree sufficient to allow the steam to expand, so as to force out the water and air, it must be so violent as to become in its nature a part of the boiler itself ”

“ It is directed to use quicksilver, and other metals in their fluid state. Quicksilver, my Lord, would amalgamate, and incorporate with all the parts of an Engine which are necessarily of brass, and presently crumble them to powder. Besides when the Engine received a dense, and overheated steam, the Mercury would dissipate in fumes and poison every living creature in its vicinity. ”

“ Article Thirdly, sets forth that Pumps are to be used for extracting the uncondensed Vapour, but as in all the foregoing instances, the least trace of their situation, dimensions, construction or action is not mentioned; every Engineer must discover the best he can, and apply it as his own ingenuity directs; the writer of the Specification having thought proper to reserve this secret for his sole use. ”

“ Watt has contrived to smuggle into this curious condenser (contrary to what he intended when he took his patent) must be always equal with the help of his surrounding jacket (which may be of water or any thing else) to condense or destroy the steam’s force even in its way to the condenser. ”

“ Upon the whole, my Lord, I conclude the writer of this Specification comes very much under the similitude of one, who having privately turned out a bag-fox, and joining in the chase, has this advantage over his brother sportsmen; he well knows even at starting what he is pursuing, while the others must both pursue and overtake before they can describe the animal. ”

“ From this part, for a small distance upwards, the box is turned in a conical form, so as to make a chamber exactly in the shape of a snuf-mull; at the top of this conical part is turned a rebate or seat, into which is fitted a brass or iron ring, the extreme circle of which exactly fits the cylindrical part above the conical part described. This conical chamber is then filled with hemp or junk, so as to surround the piston rod on all sides; and being secured down by the brass or iron ring above mentioned, causes the rod to slide steam and air tight. ”

“ Or he may be compared to one who secretes a spring-gun so nicely balanced on a swivel, that it readily points in all directions, and let the trespasser approach either in front, in rear, or on either side, it is sure to tack about and kill him. ”