Report on the Trials of Implements at Wolverhampton. 493 
simultaneously. Tlic ring D is licld in any required place upon the drum by 
means of bolts, E. By this regulation of the distance between the centres 
of each pair of clips, any greater or less degree of pressing-power is given at 
pleasure to the knee-joint lever-action of the clips ; so that no more com- 
pression need be used than is found absolutely necessary for holding the rope 
against slipping. It will be seen that, upon the rope leaving the jaws, the 
pieces open outwards, the lower clip 13 being formed with a weighted liji, for 
the purpose of falling open and at the same time raising the upper clip A 
by means of the tongue F. The extent of opening is limited by the stop II 
coming against the drum-flange. 
The parts attached below the engine boiler arc extremely simple, because no 
automatic coiling apparatus is required ; the rope merely passing, over two 
guide rollers, one half-turn round tlie clip-drum, and thence in two plies along 
the length of the field to the anchor-pulley on the opposite headland. In fact, 
the arrangement is that of an endless rope stretched between the clip-drum 
and the anchor-pulley, the junction of the two plies of rope being at the imple- 
ment. It is indispensable for the outgoing rope to be moderately taut as it 
leaves the clip-drum ; for as the rope, soto speak, pinches itself between the 
clips, no grip at all would be exerted unless there were some, even the slightest, 
tension or strain upon the rope, and this strain at any one pair of clips is due to 
the hold of the preceding clips, while any grip of the last pair on the payiug-off 
side is dependent upon some degree of pull or tension in the rope as it leaves 
the drum. Hence the necessity for a taking-up, or so-called "slack gear," 
■upon the implement, which also furnishes a means of carrying a reserve 
portion or short length of rope upon the implement and, in a self-acting 
manner, regulating the quantity of rope out according to the varying distances 
between the engine and anchor — a condition obtaining in all eases except that 
of perfectly parallel headlands. The slack gear consists of two small rope- 
barrels placed at the centre of the implement, and connected with each 
other by means of pitch-chains, spike-wheels, and ratchet-clutches ; the wheels 
being so proportioned that the pulley-rope uncoiling from one barrel causes the 
other barrel to rotate and to wind in the tail-rope at five times the speed. 
The smaller spike-wheels are thrown in or out of gear with their respective 
barrels by levers and rods connected with the ploughman's two seats at the 
opposite ends of the implement ; so that the act of the man's seating himself 
in readiness for steering on his journey reverses the gearing of the barrels, 
and permits the strain on the puUing-rope to wind in the slack or following- 
rope until the tension of the latter becomes one-fifth that of the former. The 
Fig. 9. — SlacJc-gear arrangement attached to Messrs, Fowler's 
Balance Implements. 
arrangement is explained in the Plan, Fig. 9, where A and B are two small 
drums (mounted upon axles placed across the implement frame) to which the 
