Device to prevent heavy weights from falling
Date
11 July 1683
Creator
Unknown, Artist
After
Robert Hooke (1635 - 1703, British) , Natural philosopher
Object type
Archive reference number
Manuscript page number
p77
Material
Dimensions
height (page): 365mm
width (page): 230mm
width (page): 230mm
Subject
Content object
Description
Robert Hooke’s design of a bar with a spring (or ‘arm’, according to Hooke) which is attached to a weight and a secondary rope. The bar, when the primary rope or chain by which the weight is drawn up or down is fastened on its end, remains perpendicular to both ropes, and the hole at the other end of the bar allows the weight to move freely along the larger support rope. When the primary rope fails, it tips the bar to an oblique position and the spring catches the support rope, thus stopping the weight from falling all the way down. Hooke argued that this could be used for the chime weights of clocks, or weights used in mines. Hooke reported on this device at the meeting of the Royal Society on 11 July 1683, when it was ordered to be placed in the Register Book.
Object history
At the meeting of the Royal Society on 11 July 1683, ‘[Mr. Hooke] shewed likewise a way to stop any great weight from falling down to the bottom, when the rope of chain, by which it is drawn, chances to break’ (Birch 4:214).
The account, with the figure, was printed in Robert Hooke, Philosophical Experiments and Observations, ed. by W. Derham (1726), pp. 109-10.
The account, with the figure, was printed in Robert Hooke, Philosophical Experiments and Observations, ed. by W. Derham (1726), pp. 109-10.
Related fellows
Robert Hooke (1635 - 1703, British) , Natural philosopher
Associated place