Ross v. Dowden Mfg. Co.

• Decision Date: 04 November 1907
• Docket Number: 2,561.
• Citation: 157 F. 681
• Parties: ROSS v. DOWDEN MFG. CO.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

157 F. 681

ROSS v. DOWDEN MFG. CO.

No. 2,561.

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

November 4, 1907

Appeal from the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern District of Iowa.

Wallace R. Lane and Robert H. Haines, for appellant.

William B. Brown and John I. Dille (Brown & Dille, on the brief), for appellee.

Before VAN DEVANTER and ADAMS, Circuit Judges, and RINER, District judge.

RINER District Judge.

This is an appeal from a decree entered by the Circuit Court for the Southern District of Iowa dismissing a bill brought for an alleged infringement of patent No. 640,816, granted to George M. Ross, January 9, 1900, for an attachment to potato harvesters. Claim 1 of the patent, alleged to have been infringed by the defendant, reads as follows:

'1. In combination with a potato harvester having a conveyer to move upwardly and rearwardly and carry earth and potatoes and discharge them from the rear of the conveyer, an auxiliary vertically adjustable conveyer having a hinged connection with the frame of the machine and composed of a series of transversely extended bars adapted to permit the lumps of earth to be broken up as they fall thereon and to pass through said auxiliary conveyer and to carry the potatoes to a point of discharge in the rear so that they will fall on top of the earth, and means for raising and lowering the rear end of the auxiliary conveyer in the manner set forth for the purposes stated.'

The invention, as described in the specifications--

'relates to that class of potato harvesters in which the potatoes are conveyed over a sieve-like carrier which separates them from the earth and which are dropped at the rear of the machine and it consists of an attachment which may be applied to potato harvesters of this class-- such, for example, as the harvester illustrated in the patent issued to Ashford T Dowden, February 1, 1887, and numbered 357,119. * * * The object of this invention is to provide means for carrying the potatoes to a point some distance in the rear of the endless carrier, so that the broken clods and other matter may first fall to the ground and then the potatoes be dropped on top of the ground, so that they may be readily seen and not be buried by said matter.'

The construction, omitting the numerals, is thus described by the patentee:

'My attachments comprise two flat supporting arms fixed to the sides of the machine-frame to project downwardly and rearwardly, one of them having near its central portion a slot, in which an idler is adjustably clamped. At the lower end of each of these side pieces a shaft is rotatably mounted, and on one end of this shaft is a sprocket-wheel, having a sprocket chain passed under it, around the said idler and over a sprocket-wheel, fixed to the shaft (referring to the shaft on the harvester). Hence, this shaft will be constantly rotated during the advance of the machine. A rectangular frame is pivoted at its forward lower corner to the said shaft, and said frame extends straight rearwardly. A mating frame is pivoted at the opposite side of the machine, and in the rear lower corner of this frame a shaft is fixed, which serves to clamp the rear ends of the said frames together and which provides a bearing for the sprocket-wheels which are rotatably mounted thereon. An endless conveyer, composed of a series of transversely-extended rods having integral hooks extending at right angles from their ends and interlocked, is passed over the said sprockets and also over the sprockets fixed to the shaft. Thus an auxiliary conveyer is provided to extend from a point in the rear of the conveyer and a considerable distance rearwardly to the point of discharge. Means are provided for raising and lowering this frame, so that when the front end of the harvester is elevated the said conveyer will not rest upon the ground. These means comprise a lever, fulcrumed to a part of the machine-frame and extended straight upwardly at one side of the driver's seat. Attached to this lever is a gravity-actuated pawl, which is operated by the bell-crank lever, adjacent to the handle of the lever. A segmental-rack is fixed to the machine-frame adjacent to the pawl. A rod is adjustably connected with the lever and attached to the forward upper corner of the frame. Hence, when the said lever is moved forwardly the rear lower corner of the frame will necessarily be raised.'

It will be noticed that the claim in controversy calls for a conveyer to move upwardly and rearwardly, having a hinged connection with the frame of the machine, composed of a series of transversely-extended bars adapted to permit the lumps of earth to be broken up as they fall thereon and to pass through the conveyer and to carry the potatoes to a point of discharge in the rear, so that they will fall on top of the earth. It also calls for a means for raising and lowering the rear end of the conveyer, 'in manner set forth for the purposes stated. ' When we refer back to the specifications, we find that these means for raising and lowering the conveyer are two rectangular mating-frames, a lever, a connecting rod attached to the lever having an arm at the opposite end to the lever, and a pivotal mounting of each mating frame at its lower front corner at a point adjacent to the ground.

The testimony shows that the conveyer itself is identical in every particular with the conveyer on the Dowden harvester referred to in complainant's patent, which has been in use for many years. It is attached in the same way and driven by the same driving...