The Scott & Baker patent was a different action cocking system. If your cocking rods emerge on the flat of the action, just behind the knuckle, engages with a hook on the barrel flat and PULLS the tumbler to cock it then that is the S&B patent no 761 of 1878.
If the cocking rod emerges low on the knuckle of the action and PUSHES the tumbler to cock it, it is the Perkes patent 1968 of 1878.
As regards improvements, many patents attempted to get round pre-existing patent by 'improvements' and generally at that time the patent office would accept them and then let the 2 protagonists fight it out in court if they wanted.
If you will forgive the wordiness, I can probably do no better than to quote the following:
A patent was a form of protection for an idea, granted to the inventor under the authority of the sovereign so that he might realise the full commercial value of the invention. Prior to the Great Exhibition in 1851, the patent laws were hugely expensive and complicated which discouraged all but the very wealthy, or bold, from patenting anything. This of course did little to encourage experimentation or innovation. However, HRH Prince Albert, after playing a leading role in the promotion of the Great Exhibition, went on to support the Patent Act of 1852 which revolutionised the process of protecting one’s imaginative improvements on any object. Patents became cheap and simple to obtain and so there was an incentive to protect anything that appeared to have some potential.
To obtain this protection the inventor firstly had to submit a complete specification, with drawings, to a sufficient level of clarity that a skilled worker within the appropriate trade could make use of the invention without having to further invent for himself. Secondly, the inventor had to pay the prescribed fees which defined the length of time that the invention was to be protected.
In 1860, after paying the draftsman some Ł10 for his work, the inventor would have to pay Ł15 for the first three years of the patent followed by Ł50 for a further four years and then Ł100 to prolong the patent for its maximum life of fourteen years.
A ‘provisional’ patent was a less detailed, often un-illustrated, specification which was deposited with, and kept secret by, the Patent Office for a period of six months during which the full patent had to be submitted.
The flaw in this scheme was that it gave little disincentive to publish a patent even if it was hardly more than a copy, or assembly, of other peoples’ patents. In the end, the successful patentee was not necessarily the first to claim an idea but often the most litigious and/or wealthy inventor. Often you will find the same well defined ideas in several different patents but since the idea may never have become particularly valuable, no one felt it worth their while to dispute it in the courts.
A notable exception to this is the ejector mechanism found on many guns of the 1880’s and 1890’s which was the cause of an extremely acrimonious legal action between Thomas Perkes and John Deeley, the son of the chairman of the Westley Richards company. Deeley sued Perkes for infringement of his patent no. 14526 of 1884 but lost, both at the original hearing and in the Court of Appeal. This case was hugely expensive and although he won the battle, Thomas Perkes could be said to have lost the war and was declared bankrupt in 1898.
Many patents were not protected for the fullest possible period and as soon as protection lapsed, they became public property and if meritorious, were often included in specifications for other actions and ideas.
Patents, while still protected, were often credited by a stamp or engraving on the action, sometimes for all to see on an external surface but often hidden internally. These stamps may give the name of the inventor or only the patent number and date. In other cases a succinct description of the patent, eg. ‘Patent Block Safety’, or simply the word ‘Patent’ may be engraved on the action along with a ‘use number’.
Last edited by Toby Barclay; 08/20/12 02:24 PM.
