Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 91.djvu/136

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An Attachment Which Will Lock Your Camera to the Tripod in an Instant

AN ingenious camera l\ attachment has been invented by Clarence J. Dawson, of Detroit, which will instantly lock your camera to its tripod, and will just as quickly re- lease it. It does away with the inconvenience of having to turn your cam- era a dozen times about the tripod stand in order to screw it down tight. With this attachment, the camera can be locked down by the mere pressing in of a bar, when pointing in any direction.

One-half of the attach- ment consists of a metal casing which is screwed permanently on the tripod stand. A slotted locking bar slides back and for- ward just beneath the top of this casing. The other half of the attachment consists merely of a metal disk through which a flat-head screw projects to within one eighth of an inch from its end. This half is screwed into the threaded aperture in the bottom of the cam- era. The camera is immediately ready to be locked to the tripod. This is accomplished by setting the camera down so that the flat- headed screw passes through the hole in the top of the metal casing, and through the hole in the locking bar, also. The bar is pressed in- ward. The wedge- shaped slot in the bar grips down upon the head of the screw, fast- ening down the camera in the operation.

Simple it surely is. and it can be made very cheaply. Auto- matic pressing machines could stamp the parts from sheet steel.

��Popular Science Monthly

��Inclined surface

���A flat-head screw is passed through the top of the casing and the hole in the slotted bar to the bottom of the camera

���Making the Acetylene Light as Brilliant as the Electric Lamp

THE accompanying ' diagram shows the detaiis of an ingenious de- vice which makes the acetylene light almost as brilliant as that cast by the electric lamp on auto- mobiles and motorcycles. The burner consists of a round disk, or "button," three-fourths of an inch in diameter, set in a pressed metal holder. It is made of the same white sub- stance of which ordinary gas mantles are construct- ed. A tiny bunsen burner directs the flame against this disk, which is thus caused to give out a bright incandescent light. The burner is designed to fit any standard headlight from an acetylene tank.

Two kinds of light may be produced. If the white disk and bunsen tube are pointed toward the reflector, a brilliant white light is thrown far ahead on the pathway. If the burner is turned so that the flame comes from the front, a diffused light is cast instead of the powerful ray. This is really equivalent to a dimmer, since it is a light which does not dazzle. No wrench or other tool is required for turning the burner. It can be easily accom- plished with the fingers.

��FACE OF BUTTON

��SPRING TO KEEP BUTTON IN HOLDER

��Here the light is directed into the tree top. At right is a diagram of the burner

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