Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 92.djvu/913

 Popular Science Monllth/ 897

Holding the Screw to the Screw- Electric Sparks Peel the Tomatoes.

Driver with a Vise- Grip

��Here's How It's Done

��C

��ARPENTERS,

��machinists and other workers who use screw-drivers fre- quently have to do their work under con- ditions which make it impossible to use both hands at the same time in starting a screw. For many- years the need was felt for some device that would hold the screw firmly against the edge of the screw- driver, that could be quickly put on and taken off and that would fit screw- drivers and screws of any size.

The screw-holder invented by David H. Royer, of Hart- ville, 0., fulfills these requirements and is

comparatively simple in construction. The

mere turning of a lever closes the jaws

and clamps of the device, so as to hold

the screw and the screw-driver securely.

By merely throwing back the lever, which

w^orks on the principle of an eccentric,

the grip of the device is released so that it

can be removed. To adapt the device for

use with screws of

different sizes, keys

or wedges are used,

which are inserted

between the screw- holding part and the

yoke, opposite the

eccentric-lever clamp.

Where screws are to

be inserted at heights

beyond convenient

reach, or where lack

of space interferes

with the workman,

this device should

prove especially use- -p^e

ful. the

���WILLIAM H. CHAI

��The man in the picture does not have to hold the screw. The device below does it, leaving his hands free

����PMAN, of Portland, Me., dis- covered that electric sparks, if allowed to strike the skin of a tomato, will puncture it and, by expanding the air underneath the skin, loosen it from the pulp. He thinks that he has solved the tomato- peeling problem for canners.

The tomato or fruit to be treated is im- paled upon a fork ro- tated around its long axis by a mechan- ically or electrically driven pulley. The fork is connected with an insulated wire which leads to the ground. A sliding base, operated by a handle, has, attached to the vertical post at its front end, a curved part lined on the inside of the curve wuth comb teeth of metal, through which sparks of a high voltage alternating current are allowed to pass to the impaled tomato or fruit. It is claimed that the device is very effective and does its work quickly and choroughly. This invention will undoubtedly be of particular value to canning factories, where large quanti- ties of tomatoes have to be peeled. For factory use, a modi- fied form of the de- vice is available.

The accompanying illustration conveys an idea of the work- ings of this device. The power may be obtained from an electric or other form of motor.

��high voltage sparks puncture tomato's skin and loosen it

�� �