1867 Chatwood v Herring Safe Challerge

[Adrian Weber]

Which book are we talking about again? Sorry I lost it a bit

one of the Germans produced a key and tried it in the lock

Ja ja, ze Germans

I can't believe that the knowledgeable German would have bothered for an instant to try sight reading

Wouldn't be so sure about that. I recently had the honor to meet Kromers "Keymaster" the person that is making replacement keys for older Protector locks. Some of them being older than 100 years. He has course the right machines to do that. I was still impressed by his knowledge and what he is capable of achieving even with simple tools.

[Tom Gordon]

A lot of crying came out of the Chatwood camp both prior and after the challenge. I think this safe would have put them over the edge. It is probably the one Herring was trying to bring in from LeHavre.

There was wilful shenanigans on both sides such as Herring probably trying to substitute this safe shown by yourself.
I don't think it fair to call anything before the test "crying" when they didn't protest enough about a whole range of things, which as a direct result ended up in the mess that it did.
Afterwards, there was both lots more shenanigans and a lot to complain about. Crying in my book is when you give up and do nothing constructive. What chatwood did was to get the courts (with a much more complete range of evidence no doubt) to decide that he was the winner.

[Tom Gordon]

Which book are we talking about again?

Don't mention ze war
Sorry I mean "the battle of the safes by George Sala"
make sure to get it in "Easyscript" or else the text is unbelievably tiny. Sala already made it very difficult to read by the odd way he set the text interweaving his fiction with some of the facts...probably on purpose.

[Adrian Weber]

Hey Tom,

Thank you very much my friend!
Just downloaded it but would also be interested in the hard copy one day :)

[Doug MacQueen]

I don't know about supplying more complete evidence, but you could say the squeeky wheel did, in fact, get greased.

[Tom Gordon]

I am more than happy to discuss this murky affair and I have readily conceded that many things Chatwood complained about were misleading or irrelevant - as we're many utterances from Herring.
100 years on with little concrete evidence to refer to, I am confident that any court would have seen far more detail than we have as well as being able to cross examine both sides. Therefore I think it relevant that the courts decided for Chatwood and let us remember that this was a French court.
to say that Chatwood won because he complained loudest adds nothing, especially as Herring wrote some very dubious stuff to English and US newspapers and instantly leafletted in the exhibition as well as publishing his own report claiming to be from the committee.
if Herring had had his latest safe and Chatwood his latest Octuple safe then it would have been a very different and more difficult challenge.
twenty five years afterwards, the US treasury itself was very scathing of Herrings safes yet were all luvved up with the new to America steels which Chatwood were using in their octuple safes 25 years before.

[Doug MacQueen]

Hi Tom, yes it is all good here. Not that I doubt you because I do not, but can you post the patent you speak of. For that matter, can you post or direct me to a photo of a Chatwood Septuple or Octuple safe. Before we muddy the waters too much, I would point out that the U.S. Treasury testing you speak of did in fact, fall in love with the Corliss safe, which was not of made of either English or U.S. steel, but was white (chilled) cast iron. Doug

[Tom Gordon]

TSamuel Chatwood Patent No. 415 Molton Spiegeleisen run between door plates. Hydraulic operation of well safe.The Chatwood safe tested was the Septuple Patent in which the filling between the dovetailed 1/2" plates was probably of haematite iron and more prone to shattering than the 'spiegeleisen' which was patented in 1868 and incorporated in the Octuple Patent, which was still a square dovetailed body and with sliding claw boltwork. The specification is described under the catagory of List 8 in the year 1880 and it is mentioned that it is superior to the 1867 version of the Paris test. September 2 1865 No 2265 CHATWOOD, Samuel The object of this invention, relating to the construction of safes of cast iron by two separate operations, is described as follows: I run into moulds of the required form for safes or parts of safes for strong rooms or parts of strong rooms, and for doors or parts of doors any hard or brittle metal, and produce castings having projections, or indentations, or holes, or perforations of any form or shape on or in those parts intended to be coated over with, or cast on or surrounded with soft or ductile metal which is cast on the hard or brittle metal in a molten state and in suitable moulds for the purpose."The arrangement of the metals may be hard or brittle inside the safe, room, or door, and soft or ductile outside, or the reverse, also soft or ductile metal between hard or brittle metal, or hard or brittle metal between soft or ductile metal."To prevent detrimental strain by the contraction of the metal cast on the other metal, I take the first casting as soon as the metal is set and while it is still in a hot state, and place it in a mould prepared for it, and run the other metal in a molten state upon it, so that when they cool together the tensile property of the last named-metal will not be much decreased in any of its parts or fractured by contraction."The metals I prefer for the hard or brittle castings, beforenamed, are compounds of iron and carbon or steel; of iron, carbon, and manganese; of iron and titanium; and those for the soft of ductile portions are decarbonized iron or iron and carbon or steel. The details of other parts and apparatus required for the fitting up of safes, are cast of soft or ductile metal.[Printed, 4d. No Drawings]

[Tom Gordon]

* spiegeleisen - a ferro-manganese alloy the original purpose of which was as an additive to steel during the Bessemer process to reduce brittleness and blowholes. ** chilled cast iron - unlike steel, cast iron does not readily oxidise with the application of the oxy-acetylene torch and is therefore much more difficult to cut. It is however extremely brittle and can readily shatter under heavy impact. The means of applying this material in door and body construction is in plate or slab form, varying from a useless 18mm to a more effective 50mm, but can be ineffective in circumstances where entire sides, back, or door can be delaminated. (i.e.when there is sufficient space around the safe to mount such an attack.

[Tom Gordon]

PS I do own an 1873 octuple with good original paintwork plus the removable knob that was the locking escutcheon....but as I am gallivanting off on holiday at the moment, I can't show you a picture, sorry
cheers
tom