Home/U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Southern New York/National Meter Co. v. Thomson Meter Co.

National Meter Co. v. Thomson Meter Co.

106 F. 531, 1900 U.S. App. LEXIS 4764
CourtU.S. Circuit Court for the District of Southern New York
DecidedOctober 5, 1900
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 106 F. 531 (National Meter Co. v. Thomson Meter Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Southern New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
National Meter Co. v. Thomson Meter Co., 106 F. 531, 1900 U.S. App. LEXIS 4764 (circtsdny 1900).

Opinion

TOWNSEND, District Judge.

Final bearing on bill and answer raising questions of validity and infringement of tbe first and third claims of complainant’s patent, No. 547,178, granted October 1,1895, and of tbe two claims of patent No. 527,535, granted October 16, 1894, to L. H. Nash for improvements in disk water meters. Tbe class of meters to which these patents relate, tbe construction of tbe patent under which defendant herein claims to make tbe meters alleged to infringe, and tbe relations of tbe parties hereto have been discussed in tbe suit of this defendant against this complainant beard at the same session of this court, 106 Fed. 519. All tbe evidence in said suit has been stipulated into this suit, and many of tbe questions involved herein were therein discussed and disposed of. The following statement recapitulates some of the facts already found, in connection with other facts bearing directly on the issues herein: The parties are rival water-meter manufacturers. Each of the pat-entees is an inventor in the same art. Each had made valuable contributions thereto prior to the inventions involved in these suits. The Thomson patent, No. 387,831, the second claim of which was tbe basis of tbe other suit, was dated August 14, 1888. Between said date and November 23, 1895, tbe date of the alleged infringement herein, tbe Thomson Conipany sold about 65,000 meters, none of which had ports such as are shown in said Thomson patent, and all of which had ports such as were shown in the prior Thomson & Lambert patent, although during all this time they had been experimenting to find out “how the ports ought to be formed and proportioned to get the self-control of the disk by the current without any rigid control.” Prior to this later date, namely, ,on October 1, 1895, the main Nash patent in suit, No. 547,178, hereinafter to be called “Nash No. 1,” was issued to this complainant. That is, nearly two months after the issuance of this Nash No. 1 patent, and over a year after the Nash Company had put on the market a meter built according to its patent, and having its piston held to its seat without mechanical control (being the meter alleged to infringe in the Thomson suit), the Thomson Company first made and sold a meter differing from the old Thomson & Lambert, and so closely resembling the construction of Nash No. 1 that, barring a contention of accidental sale, infringement is practically admitted. In view of the foregoing and other facts, it was held in said other suit that the second claim of the Thomson patent did not cover an operative construction for holding a piston on its seat by water pressure alone. On the argument in this case it was agreed as follows:

“That after the issuance of the Nash patent, and after complainant’s meters were put on the market, the changes made hy defendant consisted in the construction of ports as in defendant’s wide-flange meter No. 3 and Thomson meter No. 4. The changes consisted in opening or enlarging the [533]*533pert in the piston, and diminishing the outlet port, as indicated, substantially, by line 30, figures 4 and 5, of the Ñash patent.”

It will be necessary to refer to said patent and exhibits to show the nature of these changes.

Complainant claims that Nash made the brilliant discovery of the principle, and the invention of the means for accomplishing this object, and disclosed it in patent No. 1, and that defendant infringes the first and third claims, which are as follows:

“(1) In a water meter, a nutating piston combined with a measuring chamber and with ports so constructed and proportioned relatively to eacli other as to constantly maintain a. superior resultant pressure opposite the linos of contact between the piston and its cones. (3) In a water meter, a nutating piston provided with a port or ports communicating between the chamber on opposite sides of the piston, combined with ports in the ease; said ports being-so constructed and proportioned relatively to each" oilier as to constantly maintain a superior resultant pressure opposite the lines of contact between the piston and its cone.”

Perhaps the problem which complainant herein claims wasJ presented to Nash prior to 1895 cannot he more forcibly stated than in the language of Mr, Benjamin, the expert for complainant in the Thomson Case, where he was stating the problem which was presented to Thomson prior to 1888. He says:

“The question, therefore, before the inventor is, how can a nutating' meter be constructed so that the disk by reason of tiiat construction shall remain balanced in the chamber while constantly maintaining contact with the chamber cones, under all conditions of water supply up to the maximum which the meter will permit 1o pass, thereby preventing leakage and thereby causing the meter to perform its maximum duly? The patentee of .the patent in suit has discovered the answer; and, so far as I know, for the first time in the art he shows that the desired result can be secured by a. certain shaping and relative proportioning of the inlet and outlet ports of the meter chamber, so that the apparatus is rendered independent, of the force of the water flow, and requires no adjustment and no variation in point oí construction with relation thereto, even up to the condition when the maximum possible current, enters the inlet port, or, in other words, the meter is rendered always self-balancing by reason of its permanent construction.”

Thomson did not solve this problem. Neither he nor any one else even tested his patented construction to see whether it would have this effect until after the issue of the patent in suit. Did Nash solve this problem? In his patent he says:

“One of the principal features of my present invention consists in proportioning either the inlet or outlet, hut. preferably both the inlet and outlet, ports with relation to the enlarging and contracting measuring chambers with which they communicate, so that the unequal pressures on the opposite surfaces of the piston will automatically develop k force always tending to hold it in joint-forming contact with its case. This may be accomplished in various ways in a structure like that which is illustrated here. I have shown one way which is efficient, and in connection therewith have shown the ports as I at present prefer to make them.
“Figs, -i and 5 are representations of a measuring chamber with a nutating piston in two different positions, and with inlet and outlet ports in the side walls of maximum capacity. We will assume that the chambers on the right-hand side of riio abutment, 21, are the enlarging and receiving chambers, and that those on the left-hand side are the discharging and contracting chambers. 23 and 24 thus show two enlarging chambers, and 25 and 26 two contracting chambers. The edge of the piston separates not only the enlarging chambers, hut also defines the limits of the ports loading to each. The ports and the measuring chambers are constantly changing in size as the piston moves. It
[534]

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
106 F. 531, 1900 U.S. App. LEXIS 4764, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/national-meter-co-v-thomson-meter-co-circtsdny-1900.