US1561247A - Metallic composition - Google Patents

Description

Patented Novflo, 1925.

I UNITED STATESVPATENT OFFICE.

EDWIN I. KINGSBURY, OF RUTHERFORD, NEW JERSEY, ASSIGNOR TO WESTERN ELEC- TRIO COMPANY, INCORPORATED, OF NEW YORK, N. Y., A CORPORATION OF NEW yomr. I

'METALLIC COMPOSITION.

No Drawing.

To'all whom it may. concern:

Be it known that I, EDWIN F. KINGSBURY, a citizen of the United States, residing at Rutherford, in the countyof Bergen, State of New Jersey, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Metallic Compositions, of which the following is a full, clear, concise, and exact description.

This invention relates to metallic compositions for use inconnection with electrical apparatus, and its object is to provide an alloy which is relatively inexpensive and which nevertheless possesses the roperties which are requisite in a metal to Ee used in g electrical contacts and the like.

In accordance with the features of the invention, there is provided an alloy of gold and silver with a base metal. introduced in quantities suflicient to materially lessen the cost without destroying the non-tarnishing property of pure gold; and sufficient quantities of one or more base metals, such as nickel, cobalt, iron, copper, tin, and the like, are added to produce an alloy having the resistance to electrical and mechanical wear necessary in a contact metal. The amount of such base metal which may be added, however, is limited, by the tendency of alloys containing a large amount thereof to have formed on them base metal oxides, which seriously increase their electrical resistance. It has been found that the tendency to form base metal oxide is present to an objectionable extent in 211- loys in which the atomic proportion of base metal is greater than 12%. It has also been found that the amount of gold in the alloy The silver is Application filed September 7, 1923. Serial No. 661,519.

should be at least as great as 37 atoms in a hundred, or over 50% of the alloy by welght. The preferred atomic proportions of the metal, to be used in such an alloy is as follows: i

Per cent. Gold 57.2 Silver 38 Base metal 4.8

Nickel has been found to be the most satlsfactory base metal to be used with gold and silver to form a contact alloy; and, while any quantity of nickel between onehalf of one per cent to five per cent by weight may be satisfactorily employed, the

pre erred alloy contains the metals in the following proportions by weight:

Per cent. Gold 72 Silver 26.2 Nickel 1.8

- EDWIN F. KINGSBUR-Y.