Object Description
This rare example of a bourdon barometer has a five inch reverse printed glass dial showing 28 to 31 inches of barometric pressure and English weather predictions. It has a blue steel indicating hand and a brass pointer operated by a knurled knob to the front of the glass.
The movement has Eugene Bourdon’s tell-tale crescent shaped flattened vacuum tube with tear dropped fan shaped rack operated by twin levers and is stamped to the movement with the serial number 15691.
The barometer has a graduated brass case with adjustment hole to the centre of the back plate. The case rests on an ebonised wooden stand.
The French engineer Eugene Bourdon (1808-1884) was an early competitor to Lucien Vidie (inventor of the bellows movement) registering his patent for this crescent shaped mechanism design in 1849. He was a prolific inventor and a maker of repute and died in 1884. His barometer movements are today prized for their workmanship, beauty and for their rarity. It is Vidie’s design which became the most widely used however.