The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1878-09-19
ARTIFICIAL, ICE

An Apparatus which VIII Turn out Thirty
Tons Of Clear Ice in n Dny-How IL Is
Done.
The ice factory recently opened in
West Eleventh street was visited by O
Herald reporter, and it proved to be an
object of much interest. The ice, pro-
duced in blocks of about five hundred
pounds each, measuring four feet square
and nine inches thick, was 80 clear that
the hour could plainly be told on watch
dial through the entire thickness of the
block. Printed bills and bottles of
champagne were frozen tight in the ice.
The bills were read with the greatest
ease through the side of the block in
which they had been embedded. A ther-
mometer embedded with Fahrenheit's
scale was frozen into the block at q point
marking nineteen degrees below the
freezing point.
The ice generating apparatus is run,
in the present instance, by steam en-
gine of twenty horse power. On the
right hand of the engine is the refrigera-
tor, copper tubular vessel, enclosed in
wooden box about six or seven feet
square. The refrigerator is charged
with liquid ether, evaporated, when re-
required, by vacuum pump, which
stands on the left of the engine and is
connected by copper tubes with the
refrigerator. The ether is drawn away
in the form of vapor and passed into a
copper tubular condenser, where, under
a low degree of pressure, aided by q
stream of water, it is again brought back
to its original state and returns through
the ether cooler into the meter, which
regulates the flow of the liquid ether
into the refrigerator. The same ether
is used continuously with inappreciable
loss. To utilize the cold produced by
the ether strong, uncongealable brine
is circulated by o machine called the
brine pump through the tubes of the re-
frigerator, parting with its heat to the
ether vapor on it's passage. Thus it
leaves that vessel at temperature many
degrees below the freezing point and is
then used in the freezing tanks, return
ing afterward to the machine to be re.
cooled. For the manufacture of ice
blocks the machine is furnished with
large woopen tanks (placed at the left OF
the vacuum pump) of any convenient
dimensions, which tanks are filled with
the fresh water to be frozen. In the
tanks number of hollow metal cells are
fitted and 30 connected with the refriger.
ator and with each other that the cold
leaving the refrigerator at temperature
of from fourteen to twenty degrees
Fahrenheit, is continually circulated in.
side them, thus causing the water in the
tanks, on each side, to CONCEAL until the
required thickness of ice has been OBJ
tanned by the process of successive
layers, but done as closely and compact.
ly as nature performs her admirable
| work in winter on the lakes and ponds.
| When the blocks are frozen solid the
cold brine is pumped out of the cells and
replaced by brine of the ordinary atmos.
pheric temperature. The circulation oi
this comparatively warm brine, for o
| few minutes in the cells, loosens the ice
from their sides and renders its remova
very easy. A knotted and looped rope is
frozen into the block, hook is inserted
in the loop and the block is hoisted
away. 1t is then carried by means of 0
traveller in any convenient direction fol
delivery at the door of the factory.
It is claimed that this machine, which
| however novel here, has been in use fol
about nine years in England, con pro
duce thirty tons of ice daily at cost o
one dollar a ton. 1t requires an en-
gineer, two firemen and two laborers tc
work it. It will cost, however, from
$75, 900 to 800, 900 to put it in running
order, SO that the invention could onl,
be made available to corporations or pri
vate individuals commanding consider
able amount of capital. .--NeaO Yorj
Herald.