AN IMPROVED DESCRIPTION OF ARTIFICIAL FUEL
Year: 1854

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Charles Blunt, of Sydenham, in the County of Kent,
Gontleman, and Joseph John William Watson, of Wandsworth, Doctor of
Philosophy, for the Invention of "AN IMPROVED DESCRIPTION OF ARTIFICIAL
FUEL."
Sealed the 20th October 1854, and dated the 22nd August 1854.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Charles Blunt and Joseph
John William Watson at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents,
with their Petition, on the 22nd August 1854.
We, CHARLES BLUNT, of Sydenham, in the County of Kent, Gentleman,'
and JOSEPH JOHN WILLIAM WATSON, of Wandsworth, Doctor of Philosophy,
do hereby declare that the Invention for "AN IMPROVED DESCRIPTION OF ARTI-
FICIAL FUEL to be as follows:-
Our improvements consist, first, in the introduction of a cellular, spherical,
or spheroidal form to the fuel, whereby a great facility of combustion is
obtained, and the whole or nearly the whole of the products consumed without
the production of smoke or other fuliginous matters.
Secondly, the use of bituminus matters with small or screened coal or other
carbonaceous matters in the production of the aforesaid form.
Thirdly, the introduction of perforations and corrugations in the body or
on the surface of the spheres to produce and multiply the points of ignition."

page_text: Fourthly, the production of the separate spheres in two hemispheres or other
sections, and their subsequent junction to form the spheres.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Charles Blunt and Joseph John William Watson in the
Great Seal Patent Office on the 20th February 1855.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, CHARLES
BLUNT, of Sydenham, in the County of Kent, Gentleman, and JOSEPH JOHN
WILLIAM WATSON, of Wandsworth, in the County of Surrey, Doctor of
Philosophy, send greeting..
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-first day of August, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-four, in the eighteenth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto us, the
said Charles Blunt and Joseph John William Watson, Her special licence
that we, the said Charles Blunt and Joseph John William Watson, our
executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as we, the said Charles
Blunt and Joseph John William Watson, our executors, administrators, and
assigns, should at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time
and at all times thereafter during the term therein expressed, should and
lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within the United Kingdom of
Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Inven-
tion for "AN IMPROVED DESCRIPTION OF ARTIFICIAL FUEL," upon the condition
(amongst others) that we, the said Charles Blunt and Joseph John William
Watson, by an instrument in writing under our hands and seals, should par-
ticularly describe and ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in what
manner the same was to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the
Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar months next and immediately
after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that we, the said Charles Blunt and Joseph John
William Watson, do hereby declare the nature of our said Invention, and in
what manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and
ascertained in and by the following statement and accompanying Drawings
(that is to say)
Our improvements consist in the introduction of a cellular, spherical, or

page_text: spheroidal form to the fuel, whereby great facility of combustion is obtained, and
the whole or larger portion of the products consumed; indeed, so strikingly great
have been the results obtained by the figure in the first place, and the cellular
form of our new fuel in the next, that it may be safely advanced to be the only
practical improvement since the economy effected by the introduction of the
tubular boiler in the generation of steam, or the hot blast in the manufacture
of iron; so palpable have been the advantages in time, economy of fuel
employed, and results obtained, as to fairly justify the presumption that the
cellular and spherical form of fuel places itself even in advance of the two
great Inventions here referred to. The immense interests employing coal as a
manufacturing agent, the still increasing demand for general steam and
locomotive power, added to the extraordinary consumption of the domestic
economy, renders an Invention which combines many practical and unique
advantages a matter of absorbing and startling character, more particularly so
when it is considered that such fuel is composed of or may be made from
materials and of matters heretofore considered of little value, and entirely
useless for all the great ends at which we aim in the employment of first-
class coal.
Having introduced the consideration of the subject by these general but
leading remarks, we shall proceed to describe the actual construction and
arrangement of the various forms of our cellular and spherical fuel, which we
propose to adopt, and which will (reference being made to the Drawings of the
same, which accompany this our Specification,) best exhibit our principle of
construction and the entire novelty thereof. The fuel denominated cellular or
spherical, and which may be made in their forms either cellular or spherical,
or which, if required, can be made of both figures at the same time, is shortly
described. It consists of hollow or cellular spheres, or of spheroidal or other
analogous forms, varying from 2 to 12 inches in diameter; these spheres, balls,
or other forms of fuel are composed of the small of screened coal, or other
small, found in great quantities at the pit's mouth. The screenings, small, or
debris thus obtained, possessing the character of being the more unctious or
finest portion of the coal raised from given workings, have for the purposes of
conversion into a solid form advantages upon which we may be justified in
directing particular attention when speaking of and describing distinctly the
various materials of which our cellular and spherical fuel may be made. The
materials of such fuel need not, nor is it intended or proposed should be,
confined to the small or screenings of coal here referred to, but may evidently
be composed of any carbonaceous matters whatever now employed as fuel, in.
which the homogeneity of its component materials, and the integrity of its

page_text: figure, can be preserved to it by the bitumenous or other cohesive agent
employed in the manufacture and manipulation of the ball.
Having given an account of the figure of our improved fuel, we proceed to
explain our reasons for the adoption of the particular forms set forth, and to
describe the practical results obtained in combustion over every and whatever
other method of consuming the same material in present use.
Atmospheric air contains four-fifths of its bulk of matter which does not in
any manner assist combustion; two pounds and a half of oxygen, or nearly 30
feet, are requisite for the combustion of one pound of coal; 150 cubic feet of
air will supply this. It has been found that one-third of the air which enters a
furnace passes through it, without directly contributing to the process of com-
bustion, but withdraws heat. The actual amount, therefore, of air required is
about 220 cubic feet in round numbers. Now, the cellular form of fuel, and the
interstices produced by its contact being only on points, it is impossible but
that the whole or nearly so of the products obtained should be consumed, by
allowing around and within itself a vastly larger amount of oxygen to reach the
fuel in a given time than could otherwise do so if the fuel was employed in the
usual form; an additional feature of advantage being that the heat generated
in the combustion of this form of fuel does not pass off in fuligenous waste.
It has been already stated that we do not confine ourselves in the making of
cellular fuel to any particular class of coal, but that the form adopted by us is
capable of and is intended to apply to and comprise all and every matter
of carbonaceous character which can be held homogeneically, in such form by
bituminous or other cohesive matters or compounds; the character, therefore,
as a fuel, will vary with the nature and calorific value of the materials
employed. Thus, if the coal raised from the pits of Northumberland or Durham
yield forty per cent. of bitumen, the quantity of which is their chief recom-
mendation to a household coal, the cellular or spherical fuel can present no
less if made from the waste or screenings of these fields; and it will follow as
a matter of course, that the new fuel, if made from the small or screenings of
the Cannel coal of Lancashire, the parrot coal of Scotland, or the stone or
ordinary coal of the Staffordshire collieries, which respectively yield only twenty
per cent. of bituminous matter, may at once compete with the fuel made from
the screenings of the finest coal by the requisite amount of bituminous matter
being superadded.
DESCRIPTION OF THE ILLUSTRATIVE DRAWING.
The Figures in this Drawing exhibit the spherical and cellular form of
construction, and are drawn of the full size of one of the smaller class, viz', of

page_text: three inches in diameter, the same arrangement of cells being common to the
balls of the larger classes, whether spherical or spheroidal, and are, with the
exception of Figs. 5 and 10, wholly sectional.
Fig. 1 exhibits a circular perforation or cell through the centre of the
ball or axis.
Fig. 2 exhibits a transverse section of such cell.
Fig. 3 exhibits a conical perforation or cell with circular end.
Fig. 4 exhibits six conical cells or perforations with semicircular ends.
Fig. 5 exhibits the transverse or ends of three of the six cells of Fig. 4.
Fig. 6 exhibits a cell or perforation shorter than the cell of Fig. 3.
Fig. 7 exhibits two conical perforations with circular ends.
Fig. 8 exhibits a hollow sphere with two conical outlets.
Fig. 9 exhibits two semicircular cells.
Fig. 10 exhibits an end view of same, shewing at the same time that
this form of fuel is composed of two hemispheres, to be subsequently joined.
Fig. 11 exhibits a transverse section of a ball composed of two hemispheres,
with a square perforation or cell, also to be subsequently joined. This Figure
represents the general appearance and character of the materials of which it is
composed.
Fig. 12 exhibits a corrugated series of small cells upon its surface, and which
may be made of solid form or with a spherical cell, and in two hemispheres, to
be subsequently joined, as Figures 10 and 11.
Fig. 18 exhibits a transverse section through the centre of the ball, with
eight outlets.
Fig. 14 exhibits a ball with octagonal facets formed thereon, made hollow,
as Figs. 10, 12, and 13.
Fig. 15 exhibits a ball or sphere out of which the cell or cavity is formed
by taking from it a sectoral quantity, amounting to about one-eighth of
its bulk.
Having thus described the nature of our said Invention, and the manner in
which the same is to be performed, we would here have it to be understood
that, although we have herein set forth particular examples and instances of
express organization in shewing and describing the same, and various arrange-
ments, more or less in detail, of the forms and configuration of and in which it
is composed by us in carrying out our said Invention, yet we say that we
present the same in this our Specification rather as modes of elucidation of the
principle of construction than, and in accordance with the requisition made to
that effect in the grant of our Letters Patent, as giving some positive modes of
organization for those principles of construction, than as exclusively and strictly

page_text: confining ourselves to or giving them as the only definite and positive modes of
practical construction in which our said Invention is to be carried out; but that
we claim them generally, in the manner and as they are herein stated, but not
confining ourselves to the minute precision of organization, such combinations,
or such definital and fixed applications, provided that and so far the peculiar
character of any or either part of the said Invention, as well as the entirety
thereof in its general principle of construction and practical use, be used,
retained, or put in practice, under any change of form and configuration, any
transposition of parts, modification thereof whatsoever. It being distinctly
understood and taken as our substantive and positive claim of novelty, and of
our Invention in regard to this our Patent, is the formation of the blocks of the
fuel with passages into or through their bulk and substance, for the express
purpose of admitting currents of the surrounding atmosphere thereto, after
the manner described, or under any such modification thereof, as may be
substantially the same in design and effect.
In witness whereof, we, the said Charles Blunt and Joseph John William
Watson, have hereunto set our hands and seals, this Seventeenth day
of February, in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and
fifty five
CHARLES BLUNT.
(L.S.)
JOSEPH J. W. WATSON. (L.S.)
CHARLES BLUNT.
(L.S.)
JOSEPH J. W. WATSON. (L.S.)