IMPROVEMENTS IN THE APPARATUSES FOR TREATING SACCHARINE LIQUIDS
Year: 1862

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by John Fletcher at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 28th April
1862.
I, JOHN FLETCHER, of Farnham Place, Southwark, in the County of Surrey,
Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of my Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN
THE APPARATUSES FOR TREATING SACCHARINE LIQUIDS," to be as follows, that is
to say
My improvements relate to an improved construction of apparatuses
employed in various stages of the processes for treating cane and other sac-
charine juices for converting them into sugar, and I will proceed to describe
the same in the order in which they are employed in such manufacture.
The first part of my Invention has for object the superseding the use of
open fire-heated boilers employed for boiling saccharine liquids, and consists
in the arrangement and employment of an evaporating apparatus to perform
this operation with greater advantage. The improvements in this apparatus
are as follows:-I construct the pan or vessel for containing the liquid to be
treated with a curved bottom, from which the sides rise diagonally to within
a short distance of the top, where they assume a vertical direction, the ends
of the pan rising perpendicularly from the bottom. This pan is fitted with an
ordinary steam casing or jacket for beating the liquid in the interior of the
pan, and near to the bottom are set several series or groups of hollow tubes
set horizontally, the ends of which are secured to two circular flat drums, one
at either end of the pan, and which with the tubes rotate in the liquid. Each

page_text: drum at its centre is fitted with a hollow spindle, passing through a stuffing
box supporting the said tubes, one of the spindles serving for the induction of
steam into the drum from which the tubes receive their supply, and the other
for carrying off the condensed water. Each of the spindles is also furnished
at its outer end with a stuffing box. The interior of the last-mentioned drum
is divided into several equal compartments, as is also the interior of the
hollow spindle with which it is in connection, each compartment corresponding
with a group of tubes. The compartments of the drum and spindle are so
arranged as to lie opposite to each other, by which means, as the drum
revolves, each compartment carries up from the bottom the water resulting
from the condensation of the steam in the tubes, and discharges it through the
corresponding compartment in the spindle with which it is in connection, from
which it is discharged, while the water resulting from condensation in the
tubes which are uppermost runs off through one or more of the compartments
into the outlet spindle by its own gravity.
The second part of my Invention consists in an improved construction of
apparatus for. evaporating saccharine liquids, whether treated in the ordinary
fire-heated boilers, or in the improved apparatus herein-before described, for
superseding the same. The improvements in this apparatus consist in the
employment of a series of coils of metallic tubing heated by steam and con-
nected to a hollow shaft which passes through the centre of the coils. This
shaft has two compartments through its whole length, one for steam, and the
other for condensed, water. The outer end of each, coil is bent down by the
side of the coil and connected to the steam compartment, while the inner end
is connected to the water compartment in the shaft or spindle. A space is
left between each round of the coil to admit of a current of air passing through
the rounds of the coils to facilitate the carrying off of vapour. The coils are
placed at intervals on the shaft or spindle, which spindle is fitted with two
plummer blocks, one at either end, on which the shaft bearing the coils
revolves. The plummer blocks are fitted on to the trough or pan.containing
the liquor, which pan is partly encased in a second pan with a space. between
the two, to be filled with steam' to heat the contents of the inner pan. The
alternate ends of the steam and condensed water compartments in the shaft
spindle are closed; the other ends are left open, one to receive the steam and
the other to run off the condensed water. Each end of the shaft or spindle is
fitted with a stuffing box supported by the ends of the pan or trough. One
of the stuffing boxes is arranged to receive the steam from the generator,
and to conduct it into the compartment in the shaft or spindle, while the
second stuffing box serves for passing off the condensed water to what is
or

page_text: generally termed a condensed water box. The coils are secured to the shaft
by brackets, which are secured to the shaft by screws, which brackets are
stayed by each other by means of bars passing over their outer points longi-
tudinally with the shaft or spindle to which each bracket is secured. On these
bars are attached a series of small buckets placed at equal distances from the
centre of the shaft. The inner side of each bucket is corrugated, so that in
emptying themselves of the liquor which they have taken up from the pan or
trough in their revolution it may be divided into a greater number of small
streams, and more thoroughly liberate the vapour of the liquid under treatment.
The top of the apparatus is mounted with a conical or curved cover, with its
centre sufficiently high to leave space for the vapour to rise freely from the
liquor in the cistern, which vapour is then carried off through one or more
chimneys on the top of the cover. To assist in carrying off the vapour
through the chimney or chimnies I either leave space between the top of the
cistern and the cover for the admission of air, or make a hole or holes in the
cover itself. The cover is fitted with glass windows on its sides, which are
opposite to each other and at an angle to each other, so as to throw light on
the liquor in the cistern; the cover is also fitted with a door. I employ a
small jet of steam in the chimney or chimneys.
The third part of my Invention consists in the construction of an improved
cooling or granulating apparatus, in which the molasses of the sugar formed
by the cooling of the liquid treated in the preceding apparatus is run off
before the sugar is packed for transport. The improvements in this apparatus
consists in constructing the ordinary wooden or metallic cooling or granulating
trough with a triangular-shaped bottom, such bottom being fitted with tubes
running. longitudinally. One of these tubes is placed at the lowest part of
the triangular bottom, and one or more, according to the size of the
trough, in the slopes of the trough. These tubes are placed in suitable
orifices made to receive them, and are arranged so that their sides are a little
below the inner surface of the bottom. The tubes have slits or apertures on
their circumference at intervals in their length, and the inner side of the
bottom of the trough has slits formed in it opposite to and corresponding with
those in the tubes. These tubes project out of each end of the trough, and
each tube is furnished at one end with a handle, by which it is turned round
to place the orifices in it in communication with those in the trough, and,
when so placed, the molasses from the sugar run into the tubes, and pass out
at the ends opposite to those to which the handles are applied. The discharge
ends of the tubes are fitted with short bent tubes, placed at right angles to
the main tubes, and of the same length as the depth of the trough.

page_text: The fourth part of my Invention consists in the construction of an apparatus,
of comparatively small cost, in which the clarifying, evaporating, and granu-
lating operations necessary for the manufacture of sugar from cane juice may
be successively performed at option. The apparatus is composed of a cistern
having a corrugated bottom, and its lower part encased in a jacket with a
space between the two surfaces to contain steam for heating the sides and
corrugated bottom of the cistern and tubes. The cistern is fitted with a series
of tubes placed side by side in a horizontal position, and above and in line
with the higher parts of the corrugations of the cistern bottoin. The ends of
these tubes are placed and fixed in orifices in the sides of the cistern, by
which a communication is obtained between the steam jacket and the tubes.
The top of the cistern is mounted with a conical or curved cover of the same
construction, and applied in a similar manner to that described for my
improved evaporating apparatus; I also employ the jet of steam in a similar
The water of condensation of the steam is carried off from the
apparatus by means of an ordinary condensed water box. The bottom of the
cistern is fitted with a sluice valve for discharging the contents of the cistern
when required.