Improvements in Fire Lighters.
Year: 1895

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Date of Application, 21st Feb., 1895-Accepted, 23rd Mar., 1895
[Communicated from abroad by NICOLAUS JULIUS ROBERT WICHMANN, of
No. 13, Kleine Bäckerstrasse, Hamburg, in the German Empire, Merchant.]
Improvements in Fire Lighters.
I, HENRY HARINGTON LEIGH, Assoc. M. Inst. C.E., Fel. Ch. Inst. P.A.,
F.I. Inst., practising as Phillips and Leigh at 22 Southampton Buildings
Chancery Lane, in the Adininistrative County of London, Engineer and Chartered
Patent Agent, do hereby declare the nature of this invention and in what manner
the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by
the following statement :-
This invention relates to improvements in fire lighters and the object of it is to
entirely dispense with nails, pegs, strings, and analogous devices for holding together
the combustible parts which, preferably, consist of wood chips or shavings.
In carrying this invention into effect, chips or shavings of wood, or other flexible
and easily combustible material, are wound or rolled up into a flat ended cylinder
or other similar form, and then dipped into a bath of molten resin, pitch, or other
easily inflammable substance capable of impregnating the wood or like material
and of setting hard when cold and then holding the wooden or other materials closely
together.
To make my invention more clearly understood I proceed to describe it in detail.
referring in so doing to the accompanying sheet of drawings, in which
Figure 1 is side elevation of a fire lighter made according to the present
invention:
Figure 2, a vertical section; and
Figure 3, a plan of the same.
Similar letters refer to similar parts throughout the several figures.
The framework or skeleton a is assumed to be produced by rolling together
ordinary wood shavings. This framework is then dipped with its upper face b into
a bath of molten pitch, resin, or other easily inflammable substance so far that
about half of the height of the fire lighter becomes thoroughly impregnated, and
the spaces between the single layers of the shavings filled out, by the said
impregnating substance, which, when sufficiently cooled, solidifies and thereby
prevents the unwinding of the shavings. In some cases, the central opening aº is
partly filled out. with wooden chips c, or like combustible material, previous to
submerging the skeleton a in the molten pitch, resin or other analogous substance.
The fire lighter made as above described, is used by putting it, with its flat
unimpregnated side below, upon the fire grate, or if the heating is effected from
above, upon the heaped up fuel in the stove; and after the fire lighter is covered
with a few shovels of coal, it may be lighted in the usual manner,
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of the said inven-
tion as communicated to me from abroad, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, I claim :-
A fire lighter consisting of wood shavings, or other flexible combustible material
rolled or wound together so as to form a frainework or skeletou and dipped wholly

page_text: or partly into a bath of molten pitch, resin, or other easily ignitable substance,
substantially as and for the purpose set forth.
Dated this 21st day of February 1895.
HENRY H. LEIGH,
Chartered Patent Agent.