DISTILLING OR EVAPORATING IN VACUO, CONDENSING THE VAPOUR BY PRESSURE, AND ECONOMISING HEAT
Year: 1856

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to James Harrison, of Geelong, in the Colony of
Victoria, Gentleman, Member of the Legislative Council of Victoria, for
the Invention of "DISTILLING OR EVAPORATING IN VACUO, CONDENSING THE
VAPOUR BY PRESSURE, AND ECONOMISING HEAT."
Sealed the 23rd September 1856, and dated the 28th March 1856.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said James Harrison at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
28th March 1856.
I, JAMES HARRISON, of Geelong, in the Colony of Victoria, Gentleman,
Member of the Legislative Council of Victoria, do hereby declare the nature
of the Invention for "DISTILLING OR EVAPORATING IN VACUO, CONDENSING THE
VAPOUR BY PRESSURE, AND ECONOMISING HEAT," to be as follows:-
To employ an air-tight apparatus of three vessels or chambers connected
by tubes, a vacuum is to be established throughout the apparatus, the air
being expelled by the vapour of the liquid to be distilled or evaporated. The
first vessel is to be charged with the wash or mixture to be distilled; the
second vessel or chamber is to contain a pumping and compressing apparatus
or blowing fan, whereby the vapour is to be withdrawn from the first vesse!
and forced into a third, wherein it will be liquified by the pressure. This
third vessel is to be in contact with, or to invest or permeate the first vessel,

page_text: so that the heat given out by the liquifaction may be re-communicated to
the first vessel. The withdrawal of the effete charge and of the product
to be effected, without destroying the vacuum, by descending tubes of such
lengths as may enable the contained liquid to counterbalance the pressure of
the atmosphere.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said James Harrison in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
27th September 1856..
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JAMES
HARRISON, of Geelong, in the Colony of Victoria, Gentleman, Member of the
Legislative Council of Victoria, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-eighth day of March, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six, in the nineteenth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me,
the said James Harrison, Her special licence that I, the said James
Harrison, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the
said James Harrison, my 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 Invention for DISTILLING
OR EVAPORATING IN VACUO, CONDENSING THE VAPOUR BY PRESSURE, AND ECONO-
MISING HEAT, upon the condition (amongst others) that I, the said James
Harrison, my executors or administrators, by an instrument in writing under
my, or their, or one of their hands and seals, should particularly 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 I, the said James Harrison, do hereby declare
the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement thereof, that is to say :-
The nature of my Invention consists in carrying on the process of distillation

page_text: or evaporation by withdrawing the vapors formed in one vessel, and com-
pressing such vapors with a force sufficient to liquify them in another vessel,
or in another chamber of the same vessel, so that the heat given out by com-
pression shall be available for raising a continued supply of vapors from the
first vessel or chamber; the whole process being conducted at any required
temperature in vacuo, that is to say, the liquid and vapor being isolated from
the pressure of the atmosphere.
I now proceed to describe, by reference to the annexed Drawing, one of the
many ways in which my Invention may be performed.
The annexed Drawing is an elevation in section of an apparatus for the
distillation of spirits. A is a cylindrical vessel of copper or iron, of sufficient
strength to resist the pressure of the atmosphere, enclosing B, a spherical or
pear-shaped vessel of tinned copper of sufficient strength to resist a bursting
pressure of 10 lbs. to the square inch. C is a charging back, containing the
wash to be distilled; D, a double acting pump, the cylinder containing pas-
sages a, a, communicating with valves b, b, for the admission of vapor, and
c, c, for the egress of compressed vapor; E, a small single acting pump for
obtaining the vacuum required at starting, and for restoring and maintaining
a vacuum in the apparatus in case a leak should exist in any part commu-
nicating with the air, or in case carbonic acid or other gas should enter with
the wash from the charging back. A condensing worm d is attached to the
egress pipe of this pump, with the view of saving whatever portion of the
product of distillation should be expelled during its action. F is a cistern, to
be kept full of water at or near the temperature at which the distillation is to
be conducted; e and fa are pressure guages; e is a barometer tube standing in
an open cup of mercury; f is a double tube, filled to the height of 15 inches
with mercury, one leg being open to the air, that it may indicate either rare-
faction or excess of pressure; 9 is a glass tube for indicating the height of
the spent wash in the vessel A; h and i are descending tubes of sufficient
length to enable the contained fluids, aided by the tension of the vapors in A
and B, to counterbalance the weight of the atmosphere, and to flow from the
lower orifices h, to carry off the spent wash, and i the product of distillation;
r, r, are spiral strips of copper, fastened edgeways to the interior of the tube s
and exterior of the tube t, so that the ascending vapor may be exposed to
contact with the descending wash; v, v, are similar strips, to prevent the wash
from falling too rapidly to the bottom of the vessel A.
The apparatus is set in action by employing the large pump to exhaust the
air from the vessel A, the stop-cocks j, k, l, m, and q, being shut, and the tap n
opened, the small pump being at the same time employed in exhausting the

page_text: The
air from the vessel B, the stop-cock o being open. A good vacuum having
been thus obtained, the tap n is closed, the stop-cock m opened, half a gallon
of spirits introduced by the tap p, and the pumps again set to work.
remaining air will thus be pumped out, mixed with the spirituous vapor, and
when the pressure guages show a good vacuum, there will then remain
throughout the apparatus a rarefied atmosphere of spirituous vapour.
The apparatus will then be ready for commencing the process of distillation.
The cistern F is to be filled with water of the temperature at which the pro-
cess is to be conducted. The stop-cock is to be opened to allow the wash
to pass through the tube s into the vessel A, and be delivered on the top of
the globe B, and thence to spread over its surface, falling over the barriers v, v.
The pump D being set in action will withdraw the spirituous vapour from the
vessel A, and force it into the vessel B, where it will be condensed by com-
pression into the liquid form and give out its latent heat, which heat will
become available in keeping up the evaporation from the exterior of the globe
B. When the process is to be conducted at a low temperature and has been
fairly commenced, very little, if any, further supply of heated water for the
cistern F will be required, the heat from the friction of the pump being suffi-
cient to compensate for any loss of heat from the surrounding air, and for a
large portion, if not all, of the heat carried off by the spent wash and spirits.
When the distillation is conducted at a high temperature, the heat of the spent
wash and spirits may be recovered by leading the pipes h and i through the
charging back before they descend to the discharge level. When this is done,
the charging back may be level with or below the level of the cistern F, the
supply of wash being sucked up to its point of discharge into the tube s. The
pipes, &c. exposed to the air to be kept covered with a woollen or other
non-conducting envelope. When the distillation is carried on at a low tem-
perature the spirits will be very pure without the use of any rectifying appa-
ratus, and the arrangement for bringing the ascending vapor into contact with
the descending wash may be dispensed with. The supply of wash must be
regulated by the stop-cock 1, according to the richness of the wash in spirit, and
the rapidity with which the spent wash accumulates at the bottom of the
vessel A. The proper rate of the supply and the rate of discharge from the
lower orifices of the tubes and i can only be ascertained by experience. The
tube i, near its point of issue from the cistern, is to be of glass, and whenever
the liquid shall fall too low in the tube the stop-cock is to be closed, or par-
tially closed. As an additional protection, the lower orifices of these tubes
may be fitted with valves, which shall close whenever the column of liquid
shall be insufficient to balance the atmospheric pressure.

page_text: The vessels A and B may be of any air-tight and water-tight material of
sufficient strength, and not liable to be acted upon by the substances in con-
tact with them, that of B being also of good heat-conducting power. The vessels
may be of any shape, provided that B has a sufficient extent of evaporating
and condensing surface.
The apparatus whereby the vapor is to be withdrawn and compressed, may
consist of a double-acting pump, a pump with a piston of gasometer shape
working in mercury, a blowing fan enclosed in an air-tight vessel, or the vapor
may be forced under a head of mercury, and delivered on the other side of a
partition by means of a diving bell, a reversed archimedian screw (that is to
say, a screw in which the spiral turns in the opposite direction to that in
which it would raise water, so that it shall scoop in and carry down the vapor
and deliver it behind a partition where the mercury is kept at a lower level by
the increased tension of the vapour), a reversed overshot wheel, or generally by
reversing any of the ordinary means whereby water is raised, the vapor may be
depressed.
Another mode of working this my Invention consists in compressing the
vapour into a worm or coil of pipe contained in the vessel A, which vessel is to
be filled, or nearly filled, with the liquid to be distilled. The pump is to be
worked until the whole of the product of distillation shall have been with-
drawn and condensed. The vessel A is then to be emptied and a fresh supply
of wash admitted. By this mode, the nicety required in regulating the supply
of wash, and the outflow of spent wash will not be necessary. The use of
the coil of pipe and of the globe B may be combined, the pipe being carried
through the wash in the lower part of the vessel A, before entering the
globe B.
As this my Invention is applicable to the distillation or evaporation of fluids
at any temperature, it is impossible to specify the dimensions of the various
parts of the apparatus suitable for the endless variety of conditions under
which it may be worked, I consider it sufficient to refer to such data for the
calculation of dimensions, &c. as may be a guide to intelligent persons conver-
sant with the leading phenomena of heat, and the chemical and mechanical pro-
perties of the substances to be acted upon or produced. The requisite surface of
the evaporating vessel may be deduced from the ascertained fact that a surface
of ten square feet will evaporate fully one pound of water per minute, with a
difference of temperature of 30°; with a less difference a proportionately larger
surface would be required. The latent heat of other vapors being less than
that of steam, a less surface will suffice for their evaporation. Thus, the
latent heat of alcoholic vapor at 173° is to that of steam at 212° as 376 to

page_text: 1,000 nearly, so that a little more than one-third of the surface, or one-third
of the difference of temperature would suffice for the evaporation of alcohol.
The same rule will apply to its condensation. But as no loss, except of space,
can accrue from having the vessels larger than is by calculation necessary, it
will be well to make them of ample capacity and surface.
The method of
ascertaining the dimensions of a pump to withdraw and compress a given
quantity of vapor in a given time, and at a given temperature, and of the
power required to work such pump (in addition to the loss accruing from
friction, and the power required to overcome the weight of valves, &c.), may
be illustrated by the following calculations for an alcohol distilling apparatus.
It has been ascertained that 100 cubic inches of air weigh 31 grains, so that
one pound of air occupies 22,580.6 cubic inches. The vapor of alcohol at
173° is of specific gravity 1.6, so that one pound of it occupies 14,113 cubic
inches. The force or tension of alcohol vapor at (say) 150°, is equal to 18
inches of mercury, and as the specific gravity is proportional to the tension,
one pound of vapor at this temperature will occupy 23,522 cubic inches.
But a condensation takes place on account of the lowness of temperature,
amounting to ½ of the volume at 32° for each degree. Corrected by this
amount, one pound of vapor of alcohol at 150° occupies 22,651 cubic inches.
To withdraw and condense this quantity per minute, a pump of (say) 453
cubic inches capacity, making 50 strokes, would be required. The power
required to work such a pump is the difference of tension between the vapor
of the temperature of evaporation and its tension at the temperature of con-
densation, thus the tension of the vapor of alcohol at (say) 150° being equi-
valent to 18 inches of mercury, and its tension at (say) 160° being equiva-
lent to 22.6 inches, the power required to raise vapor at the former and
condense it at the latter temperature will require to be sufficient to over-
come a tension equal to 4.6 inches of mercury. As, however, the vapor of
alcohol under a pressure of 22.6 inches occupies only 8 of its volume at
150°, the full power will not be required until the vapor has acquired the
full density, and only one-half the power will be required to reduce the
volume of vapor at 150° to its volume at 160°. The power, therefore, required
to raise one pound of vapor of alcohol at 150° and to condense it at 160°
is equal to the compression of 18,359 (the bulk of the vapor at 160°)
22,651 18,359
20,505 cubic inches with a weight of 4.6 inches of
or about 2-3 lbs. per square inch.
+
2
mercury,
I wish it to be understood, however, that I do not rest my claim upon any
particular form of apparatus, but what I claim is the process of distillation at

page_text: any temperature by withdrawing the vapor of the product from the vessel
containing the wash, wine, or crude liquor yielding such product, and con-
densing such product in a separate vessel or chamber enclosed within or in
tubes permeating the vessel receiving or containing such wash, &c. in such
a manner that the condensed product shall give up its latent heat to the wash,
wine, or crude liquor undergoing distillation.
In witness whereof, I, the said James Harrison, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twenty-third day of September, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six.
Witness,
AR. CARPMAEL.
JAMES HARRISON. (L.S.)