IMPROVED APPARATUS FOR GENERATING STEAM OR ELASTIC VAPOURS FOR ACTUATING MOTIVE-POWER ENGINES
Year: 1870

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to William Edward Newton, of the Office for Patents,
66, Chancery Lane, in the County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer,
for the Invention of "IMPROVED APPARATUS FOR GENERATING STEAM OR
ELASTIC VAPOURS FOR ACTUATING MOTIVE-POWER ENGINES."-A communi-
cation from abroad by Jean Baptiste Givord, of Paris, in the Empire
of France.
Sealed the 23rd August 1870, and dated the 8th March 1870.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William Edward Newton
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition,
on the 8th March 1870.
I, WILLIAM EDWARD NEWTON, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery
Lane, in the County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer, do hereby declare
the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVED APPARATUS FOR GENERATING
STEAM OR ELASTIC VAPOURS FOR ACTUATING MOTIVE-POWER ENGINES," to be as
follows:-

page_text: The apparatus consists of a close fire-place for containing the fuel,
and is formed by preference of a cylindrical shape. It rests upon a
cast-iron base and is surmounted by a hemispherical head or dome.
The fire-place is formed in the cast-iron base, and is provided with a
perforated door. Air is forced under pressure through tuyeres into
the fire-place to maintain the combustion of the fuel, which is supplied
from a close chamber down an inclined plate which is closed by a valve.
Injectors or spray jets of peculiar form (the Invention of M. Du Fay, and
for which I have applied for Letters Patent on the 7th instant) are adapted
to the dome for the purpose of supplying water in a state of minute
subdivision. The supply of water is carefully regulated, and is injected
in small quantities at a time so that it may be flashed into steam and be
conducted away with the heated gases from the fire and used for motive-
power purposes. By this means the steam will be perfectly dry and be
superheated. The steam and gases pass from the generator into a steam
chamber in which there is a layer of water for the purpose of arresting
any solid matters that may ascend with the steam and gases. In order
to prevent the loss of heat by radiation the generator is surrounded by
an envelope of some non-conducting substance, and the generator or
fire-place is lined with fire-brick. Two or more of these generators may
he combined, so that when one is being supplied with fuel or being
cleared the other may be at work.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said William Edward Newton in the Great Seal Patent
Office on the 8th September 1870.
:
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, WILLIAM
EDWARD NEWTON, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery Lane, in the
County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Eighth day of March, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy, in the thirty-third
year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and
grant unto me, the said William Edward Newton, Her special licence
that I, the said William Edward Newton, my executors, adminis-
trators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said William Edward
1

page_text: Newton, 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 time 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
"IMPROVED APPARATUS FOR GENERATING STEAM OR ELASTIC VAPOURS FOR
ACTUATING MOTIVE-POWER ENGINES," being a communication to me from
abroad by Jean Baptiste Givord, of Paris, in the Empire of France, upon
the condition (amongst others) that I, the said William Edward Newton,
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 William Edward Newton, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained
in and by the following statement, reference being had to the Drawing
hereunto annexed, and to the letters and figures marked thereon (that is
to say) :-
:
This Invention consists in the application to engines with closed
fire-places or close chambers of an arrangement of apparatus for the
instantaneous production of steam in a superheated state, and the
application of such steam to motive-power engines. The boilers
now in use require a draft by a chimney, and a larger or smaller
reservoir to contain the water that is to be converted into steam. In
this last system the best utilization of the heat is obtained by using
a very high pressure by great expansion of the steam, and only slightly
superheating it; all boilers of this kind are liable to total or partial
explosions. If partial explosions are not as destructive and disastrous
as the others, their result at least is a derangement of the apparatus.
The close generators which form the subject of the present Invention
are peculiarly calculated to realize or produce all the advantages that
have been attempted to be obtained with apparatus heretofore known;
and they are moreover inexplosible.
The conditions which they fulfil are the following:-
• First. The instantaneous evaporation of the water.
—
:

page_text: Second. Regulating the quantity of water supplied for evaporation
so as to obtain steam at the desired temperature.
Third. The preservation or maintaining of the fire in an efficient
state notwithstanding the introduction of the water into the fire-
chamber.
The result of these conditions or arrangements will be, first, the
impossibility of suddenly creating such a body of steam as would
cause an explosion; second, the advantage of being able to highly.
superheat the steam, as the vapour (not being in the presence of the
liquid from which it was generated) will be immediately superheated and
the temperature may be raised to any point that will be practically
useful.
It is true that in the improved system a blowing apparatus is sub-
stituted for the usual chimney, but the loss of heat by chimnies (which
is calculated at twenty-five per cent. of the caloric given off from the
fire) is in reality much greater in practice.
In the close chamber the
gases from the combustion of the fuel are not lost, they remain mixed
with the steam and act with it, and therefore the engine is worked
by mixed gases at a temperature to be regulated at will by the supply
of water; this new system ensures at the same time the conditions
of security and economy of fuel. Morcover the management of the
fire-place is simple and is not fatiguing.
The construction and operation of the apparatus will be easily
understood by referring to the accompanying Drawings, in which Fig. 1
represents a combination of two fire-places, one of which is shewn in
vertical section taken in the line 1, 2, of the plan view Fig. 2, and the
other represents a section taken in the line 3, 4, so as to show the
chimney for lighting or igniting the fire; Fig. 2 is a plan view seen
from above and partly in section; Fig. 3 is a vertical section in the
line 7, 8, of the plan view Fig. 2, and is intended to show the box
for charging the fire, shewing also the chimney and injectors; Fig. 4
is a horizontal section in the line 9, 10, of Fig. 3; Fig. 5 is a vertical
section in the line 5, 6, of Fig. 1, and showing the steam supply, the
air supply, and the box for distributing the air; Fig. 6 is a section in
the line 11, 12, of Fig. 5 shewing the mode of supplying the air above
the grate bars; Fig. 7 represents in vertical section the vessel for
purifying or cleansing the steam from extraneous substances. This
apparatus is connected to Fig. 5 in order that its use may be more clearly

page_text: understood. Each apparatus consists of a cylindrical vertical chamber
O made of sheet iron, and surmounted by a hemispherical cast-iron
dome, and supported by or resting on a cast-iron foot or foundation S
which encloses the grate bars or fire-place. All the cylindrical part
and also the foot or foundation S are lined internally with fire-bricks.
A lateral opening is provided for the passage of the steam, and another
opening opens a communication with the chimney; these openings
are closed by metal shutters worked from the outside. The chimney c
serves for first lighting the fires, and for drawing off the products of
combustion when during the working the fire-places are opened. At
the bottom of the fire-place and in front of the grate or fire bars is
a perforated door.
The hemispherical dome of the apparatus carries the instruments or
devices for injecting the water. One of these is shewn detached and
drawn upon an enlarged scale at Fig. 8. It is also provided with a
safety valve and a metallic thermometer. A lateral chamber c¹ serves
as a box for supplying fuel while the apparatus is at work. It com-
municates by means of an inclined plane with the upper side of fire-bars,
and is provided with a valve b which is worked from the outside. At
the upper part of this chamber there is a door for charging or filling it.
Tuyere holes are formed in the brickwork (as shewn at Fig. 6) for
supplying air as may be required under the fire-bars or above the fuel.
The whole apparatus is surrounded by a jacket to prevent loss of heat
by radiation. The steam mixed with the gases resulting from the
combustion of the fuel passes into the chamber 4, Fig. 7, which is
equivalent to the steam chest of an ordinary steam boiler and acts as a
purifier. The mixed gases enter with a rush by a vertical passage 1, by
which they are conducted to near the bottom of the vessel, where they
lose their velocity in consequence of the enlarged space into which they
enter. At the bottom of the vessel there is a quantity of water which
will catch and retain the dust and extraneous matters which are carried
over by or with the steam and which are by the rush of the steam
precipitated into the water. In order that there should be no lost time
the Invention requires that there should be at least two fire-places
communicating with the same steam chest, but these may be separated
the one from the other.
When it is necessary to clean the grate bars and place fuel in

page_text: temporarily cut off, and as the latter will receive all the air and all the
water it will give out the same amount of heat and produce the same
amount of power, just as in the ordinary system of steam boilers the
number of fire-places will increase in proportion to the power of the
.engines; the cleaning of the fire-bars will also take place in succession.
When the operation of charging and cleaning the fire-grate is finished
(which will take about five or six minutes at most) the connection
between the two apparatus may be re-established. I ought particularly
to mention the injecting apparatus which supplies the water to the
fire-places in a finely divided state because it is constructed on the
principle invented by Mr. Sanial du Fay, and has been patented by me
March Seventh, One thousand eight hundred and seventy, and it is the
use of this apparatus which will tend materially to the success of the
present Invention. This apparatus consists, as will be seen at Fig. 8,
of a plate p pierced with holes which will converge at a certain angle.
This plate is secured tightly by a screw upon a screwed nozzle to which
the water is supplied from a reservoir placed above. The thin streams
of water escaping by these diagonal holes under considerable pressure
strike each other at their meeting point, and the water being thus
.converted into spray enters and fills the vertical cylindrical chamber C.
The injectors are supplied by ordinary cocks from a reservoir filled by
a pump worked by the engine, and in which reservoir a constant pressure
is maintained. These parts are arranged in such a manner that they can
if required be examined and repaired when the apparatus is temporarily
out of work.
Many Patents have been obtained for engines with close fire-places,
but these Inventions have remained up to the present time as simple
experiments without practical results. This want of success in hot air
engines has been owing to their cumbrous size, the very high temperature
of the gases, and the carrying of dust and ashes into the working parts.
In air and steam engines in addition to this last there is the impossibility
up to the present of introducing the water in such a quantity and in
such a state of division that the complete vaporization of the water
should take place instantaneously, and that this water when injected
into the apparatus should not injure the fires.
All these difficulties have been overcome by the combination of means
employed as herein set forth for practically using a close chamber as a
generator of steam, and the use of such steam and of the gases produced