IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT OF ORES AND COMPOUNDS CONTAINING METALS FOR THE SEPARATION OF THE METALS THEREFROM, AND THE PRODUCTION OF ELECTRICITY, AND IN THE APPARATUS EMPLOYED THEREIN, AND THE MODE OR MEANS OF REGENERATING THE AGENTS EMPLOYED IN SUCH TREATMENT
Year: 1881

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by John Henry Johnson at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 13th April 1881. A communication
from abroad by Nicolas Emile Reynier, of Paris, in the Republic of France.
JOHN HENRY JOHNSON,, of 47, Lincoln's Inn Fields, in the County of Middlesex,
Gentleman. "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT OF ORES AND COMPOUNDS
CONTAINING METALS FOR THE SEPARATION OF THE METALS THEREFROM, AND
THE PRODUCTION OF ELECTRICITY, AND IN THE APPARATUS EMPLOYED THEREIN,
AND THE MODE OR MEANS OF REGENERATING THE AGENTS EMPLOYED IN SUCH
TREATMENT." A communication from abroad by Nicolas Emile Reynier, of Paris,
in the Republic of France.
This Invention relates to an improved clectro chemical treatment of ores or
metallic masses with a view to the economical production of electricity, and the
Invention is based essentially upon the following principles, viz.:
:-
First. The property possessed by solutions of caustic soda and potash of oxidizing
and dissolving certain metals, particularly zinc and lead, with the production or
evolution of electricity.
Second. The property possessed by certain metallic solutions, particularly
solutions of copper, nickel, cobalt, lead, mercury, silver, gold, and the like, of being
capable of acting as a depolarizing agent in a voltaic pair or element where two
liquids are employed, whilst setting free the metal or metals contained in these
solutions.
Third. The electro motive force resulting from the action of soda or potash upon
a saline neutral or acid solution being an electro motive force, which is added
to the electro motive force of the solution of the zinc or lead in the alkaline
liquid.
Fourth. The possible substitution for the ordinary saline solutions of copper,
nickel, cobalt, lead, mercury, and the like, of crude solutions of these metals
resulting from exposing their ores (roasted if necessary) to the action of acids in
voltaic pairs or elements where liquids are employed, one of such liquids being of
an alkaline sodic or potassic character.
Fifth. The possible substitution of a rich or enriched ore of zinc or lead capable
of acting as a conductor for the zinc or lead in voltaic pairs or elements where
alkaline sodic or potassic liquids are employed.

page_text: Sixth. The possible substitution of scrap or waste lead or parings of lead or zinc
for the lead or zinc plates in the said voltaic pairs.
Seventh. A special system of multiple porous and communicating vessels,
obtained by radiating folds of sheets of paper, fabric, felt, skin, membranes, or
other pliable septa, whereby the resistance of the pairs is reduced, and their action
augmented.
The combination of the various facts herein before set forth, and the employment
of these peculiar porous vessels, constitutes a new voltaic arrangement or com-
bination adapted for carrying out the improved process of electro chemical
treatment forming the subject of this Invention, and, as hereinafter described,
enables certain practical results to be produced at one and the same time, which
have not heretofore been obtained simultaneously, viz. :-
First. The treatment of ores of zinc and lead, and their conversion into useful or
easily reduced oxides.
Second. The liberation or setting free of certain metals, especially copper, nickel,
cobalt, lead, silver, mercury, and gold from their saline solutions, these solutions
being obtained by submitting the ores of the metals (either directly or after
roasting) to the action of acids, chloride of sodium, and the like.
Third. The production or generation of electricity.
In carrying out this Invention, an element or voltaic pair with two liquids is
employed, one of the liquids consists of a solution of caustic soda or potash, in
which is immersed either an anode of zinc or lead, or rich fragments of galena,
capable of acting as conductors of electricity, or again, fragments of calamine or
native carbonate of zinc or other rich and conducting ore of zinc. A plate of lead
or zinc partially immersed in the solution, and acting as a conductor, is allowed to
rest on these fragments.
The other liquid consists of a cupreous or copperish solution obtained by the
action of an acid upon copper ore.
These solutions are obtained by means of the processes described by Becquerel,
or by any other known means suited to the nature and richness of the ore; in the
case of malachite, it is dissolved after grinding in sulphuric acid.
Quartzose ores are dissolved in sulphuric acid after an oxidizing roasting; they
may also be sulphated by the combined action of sulphurous acid, steam, and air.
Poor oxidized ores are submitted for several days to the action of weak
hydrochloric acid, and the like.
When the pairs or elements thus constituted are of sufficient size and suitably
combined in a battery they produce an electric current capable of being utilized
either directly for the production of light motive power and other purposes, or
indirectly for charging secondary batteries performing chemical operations and other
like purposes.
Metallic copper is collected in the copper compartment. In the soda compartment
there is collected chiefly oxide of lead or zinc, which may be ultimately converted
into metallic lead or zinc by treatment with carbon at a red heat after having
extracted it from the soda, as hereinafter described.
The other metals besides the lead and zinc contained in the ore, particularly the
silver not being dissolved by the soda, remain in the battery, whence they are
readily extracted.
Thus the voltaic action separates the lead or the zinc from the other metals, and
by forming oxides capable of being reduced to metallic zinc or lead really performs
a metallurgical operation.
It will be understood that the nature of the materials employed as metals or ores
in the voltaic arrangement herein before described may be varied, as well as the
nature and composition of the electrolytic saline liquids employed in the same
pair or element, the employment of the sodic or potassic alkaline liquid being
constant.

page_text: In order to precipitate the oxide of lead or zinc and regenerate the sodic solution,
it is preferred to employ the process next hereinafter described, vizt. :—
This process consists in precipitating the oxide of zinc, for example, which is in
suspension in the exhausted soda liquid, either by means of the carbonic acid in the
air, or preferably by the carbonic acid which is evolved in treating carbonated
orcs, with an acid calculated to reduce them to the condition of a saline depolarising
solution.
The precipitation having taken place the oxide of zinc is converted into
carbonate of zinc which is decanted.
The soda liquor thus decanted and freed from the greater part of the oxide of
zinc which it contained will be found to be carbonated to a considerable or small
extent, according to the manner in which the operation has been conducted.
In the first case it may be considered as regenerated; in the second, and this will
be of the most frequent occurrence, it will suffice to absorb the carbonic acid
contained in the liquor by means of lime, and to decant a second time; the liquid
thus regenerated will be found to have resumed its original proportion of caustic
soda in consequence of the restitution of the quantity of soda which has been
converted into sulphate of soda by the voltaic action.
By substituting sulphurated hydrogen or chlorine for the carbonic acid, the zinc
or lead is eliminated in the condition of sulphide or chloride.
The electrolyte to be regenerated may also be treated with carbonate of soda or
potash, which is decarbonated in carbonating the oxide of zinc or lead; the
lemination of the metal and the economical restoration of the equivalent of caustic
soda electrolytically converted into sulphate being thus effected by one and the
same operation.
This treatment with carbonic acid, sulphurated hydrogen, chlorine, or alkaline
carbonate, is applicable in general to the regeneration of electrolytes, having a base
of caustic soda or potash charged with oxide of zinc or oxide of lead.
The sulphate of soda (or potash) formed in the two compartments is collected by
crystallization.
Without making any important modifications, other examples might be
mentioned applied to all zinc or lead ores on the one hand, and copper, nickel,
cobalt, lead, mercury, silver, gold, and the like on the other hand.
The permeable partitions employed to separate the two electrolytes in this
electro chemical process require to be capable of resisting the action of the liquids
employed, a condition which excludes the employment of the usual porous vessels,
namely, the vessels made of ceramic materials or of joined paper fabrics, and the
like. Moreover these porous vessels of quasi prismatic form, as heretofore
employed, made of paper fabric and the like, although sufficing for the purposes
of ordinary voltaic batteries, are not applicable to the treatment of metallic ores
and masses on account of the inadequate superficial area which they present in
proportion to their volume.
The
Hence it is advantageous to increase and multiply the action of the septa or.
partitions in order to reduce the resistance of the electro metallurgical pairs or
elements. With this object it is proposed to employ an improved kind of vessel,
consisting of multiple and communicating porous vessels, whereby the chemical and
electrical effect of the pairs is increased in a most advantageous manner.
improved porous vessels are not prismatic, being of forms derived from triangles,
and utilizing almost the whole of the surfaces of the septa or partitions employed.
These vessels (which may be composed of paper, woven fabric, felt, skin,
membrane, or other pliable material) are formed as next hereinafter described.
For example, a square sheet is folded along a diagonal line, and the part on one.
side of this line is folded over on to the other part, so that one corner coinsides
with the other.
The double rectangular isosceles triangle is then folded on a middle bisecting
line, whereby a pair of vessels in the form of rectangular isosceles triangles are

page_text: obtained. It is advisable to connect the two adjacent corners together at the
proper distance apart in order to prevent the double vessel from opening.
As another example of the method of forming these vessels, the double porous
vessel herein before described may be folded in two along a central bisecting line,
whereby a quadruple porous vessel is produced, and this, when folded in two along
a central bisecting line, becomes an octuple vessel, and so on, each additional fold
doubling the number of compartments.
The openings however are always four in number, and appear alternately on the
hypothenuse, or on the short side of the rectangular isoceles triangle in the
successive folds of the vessel.
The multiple and communicating vessels thus constituted possess important
properties.
First. They form porous vessels without joints.
Second. They present multiple communicating vessels whereby it is rendered
possible to place several electrodes of the same denomination in this multiple
porous vessel, each of such electrodes being placed opposite an electrode of opposite
denomination immersed in the other liquid, the double porous vessel may contain
two strips or blades of zinc, for example, each side of the said blades being arranged
opposite a strip of copper, for example, immersed in the external liquid.
The electrical resistance of a voltaic pair or element thus constructed is about
one half of that of an ordinary pair or element, the double porous vessel being
capable of being filled or emptied by one operation in the same manner as a single
porous vessel.
Third. In the improved porous vessel nearly the whole of the surface of the
paper or other partition, or septum employed, is utilized advantageously.
Fourth. The improved porous vessels are capable of interlocking in pairs.
This property may be utilized for effecting a considerable reduction of the
superfluous reactions of the two liquids upon each other by placing them respectively
in two distinct porous vessels plunged in a common trough containing a solution of
the salt which these two liquids form by reacting upon one another.
It is evident that the surfaces of an electro metallurgical element may be
increased at pleasure by arranging any desired number of pairs of double porous
vessels side by side in a trough and connecting together the strips of the same
denomination.
The successive folds may be made in the vessels (interlocked or otherwise) in
such a manner that notwithstanding the reduction of the internal surface of the
whole, the surfaces in presence are completely developed.
Fifth. The vessels interlocked or otherwise provided or not provided with
electrodes may be folded in the form of a helix, or in zig zag and in other suitable
forms.
Sixth. The corners of the triangular vessel may be folded over in such a manner
as to cause it to assume the form of a rectangle, a trapezum, or other figure.
Seventh. These improved porous vessels as well as quasi prismatic ones may be
found by two or more sheets of similar or different septa or partitions.
The thickness may be increased in certain parts of the vessel only.
The apex of the lower angle being a weak point in these vessels, the latter
may be strengthened at this part either by a lining of paper or other material,
or by a piece of glass or wood attached by means of wax, cement, or otherwise.
The internal capacity of the vessels may be altered by employing internal or
external filling pieces, by connecting the upper corners, by producing variations in
the levels of the internal and external liquids, or by any other suitable means.
As a further example of the mode of constructing these vessels a double porous
cell is produced by folding a sheet and then by folding this vessel along a central
line a quadruple vessel is produced.
When this vessel is folded again along the bisecting line, it forms an octuple

page_text: vessel, which in turn may be folded along a bisecting line in order to obtain a
vessel with sixteen compartments, and so on ad infinitum.
This multiple vessel may be cut along a curved line so as to remove the
superfluous corners, and by this means a vessel is obtained, the developement of
which is a disc or circular profile with radiating folds.
One or more of these successive foldings in two may be replaced by a folding in
three in order to form a vessel with, for example, three, six, nine, or other
corresponding number of compartments, and so on.
It is evident that in order to obtain the vessel it is not necessary to take a
square sheet, it being preferable to use a polygonal sheet corresponding to the
final developement.