Improvements in Utilizing the Waste Product from Sewage Works for the Manufacture of Bricks, Tiles, Quarries, Building Blocks, Slabs, and the like.
Year: 1889

page_text: Date of Application, 10th Aug., 1889-Accepted, 2nd Nov., 1889
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in Utilizing the Waste Product from Sewage Works
for the Manufacture of Bricks, Tiles, Quarries, Building Blocks,
Slabs, and the like.
I THOMAS SHAW of No. 46 Mode Wheel Road, Weaste near Manchester in the
County of Lancaster Engineer 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:―
The object of this invention is to utilize the sludge, sediment or waste product
from the precipitating tanks of sewage works, to form bricks tiles, quarries, slabs,
blocks or other similar solid forms for building and other purposes.
The sewage as pumped up or otherwise taken in a liquid state from the sewers is
ordinarily mixed with lime and other ingredients and is left to settle in the pre-
cipitating tanks; the solid refuse matter settles to the bottom of the tanks in the
form of sludge and the supernatant clear liquid (comparatively pure water) is
allowed to flow away either back again into the sewers or into a brook, river, or other
water course, being limpid, inodorous, and otherwise innoxious.
The precipitated sludge has to be removed from the tanks from time to time and
hitherto it has been considered as a valueless waste product, the accumulation of
which has been a great drawback to the adoption of the precipitating system at sewage
works.
This waste product or sludge contains various ingredients more or less valuable,
and I have discovered that by mixing the said refuse with common clay a plastic
composition may be obtained which possesses valuable properties and is capable of
being moulded into the shape of bricks, tiles slabs, blocks or other similar solid forms,
and after drying and burning in the ordinary manner is suitable for utilization for
building and other purposes.
According to my invention I take the sludge or refuse from the sewage pre-
cipitating tanks and I add thereto about an equal quantity of common clay, and these
ingredients I mix well together by means of any suitable machine such for instance
as an ordinary pug mill.
The material if too wet is then semi-dried and afterwards forced into or through
dies in the ordinary manner of making bricks tiles slabs or similar articles from clay
or other plastic materials; which when subsequently dried and burnt in the usual
manner will be found to possess valuable qualities such as hardness durability and
color far superior to ordinary bricks and other articles made from clay alone, and
may be used with advantage in place of the latter for building and for a variety of
other useful purposes as a substitute for ordinary clay.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my said inven-
tion and in what manner the same is to be performed I declare that what I
claim is
The utilization of the sludge or waste product, from the precipitating tanks of
sewage works, by mixing therewith about an equal quantity of clay and forming
from the mixture or plastic composition thus obtained bricks, tiles, slabs, blocks or
other similar articles which when dried and burnt are suitable for building and other
useful purposes.
GEORGE DAVIES,
4, St. Ann's Square, Manchester, Agent for the Applicant.