IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY AND APPARATUS FOR DISINTEGRATING AND STRAINING PARTIALLY FLUID OR SEMI-SOLID SUBSTances
Year: 1874

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Daniel Kinnear Clark, of Buckingham Street,
Strand, in the County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer, for the Inven-
tion of "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY AND APPARATUS FOR DISINTEGRATING
AND STRAINING PARTIALLY FLUID OR SEMI-SOLID SUBSTances.
"
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Daniel Kinnear Clark
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition,
on the 27th April 1874..
I, DANIEL KINNEAR CLARK, of Buckingham Street, Strand, in the
County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of
the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY AND APPARATUS FOR
DISINTEGRATING AND STRAINING PARTIALLY FLUID OR SEMI-SOLID SUBSTANCES,"
to be as follows :-
My Invention relates to improved machinery and apparatus for
disintegrating or masticating and straining or discharging liquid or
moisture or gaseous matter from partially fluid or semi-solid substances,
such substances consisting partly of water, oil, or other liquid, and partly

page_text: of solid matter, such as wet peat, yeast, clay slip for pottery or porcelain,
sewage, fatty matters, oil seeds, starch, white lead, colours, dye stuffs,
potatoes, and other roots, hops, and fruit, or any semi-solid mixtures or
preparations of such substances.
The Invention has reference partly to the straining apparatus described
in portions of the Specification and Drawings of my Invention for
"Improvements in Machinery and Apparatus for the Manufacture of
Peat Fuel and Peat Charcoal," for which a Patent was granted to me
dated April 2nd 1873, No. 1216, the apparatus referred to consisting of
a screw of diminishing pitch or capacity turning within a perforated
cylinder or cone for the purpose of expressing water from wet peat.
According to the first part of my improvements I employ a feeding
screw, conical, or partly cylindrical and partly conical, within the head
of the machine, considerably larger in diameter and capacity than the
following or first part of the screw which works within the straining
cylinder or conc. The feeding screw supplies the substance to be
treated in greater volume than the straining screw does or can receive
and remove it, in consequence of which the substance has impressed
upon it an alternate advancing and receding movement with each
revolution of the feeding screw, and is turned over, broken up, bruised,
and churned between the feeding screw and the interior surface of the
head previously to entering the straining screw. The interior surface
may be corrugated or stepped to give better effect to the disintegrating
action of the feeding screw. By means of the enlarged feeding screw
the straining screw is at once, and under considerable pressure, fully
charged with the substance to be strained.
According to the second part of my improvements the straining
cylinder or cone is for most purposes constructed as a framework of bars
or rods of any suitable material and section so as to form a cage,
grid, or latticework, with interspaces between them with a porous or
intersticial covering or lining of canvas, calico, hair cloth, press cloth,
flannel, wire gauze, or wire net, or such other material as may suffice to
retain the solid matter whilst the fluids escape through the fabric. On
this system the strainer is more simply and cheaply made and may be
constructed so as to present a larger proportional area for escape of
liquid than when made with an ordinary perforated tube. The porous
covering may be stretched on segmental frames fitted to and fastened on
the straining framework.

page_text: According to the third part of my improvements the atmospheric air
is exhausted from the straining surfaces so as to placo the strainer in a
more or less perfect vacuum, and the fluids are more rapidly disengaged.
and strained off than when they are discharged against the ordinary atmo-
spheric pressure. To effect this object the straining cylinder or cone is
enveloped in a close chamber which may consist of a larger cylinder or
cone made air-tight round the strainer. The air and the water or other
fluids discharged from the substance treated into the close chamber are
exhausted from it by means of pumps or other suitable apparatus, and a
vacuum is provided and maintained outside the external straining
surface.
Additional straining surface is provided by making hollow and
perforating the central shaft and the straining screw, the perforated
surfaces being covered or lined with suitable straining fabric, and a
vacuum is applied to the internal perforated surfaces by exhaustion from
the hollow shaft with which they are in communication. Or for some
On the
purposes the screw may consist of a covered framework.
contrary a plenum instead of a vacuum may be applied to the internal
straining surfaces by forcing air under considerable pressure into the
interior of the shaft and the screw. The air acts with its increased
pressure through the perforations on the substance with which the
straining screw is filled, and thus accelerates the disengagement and
straining off of the fluids at the circumference of the cylinder or conc.
5
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said Daniel Kinnear Clark in the Great Seal Patent
Office on the 27th October 1874.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, DANIEL
KINNEAR CLARK, of Buckingham Street, Strand, in the County of
Middlesex, Civil Engineer, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Twenty-seventh day of April, in the year
of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-four, in the thirty-
seventh year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors,

page_text: give and grant unto me, the said Daniel Kinnear Clark, Her special
license that I, the said Daniel Kinnear Clark, my executors, admini-
strators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Daniel Kinnear.
Clark, 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
"IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY AND APPARATUS FOR DISINTEGRATING AND
STRAINING PARTIALLY FLUID OR SEMI-SOLID SUBSTANCES," upon the condition
(amongst others) that I, the said Daniel Kinnear Clark, 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 Scal
Patent Office within six calendar months next and immediately after the
date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, tho said Daniel Kinnear Clark, 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 thereof, that is to say:-
My Invention relates to improved machinery and apparatus for
disintegrating or masticating and straining or discharging liquid or
moisture, or gaseous matter from partially fluid or semi-solid substances,
such substances consisting partly of water, oil, or other liquid, and
partly of solid matter, such as wet peat, yeast, clay slip for pottery or
porcelain, sewage, fatty matters, oil seeds, starch, white lead, colours,.
dye stuff, potatoes, and other roots, hops, and fruit, or any semi-solid
mixtures or preparations of such substances.
"
The Invention has reference chiefly to the straining apparatus described a
in portions of the Specification and Drawings of my Invention for.
* Improvements in Machinery and Apparatus for the Manufacture of
Peat Fuel and Peat Charcoal," for which a Patent was granted
to me dated April 2nd 1873, No. 1216, the apparatus referred to
consisting of a screw of diminishing pitch or capacity turning within a
a perforated cylinder or cone for the purpose of expressing water from
wet peat.

page_text: According to the first part of my present improvements 1 employ a
feeding screw, conical, coniformı, taper, or partly cylindrical and partly
conical, within the head of the machine considerably larger in diameter
and capacity than the following or first part of the straining screw.
which works within the straining cylinder or cone. The feeding screw
supplies the substance to be treated in greater volume than the straining
screw does or can receive and remove it, in consequence of which
portions of the substance are turned back, and it has impressed upon it
more or less of an alternate advancing and receding movement with
cach revolution of the feeding screw, and is turned over,
broken up,
bruised, mixed, and churned between the feeding screw and the interior
surface of the head of the machine previously to entering the straining
screw. The interior surface of the head of the machine may be
corrugated or stepped to facilitate the disintegrating action of the
feeding screw. By means of the larger feeding screw also the straining
screw is at once and under considerable pressure fully charged with the
substance to be strained. The form of the feeding screw constructed
according to my improvements may not be strictly conical, but it must
be so tapered and reduced in capacity as to concentrate the feeding
pressure upon the straining screw.
:
According to the second part of my improvements the straining
cylinder or cone is for most purposes constructed as a framework of bars
or rods of any suitable material and section, with interspaces between
them so as to form a lantern, grid, or latticework, with a porous or
intersticial covering or lining of canvas, calico, hair cloth, press cloth,
flannel, wire gauze, or wiro net, or such other material as may suffice to
retain the solid matter whilst the fluids escape through the fabric. On
this system the strainer is more simply and cheaply made, and may bo
constructed so as to present a larger proportional area for the escape of
liquid than when made with an ordinary perforated tube. The porous
covering may be stretched on segmental frames fitted to and fastened on
the straining framework.
According to the third part of my improvements the atmospheric air
is exhausted from the straining surfaces so as to place the strainer in a
more or less perfect vacuum, and the fluids are more rapidly disengaged
and strained off than when they are discharged against the ordinary
atmospheric pressure. To effect this object the straining cylinder or
cone is enveloped in a close chamber which may consist of a larger

page_text: descends from the hopper; C is the straining cylinder or tube, and D is
the delivery chamber; E is the main revolving shaft which carries the
screws and is driven at one or both ends by ordinary gearing, one
arrangement of which is shown at F. The feeding screw G is partly
cylindrical as at a, and partly conical as at 6; the diameter and the
pitch at a are in this example one and half times the diameter and
pitch of the first turn of the straining screw H and both the diameter
and the pitch of the feeding screw are gradually reduced as the conical
or taper outline is contracted until the feeding screw joins the straining
screw at c, where it is of the same or nearly the same diameter and
pitch. The head is made larger in diameter inside about the cylindrical
part of the feeding screw than the screw itself, so as to form a clear
space round the screw shown at d, d.
In consequence of the gradual reduction of the capacity of the feeding
screw effected by the conical or taper contraction towards the straining
screw, a portion of the comparatively large volume of peat supplied by
the first part of the feeding screw a is in due course wedged into the
contracted portion b by which it is passed into the straining cylinder,
whilst the remainder of the peat delivered by the first part of the screw
is turned back over the screw in the clear space d, d, when it is again
taken and delivered into the conical portion of the screw.
The peat
is in this way subjected to a compressing and bruising action by which
it is broken up and mixed prior to entering the straining cylinder.
up
The straining cylinder C is shown in Figure 1 having a portion of it
broken out for want of room in the Drawing, the screw H being
continuous throughout the cylinder and having a gradually diminishing
pitch. The changes of pitch take place either at every turn of the
screw or after every two, three, or more turns. The cylinder is made in
segments e, e¹, ell, ell, of any convenient length or number supported
by brackets f, f, or otherwise. The segments e and e* are in section;
the segments c' and e¹ show the tube uncovered, and the segment e¹¹
shows the tube covered with the straining material. Each segment is
constructed like a cage, and consists of flat bars f¹, f¹, rivetted to a
flanged ring at each end, forming a lantern. The covering is shown in
section in Figure 3, and it consists of a straining fabric g of flannel or
other suitable material between two wire nets h and i, of which the outer
net is framed in two halves bolted together or hinged together at one
side

page_text: The delivery chamber D is provided with dies or openings at one side
through which the peat or other substance, after having traversed the
straining screw where it is strained and compressed, is discharged to be
cut if required into pieces of suitable size. The substance may be
'discharged from the end of the machinery instead of from the side as
shown in the Figure 1.
Figures 2 and 3 show a method of enclosing the straining cylinder in
an air-tight chamber I for the purpose of generating and maintaining a
vacuum about the cylinder externally. The chamber is formed of
plates K, K, K, united and connected by angle irons. It is in two parts,
bolted together at the sides which can be taken apart for the purpose
of examination. The air and the disengaged water are extracted from
the chambers by means of air and water pumps or other well known
contrivances.
Figure 4 shows a straining cylinder constructed of latticework in
accordance with my improvements, in which bars or ribands f¹, f¹, are
bent into right-hand and left-hand helices rivetted together at the
intersections.
Figure 5 shows an application of the larger feeding screw to a strainer
of conical or taper form with a straining screw of diminishing pitch and
capacity in accordance with my improvements.
Having thus described the nature of my Invention and the manner of
performing or carrying the same into practice, I would remark that I
do not confine myself to the exact details herein described and repre-
sented in the Drawings, so long as the novel features and true character a
of my improvements are retained, but what I believe to be novel and
claim as my Invention are the following improvements on the straining
machinery and apparatus described in portions of the Specification and
Drawings of my Invention for which a Patent was granted to me as
aforesaid, applicable to the treatment of partly fluid or semi-solid a
substances.
First. The method of disentegrating and feeding under pressure
partially fluid or semi-solid substances by means of a feeding screw of
considerably larger diameter and capacity than the straining screw, the
delivering part of the screw being conical or taper, substantially as a
herein described and represented in Figures 1 and 5 of the Drawings
annexed.

page_text: Second. The construction of the straining cylinder or cone with bars
or rods so arranged and combined as to form lantern, grid, or lattice-
work, substantially as herein described and represented in the Drawings
annexed.
Third. The method of accelerating the separation and discharge of
water or other fluid from the substance strained by the formation
of a vacuum or partial vacuum about the straining cylinder or cone,
substantially as herein described and represented in the Drawings
annexed.
Fourth. The method of accelerating the separation and discharge of
water or other fluid at the circumference of the strainer from the
substance strained by the formation of a plenium or atmospheric
pressure in excess of the pressure of air within the straining scrow,
substantially as herein described.
Lastly. I claim the general arrangements and combination of
machinery and apparatus for disentegrating and straining partially fluid
or semi-solid substances, substantially as and for the purposes herein-
before described and represented in the Drawings hereto annexed.
In witness whereof, I, the said Daniel Kinnear Clark, have here-
unto set my hand and seal, the Twenty-sixth day of October;
in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-
four
Witness,
J. G. TONGUE,
Patent Agent,
34, Southampton Buildings, W.C.
D. K. CLARK. (L.S.)