A NEW METHOD OF COLLECTING SEDIMENTS OF TUBULAR STEAM BOILERS AND APPARATUS EMPLOYED THEREIN.
Year: 1872

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Alexander Friedmann, of Vienna, in the Empire
of Austria, Engineer, for the Invention of "A NEW METHOD OF
COLLECTING SEDIMENTS OF TUBULAR STEAM BOILERS AND APPARATUS EMPLOYED
THEREIN.
"
Sealed the 4th October 1872, and dated the 8th April 1872.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Alexander Friedmann
at the Office of the Commissioners of. Patents, with his Petition,
on the 8th April 1872.
I, ALEXANDER FRIEDMANN, of Vienna, in the Empire of Austria,
Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "A NEW
METHOD OF COLLECTING SEDIMENTS OF TUBULAR STEAM BOILERS AND APPARATUS
EMPLOYED THEREIN," to be as follows:-
اوو
In locomotive boilers and in all horizontal tubular steam boilers
there exists a circulation of the water. in the lower part of the barrel or
cylindrical boiler towards the water surrounding the fire-box. Robert

page_text: Stephenson was the first to adopt a contrivance to stimulate this circu-
lation on his first locomotive, the "Rocket," by fitting on each side of
the locomotive a tube communicating at the one end with the water of
the lower part of the barrel, and at the other end with the water
surrounding the fire-box near the surface of the fuel. By these two
circulation tubes of Stephenson the heavier water on the bottom of the
barrel of the locomotive flows easily to the water surrounding the fire-
box, and being here more vigorously heated ascends and establishes a
strong and continuous circulation. Now my Invention, which I will
suppose to be applied to Stephenson's locomotive," the Rocket," consists
in making use of this circulation to collect the sediments of the water of
the boiler by interposing or introducing in each of the above-mentioned
circulation tubes a hollow vessel, the sections and volume of which are
large in proportion to the section of the circulation tubes, and which the
whole circulating water passes through. The circulating water in
passing through the said interposed vessel loses therein nearly the whole
velocity which it had when flowing through the circulation tube, and
therefore deposits in the vessel a part of the matters it contains in
suspension. The circulation being continuous all the time the loco-
motive is working all the water of the boiler passes before its evapora-
tion very often through the interposed vessel, and always depositing
there a part of its sedimentary matters a great purification of the water
results, and nearly all its sediments are collected in the said vessel.
I call this vessel the accumulator. This accumulator is provided with a
cock to purge it, and a cover to enable it to be cleaned inside. On the
accumulator, at the two points where the circulation tubes are connected
with it, or on each circulation tube at the points where they communi-
cate with the barrel and with the fire-box, cocks or valves, or slide
valves are fitted, in order to be able to shut off the communication of
the accumulator with the whole boiler, and to clean it even when the
boiler is in pressure. The position of the accumulator is immaterial;
it can be lower than the barrel, or higher up on the sides of the barrel,
or on the sides of the fire-box. It is evident that wherever the accu-
mulator be placed, and whatever be the form, length, or shape given to
the circulation tubes to make them the best discharge in the top of the
accumulator, the water near the bottom of the barrel being heavier than
the water surrounding the fire-box it will always circulate regularly,
and losing its velocity in the accumulator will deposit its sediments

page_text: Having thus described my Invention as applied to Stephenson's
locomotive, the Rocket, it will be easy to apply it to the different
types of locomotives existing at present. According to these types the
accumulator can be either, as before described, a hollow vessel entirely
.independent of the locomotive, or screwed to the boiler, or rivetted to it,
inside or outside the boiler, and communicating at the one end with the
water near the bottom of the barrel, and at the other end with the water
surrounding the fire-box through circulation tubes inside or outside the
boiler. The accumulator inside the boiler can be contrived also, by
O rivetting on the barrel under the lowest range of the fire-tubes horizontal
plates the whole length of the barrel, so that the lower part of its
volume represents a channel entirely separated from the mass of the
water of the boiler, and communicating with it only at each of the two
ends of the boiler by a relatively small opening. This channel is then.
5 at the same time an accumulator and a circulation tube, and can be
provided with cocks to purge it, and covers to enable it to be cleaned.
This arrangement will be still more perfect if combined with one or more
external circulation tubes.
Although the collecting of the sediments of locomotive boilers is the
most important, and would constitute a real improvement, even if this
method has been applied already to other tubular steam boilers, still the
application to other tubular steam boilers is of a great value.
As well as the current of the water which exists in locomotive
tubular boilers, near the bottom of the barrel towards the fire-box, there
is also a current in vertical tubular boilers and in steam ship boilers.
In such boilers the water near the outside plates is less hot than the
water surrounding the fire-tubes, and sinks from the high level down to
near the level of the fire-grate. This current can be utilized in the
same way as described for locomotive boilers by introducing an accumu-
Olator for the sediments.
The circulation of the water near the bottom of the barrel of locomo-
tive boilers towards the fire-box, and the means of its stimulation,
having been demonstrated and realized since the time of Stephenson,
my Invention consists in the new method of utilizing this circulation
for collecting the sediments of the water of tubular steam boilers, and in
..the arrangements herein described for carrying out this method.

page_text: The principle of my method is to establish in the current of the circu-
lating water of locomotive boilers, and of tubular steam boilers generally,
a chamber which is entirely separated from the mass of the water of the
boiler, and which is so large and so connected with the boiler that the
water from near the bottom of the barrel enters the said chamber with
the great velocity of the current, loses its velocity in this chamber,
deposits thus its sediments in this chamber, and is therefore in a purified
state when it leaves the chamber, and enters the remaining part of the
current to flow to the fire-box. The arrangements I adopt to carry out
this method are herein-before described.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said Alexander Friedmann in the Great Seal Patent
Office on the 5th October 1872.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, ALEXANDER
FRIEDMANN, of Vienna, in the Empire of Austria, Engineer, send
greeting..
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Eighth day of April, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-two, in the thirty-
fifth year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors,
give and grant unto me, the said Alexander Friedmann, Her special
licence that I, the said Alexander Friedmann, my executors, admini-
strators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Alexander Fried-
mann, 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 "A NEW METHOD OF COLLECTING SEDIMENTS OF TUBULAR STEAM
BOILERS AND APPARATUS EMPLOYED THEREIN," upon the condition (amongst
others) that I, the said Alexander Friedmann, my executors
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
or

page_text: Office within six calendar months next and immediately. after the date
of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Alexander Friedmann, do hereby
declare the nature of my 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, reference being had to the
accompanying Drawings, that is to say :-
In locomotive boilers and in all similar horizontal tubular steam
boilers, there exists a current of the water near the bottom of the barrel
towards the fire-box. Robert Stephenson was the first to adopt a con-
trivance to utilize this current in his first celebrated locomotive," the
Rocket," represented in Figure 1, Sheet 1, of the annexed Drawings.
He fitted on each side of the said locomotive a tube C¹, C², communi-
cating at the one end with the water near the bottom of the barrel, and at
the other end with the water surrounding the fire-box near the surface of
the fuel. By these two tubes the water near the bottom of the barrel,
which does not contain so many globules of steam, and which therefore
is heavier, flows easily to the water surrounding the fire-box, and being
there more vigorously heated and producing therefore more globules of
steam, it ascends quickly; thus a circulation through the tube C³, C²,
is created. In a locomotive like the Rocket this circulation through
the pipes C³, C², can easily be utilized to collect the sediments of the
water by interposing or introducing in each of the said circulation
tubes C³, C³, of Stephenson a closed vessel D, D (see Figure 1ª), the
sections and the volume of which are large in proportion to the section
of the circulation tube, the whole water flowing through the first part C¹
of the circulation tube must pass through the vessel, lose its velocity in
the great volume therein, thus deposit a part of the sediments it contains
in suspension, and therefore enter purified into the second part C³ of the
circulation tube to flow to the water surrounding the fire-box. In the
present locomotive boilers not only could the interposing of a collector
in the circulation tubes not always be effected as in the "Rocket," but
it must be considered also that in the "Rocket" the whole fire-box was
screwed on the barrel, whilst in existing locomotives the volume of the
barrel and the volume around the fire-box form one uninterrupted space,
and that therefore the water fed to the barrel of the boiler would instead
of flowing through the circulation tubes flow directly along the bottom
of the barrel to the water surrounding the fire-box, and deposit, there all

page_text: its sediments, just as if there were no circulation tubes at all. I have
therefore invented such arrangements that the heavier water of the
barrel cannot fall directly into the space around the fire-box, but must
previously enter a chamber separated from the mass of the water of the
boiler, and cannot come into the space around the fire-box except in a
purified state.
Figures 2 to 12 of the annexed Sheets of Drawings represent these
arrangements. In all these Figures the following letters indicate corre-
sponding parts.
a is the point where the water of the barrel enters the circulation
tube; b is the point where the water leaves the circulation tube and enters
the water surrounding the fire-box; C¹ is the circulation tube con-
ducting the water of the barrel of the boiler to the sediment collector;
C² is the circulation tube conducting the purified water from the
collector to the water surrounding the fire-box; D is the collector of the
sediments; E is the cover to clean the collector; F¹ is the cock to purge
the collector and circulation tubes; F is a small air cock; G, G¹, are
cocks or valves to intercept the communication between the collector
or circulation tubes and the boiler.
p is a plate or baffle fixed inside the barrel near the fire-box, and of
such a size that it separates the lower part of the water of the barrel
from the water surrounding the fire-box near the fire-grate, whilst the
higher part of the water of the barrel remains in free communication
with the water over the fire-box.
To make the working of all. these arrangements readily understood
I will explain more explicitly the arrangement shewn in Figure 5.
Figure 5 is a longitudinal section of a locomotive with outside cylinders
provided with my arrangement to collect the sediments. When this
locomotive is running there will be a strong evaporation of the water
surrounding the fire-box, which must therefore be continuously replaced
by the water of the barrel; but as the baffle or plate prevents the water
from near the bottom of the barrel flowing as in ordinary locomotives,
directly into the space around the fire-box, the water will flow entirely
through the circulation tubes C³, C². Now the water being fed (as is
generally the case and as must be done in all my arrangements) to the
barrel, this water immediately seeks the lowest part of the boiler; and
as the baffle p prevents it falling directly into the space around the fire-

page_text: box, it rests a few moments on the bottom of the barrel, drops there a
portion of its sediments, flows afterwards successively through the circu-
lation tubes C¹, C², passes the collector D, loses here nearly all its
velocity, and drops all the rest of its sediments. The circulation through
the pipes C1, C2, and the collector is thus insured; and as the top edge
of the plate p is lower than the level of the water in the boiler the circu-
lation is not as it was in the "Rocket" limited by the evaporation of
the fire-box, but is much stronger and continuous as long as the locomo-
tive is running. There thus results a great and insured purification of
all the water, and the collection of its sediments in positions which are
not exposed to the fire, and from where the sediments can easily be
removed.
The baffle or plate p is not to be confounded with the plates, which
were formerly made in the middle of the barrel of locomotives, in order to
support the fire-tubés, which were much longer than now.
These plates
formerly made were not only in the middle of the barrel, whilst the baffle p
is situated near the fire-box, but they were also cut away near the bottom
of the barrel in order to permit a free circulation of the water all along
the bottom of the barrel. In fact a real baffle like that p, without circu-
lation pipes, would be useless, whilst in my arrangements the baffle has
simply for object to compel the water to pass through circulation pipes.
The replacing of the water evaporated around the fire-box being secured
here chiefly through the circulation tubes, care should be taken against
their obstruction by opening from time to time the purging cock F when
the boiler is in pressure. By shutting the cocks G, G¹, the circulation
tubes C, C¹, can be taken off at any time and thoroughly cleaned.
Figure 2 represents an arrangement for placing the collector above
the frames on the side of the barrel of the boiler. The plate or baffle,
not visible in this Figure, is arranged the same as in Figure 5.
Figure 3 represents an arrangement for placing the collector under
the barrel of the boiler, the circulation tubes being arranged otherwise
than in Figure 5, and not provided with cocks.
Figure 4 represents a modification of the arrangement shewn in
Figure 2, by which the collector instead of being independent of the
boiler is rivetted to the barrel above the frames of the locomotive. The
plate or baffle, not seen in this Figure, is arranged the same as in
Figures 3 and 5.

page_text: Figure 4ª is a cross section of Figure 4. Figure 5 has already been
described.
Figure 6 is a modification of the arrangement shewn in Figure 3,
by which the collector instead of being independent of the boiler is
rivetted below the barrel, and the circulation tubes are provided with
valves G, G¹, to intercept the communication between the collector and
the boiler. Figure 6ª is a cross section of Figure 6.
Figure 7 represents a modification of the arrangement shown in
Figure 6, in which the circulation tube C₁ instead of being outside the
boiler is inside; the cleaning of the said tube C³ is therefore not so easy
as in the former arrangements. Figure 7ª is a cross section of the circu-
lation tube C¹ of Figure 7 formed here by an undulated plate rivetted to
the bottom of the barrel inside. The circulation tube C¹ could also be
an ordinary copper tube or formed by rivetting an undulated plate to the
bottom of the barrel outside.
Figure 8 represents an arrangement for collecting the sediments in
locomotives of the Belpaire system with very low fire-boxes, and is a
modification of the arrangement shewn in Figure 7; the two circulation
tubes C¹, as well as C2, are inside the boiler. Thus the tube C¹, and
especially the tube C³, are very difficult to clean.
Figure 9 shews a combination especially adapted for such locomotives
as are already provided with a kind of pocket or trough to collect
sediments. Hitherto such a pocket has not had any important effect,
because the water fed to the boiler could flow immediately into the space
around the fire-box, and deposit much sediment there; and because the
water which circulates along the bottom of the barrel towards the fire-
box has not undergone, in passing the place where the pocket is fitted,
the necessary change of velocity which causes the dropping of the
sediments, the collection of the sediments will immediately be produced
if the baffle plate p be fitted, and if the volume of the pocket be separated
from the mass of the water of the boiler. In Figure 9 the separation of
the volume of the pocket from the boiler is effected by a plate m, m (see
the cross section, Figure 9ª), which covers the top of the volume of the
pocket, and which receives the two circulation tubes C and C. The
circulation tube C2 is arranged here in a special manner between the
inside and the outside fire-box by one or more quadrangular tubes placed
between the bolts of the fire-box through which the water circulates,.

page_text: by arrows
igure 3.
ine quadrangular tubes can be
cleaned by an aperture w in the outside fire-box. It is evident that the
separation of the pocket D from the rest of the barrel could also be made
otherwise.
This arrange-
the water in
Figure 10 represents an arrangement in which the baffle p is the same
as in the former arrangements, but in which the circulation tube C' is
dispensed with, and the collector D rivetted directly below the aper-
ture a, which is very small in proportion to the volume and the sections
of the collector D. Thus the feed water cannot fall directly into the
space around the fire-box; and when the locomotive is running the
circulating water enters with a great velocity from the bottom of the
barrel in the collector, loses there its velocity, drops its sediments, and
is already purified when it enters the circulation tube 0³.
ment is much worse than that shewn in Figure 6, because
the collector communicates too directly with the mass of the water of
the barrel, and thus the circulating water, in passing through the
collector too directly, is exposed to the undulating movements of the
water in the boiler, and less fit to deposit its sediments. If nevertheless
it should be desired to dispense with the first circulation pipe C¹ it
would be much better to adopt the arrangement shewn in Figure 7, and
to take away the circulation tube C¹, the water near the baffle p being
more still the direct communication of the collector without a circu-
lation tube, would be less injurious to the depositing of the sediments of
the water in the collector.
Figure 11 shews a bad modification of the arrangement represented in
Figure 4; the two collectors are here arranged inside the barrel, and
formed by the plates m, m, rivetted tightly on the sides of the barrel.
The circulation tube C is inside the boiler. The baffle p, not seen here,
is arranged the same as in the former arrangement. Figure 11" is a
cross section of Figure 11.
Figure 12 represents a modification of the arrangement shewn in
Figure 11, in which the collector is arranged inside the barrel, and
formed by a plate m, m, rivetted under the last row of the fire-tubes,
thus separating from the barrel the lower part, which then forms the
collector. The cross section of the collector (represented in Figure 12ª)
becomes thus too small to act well, and the circulation tube C¹ is too
short, and inside the boiler, therefore disadvantageous. Even the

page_text: tube could be dispensed with, and the entrance a made as large as
the cross section of the accumulator D (but it would be rather disadvan-
tageous).
The arrangement shewn in Figure 12 is not to be recommended
generally; it would however be very useful for locomotives which have
already a pocket such as I mentioned in explaining Figure 9, but even
then the circulation tube C2 should be arranged externally like that C²
in Figure 11. In vertical tubular steam boilers there also exists a
current of the water against the outside plates from the top level of the
water downwards to the fire-box, this water being somewhat less hot,
and therefore heavier than the water in the centre of the boiler. This
current can be utilized in a similar way for collecting the sediments, as
I have described for locomotive boilers.
In all the arrangements described the entrance of the feed water
into the boiler must be made into the barrel of the boiler, and in no
case into the space separated by the baffle from the volume of the barrel
or in the collector.
In cases of very bad water two collectors, can be constructed, and two
of the arrangements shewn in the Figures be combined, so that the
circulating water after having passed through the first collector must
before its entrance into the fire-box pass through a second collector.
In cases of very good water the collector itself becomes less important;
but if even then the collector could be dispensed with the rest of my
arrangements would still have the most useful effects; a large part of
the sediments would fall on the bottom of the barrel where they would
do no harm, and the water fed into the boiler could not fall directly into
the space around the fire-box, and cool the plates rapidly.
With the above description, and the Figures of the annexed Sheets of
Drawings, any engineer will be able to modify cach arrangement by the
details shewn in the other Figures, or to combine one arrangement
with another.
And having now described the nature of my said Invention, and in
what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that I claim,
utilizing the current of the water from the lower part of the barrel to
the fire-box of locomotive and other similar tubular steam boilers,
with fire-boxes for the purpose of collecting the sediments from the

page_text: In witness whereof, I, the said Alexander Friedmann, have hereunto
set my hand and scal, this Twenty-eighth day of September One
thousand eight hundred and seventy-two.