IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY OR APPARATUS FOR MAKING ICE AND REDUCING TEMPERATURES
Year: 1876

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by John Garrett Tongue at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents on the 1st December 1876. A communication
from abroad by Carroll L. Riker, of the City, County, and State of New
York, United States of America.
JOHN GARRETT TONGUE, of the Firm of Tongue and Birkbeck, Patent Agents and
Engineers, of 34, Southampton Buildings, Chancery Lane, in the County of
Middlesex. "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY OR APPARATUS FOR MAKING ICE AND
REDUCING TEMPERATURES." A communication from abroad. by Carroll L. Ri kerof
the City, County, and State of New York, United States of America.
This Invention relates to improvements in machines or apparatus for making ice,
reducing temperatures, or producing cold by means of compressed and expanded air,
and it consists in novel arrangements and combinations of parts consisting of a
steam engine or other motive-power air-compressing cylinder and air-expanding
cylinder, as herein-after fully described.
The machine or apparatus consists of the cylinder of an ordinary steam engine
or other motive-power and air-compressing engine and an air expander. Those parts
being in all respects similar to well known devices of the same class are not here
now particularly described. A fly wheel is mounted upon a suitable shaft connected
by means of a crank with the piston rod of the steam engine.
In the manufacture of ice by what is known as the air process the air used is first
compressed by any suitable means, and the heat thereby generated is absorbed by
any cooling medium, such as cold water. The cold compressed air is then caused
to expand, or rather does so of its own accord, upon being introduced into an
expanding cylinder. Intense cold is thereby produced, and the cold air is utilized
for any purpose for which it may be required, such as for cooling buildings or for
the manufacture of ice. Great care is always taken to cover the expanding engine
and cold air pipes with some non-conducting material, in order to prevent the
warming of the air while the compressing cylinder and pipes, in which the air is
still warm from compression, are cooled as thoroughly as circumstances will
admit of.
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In order to obviate the necessity for packing the expanding cylinder it is placed
inside the building intended to be cooled or in which the ice is to be made. By
this arrangement of the cylinders great advantages are secured.

page_text: According to one arrangement of apparatus for carrying out this Invention the
samo piston rod carries the pistons of the steam cylinder and of the air-compressing
cylinder;
the expanding engine is also attached to the same shaft, but its crank is
at an angle with that of the steam engine piston rod. By this means the expanding
engine acts to carry the steam engine crank past the centre, besides performing its
legitimate functions of expanding the compressed air.
In another modification of the apparatus all the cylinders are arranged in a right
line and all their pistons are upon the same rod. In this arrangement the expanding
engine also acts to aid the compressing engine, but as it can have no effect in
carrying the crank past the centres 1 prefer to gear two such systems to the same
shaft and have the cranks at right angles in the usual way. The advantages of
either construction are evident.
In both cases the expanding engine acts in aid of the compressor, and were it not
for the increased tension of the air caused by the heat of compression and the cold
of expansion the steam engine would theoretically only have to run itself.
It will be seen that by arranging the parts as previously described an air
compressor and expander may readily be attached to an ordinary steam engine, it
being only necessary to perforate the other cylinder head of the engine and attach
the piston rod of the compressor to the piston of the steam engine in any convenient
way.
It is unimportant whether the steam engine compressor and expander are
arranged in the order nained, or in any other, so far as their co-operation is
concerned. It is advantageous to place the expander furthest from the shaft (in
case all three cylinders are arranged in line), in order to place it and it alone within
the refrigerator building or ice factory.