AM IMPROVED MODE OF CONSTRUCTING FIRE-PROOF FLOORS, CEILINGS, AND Roors
Year: 1844

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, HENRY HAWES
Fox, of Northwoods, in the Parish of Frampton Cotterell, near Winterbourne,
in the County of Gloucester, Doctor of Medicine, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Tenth day of February, in the seventh year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said
Henry Hawes Fox, Her especial license that I, the said Henry Hawes Fox,
my exors, adñiors, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Henry Hawes
Fox, my exors, admors, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and no
others, from time to time and at all times during the term of years therein
expressed, should, and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within
England, Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, and also in all Her
said Majesty's Colonies and Plantations abroad, my Invention of "AM IMPROVED
MODE OF CONSTRUCTING FIRE-PROOF FLOORS, CEILINGS, AND Roors;" in which
said Letters Patent is contained a proviso, obliging me, the said Henry
Hawes Fox, by an instrument in writing under my hand and seal, particularly
to describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, and to cause the same to be enrolled in
Her said Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six calendar months next
and immediately after the date of the said in part recited Letters Patent,
as in and by the same, reference being thereunto had, will more fully and at
large appear.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Henry Hawes Fox, do hereby declare the nature of my said Invention to
consist principally in combining and arranging the materials of which my said
floors, ceilings, and roofs are composed, and in arranging that such portions of
the materials as are in themselves combustible shall be completely covered by
and imbedded in such other portions of the materials as are not combustible.
And further, in coating the floors with prepared oil, so as to give them a sur-
face which protects them from injury, and in coating the roofs with a covering
of tar, pitch, and paper, put on in an improved manner, which effectually sheds
the wet and preserves the materials under it. And in further compliance with
the said proviso, I, the said Henry Hawes Fox, do hereby describe the manner
in which my said Invention is to be performed, by the following statement
thereof, reference being had to the Drawing annexed, and to the figures and
letters marked thereon, similar letters being used to denote similar parts in all
the Figures, that is to say :-
And, first, with reference to my fire-proof floors.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING.
Figure 1 is a side view of a cast-iron flooring joist; Figure 2 is a plan of a
floor in progress of construction, shewing the various stages of the process. The
parts marked A are the joists, resting on the side walls of a building, with their
footlings marked a. The parts marked B are stout laths, laid across from joist
to joist resting on ribs or flanges cast with the joists to receive them. On these
laths is spread, about three-fourths of an inch thick, the sort of mortar used by
plasterers for what is called rendering, marked C, composed of one part of lime
to three parts coal ashes, which, protruding through and from between the
laths, serves as a key to hold up the plastering of the ceiling below. Over the
rendering "C," is then laid what I call pugging D, being a mixture of
eight-tenths of road grit to one-tenth of coal ashes, and one-tenth of lime,
which being mixed with not more water than will will make it work well,
should be well pugged or trodden in, so as to compress it as close as possible,
and to be of the thickness shewn in the Drawing. Next, upon this pugging
is laid a cement E, made of two parts course sand and one part lime
mixed together as mortar, levelled and trod in as long as it cracks, and
then the surface coating or floating F is laid on about one-fourth of an
inch thick, composed of two parts fine sand, and one part lime, and well.
trowelled down to a nice even and level surface, which surface when perfectly.
dry is then to be thoroughly saturated with cold-drawn linseed oil, made hot

page_text: and applied with a brush while in that state all over the floor; two coats will
generally be found sufficient for the saturation required; and this makes the
surface of the floor so hard and tough that it is not liable afterwards to be
injured by the brushing, cleaning, or moving of furniture, &c. thereon, to which
it may be subjected.
Secondly, with reference to my fire-proof ceiling, which will be formed under-
neath by the foregoing arrangement and composition of flooring above, it will
only have to be plastered and finished off in the ordinary manner in which
plasterers complete such work.
Thirdly, with reference to my fire-proof roofs, Figure 4 is a section through
a roof made on my plan. A, A, A, are three of my iron joists, "a," "a," being
the footings of the joists in the two walls of a passage running through the
house, and the joists between these two walls being of course much shorter
than the joists on each side of them. The long joists have a slight inclination
towards the centre, and the centre joists have a slight inclination from end to
end of the building to carry off the water, the under side of the joists being
finished as a ceiling, and the upper side as a floor, as before described. The
only difference between the roof and the floor is its inclination for the water-
way, and that the floating should be done with good hair mortar instead of the
materials herein-before described, and the surface made perfectly even, and the
coating of oil omitted. In order to complete the roof, I proceed to cover the
upper surface with pitch, tar, paper, and sand, as herein-after described; that is
to say, first, I take twelve gallons of mineral pitch, "or what is commonly called
coal tar, and boil it down to nine gallons; in boiling the tar care must be
taken not to introduce too much coal tar at one time, the result of which would
be a fierce commotion, and the tar would rise and overflow the boiler, and
perhaps take fire. The boiler should have a lid cased with sheet iron, in case
a shower of rain should come on during the boiling, which would produce a
fermentation aud spoil the tar. The lid is of the greatest use, for if the tar
should catch fire you can smother it with the lid, but without it you would find
it difficult to effect this, and the probability is, that it would burn until all the
tar was consumed. If the person who boils the tar wants to know how it is
proceeding, let him apply some to a piece of paper; if it is not reduced enough
it will part as if it had been stuck with treacle, but when of a proper con-
sistency it will stick it tightly together; if he goes beyond this it will easily snap
when bent, and if he rub it it will become powder, as rosin would if rubbed
hard; if the tar be too hot for the brushes (for the roof it never can be too hot)
it will discharge a thick snuff-coloured vapour and burn the brushes. When
the floating is perfectly dry the pitch must be spread on it in a hot state with

page_text: large whitewashing brushes, and while the pitch is hot the paper (prepared.
as herein-after described) must be spread on it as quickly as possible, two men
unrolling the sheet, and two other men on their knees rubbing and pressing the
paper down. The paper should be previously dressed with hot raw tar on one
side only, leaving the other side dry and clean for the men to kneel on and
handle. One sheet of paper should overlap the other about five inches; put the
first sheet on the lowest part of the roof and work right and left that the lower
sheets may be always be overlaped by those above them. When a part of the
paper is thus laid on it must be coated with the hot pitch, and instantly as the
brushes have left it some good clean sand free from earthy matter must be
sifted through a fine sand sieve on it. This last operation must be performed
as quickly as possible, or else the pitch will set, and prevent the sand from
gravitating or sinking into it. The reason for thus completing the work when
only a part of the paper is laid is this, if you leave it all night exposed, and
rain should come, it would greatly injure the face of the paper; and if done
soon after the paper has been laid on, the heat will not have escaped, and the
more heat the paper contains the longer the pitch will remain fluid and the
more sand it will receive.
Now, whereas I do not claim as my Invention any new fire-proof prin-
ciple of construction, but only an improved mode of carrying out known fire-
proof principles in the construction of floors, ceilings, and roofs.
And, first, I claim the formation or construction of a floor by the particular
combination and arrangement in layers of the materials herein-before described
on laths supported on cast-iron joists, as shewn by the Drawing annexed, and
finished by saturating the surface with oil.
Secondly, I claim the attaching of an ordinary ceiling to the under side of
a floor constructed as aforesaid, whereby both the floor and the ceiling are
rendered fire-proof.
And, lastly, I claim the construction of a roof in the same manner as I con-
struct the floor, ceiling it underneath, so as to make it fire-proof; but instead
of the oiled surface given to the floor, covering it with pitch, tar, paper, and
sand, in the particular manner herein before described. And such my Inven-
tion, being to the best of my knowledge and belief, entirely new, and never
before used within that part of Her said Majesty's United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland called England, Her said Dominion of Wales, or
Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, nor in any of Her said Majesty's Colonies or
Plantations abroad, I do hereby declare this to be my Specification of the
same, and that I do verily believe this my said Specification doth comply in
all respects fully and without reserve or disguise with the proviso in the said

page_text: herein-before in part recited Letters Patent contained, wherefore I hereby
claim to maintain exclusive right and privilege to my said Invention.
In witness whereof, I, the said Henry Hawes Fox, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Eighth day of August, One thousand eight hundred
and forty-four.
HENRY HAWES FOX. (L.S.)
Signed, sealed, and delivered by the above-
named Henry Hawes Fox, in the presence
of, the words "when perfectly dry" being
first interlined between the twenty-first
and twenty-second lines from the top,