IMPROVEMENTS IN THE METHOD OF AND IN APPARATUS FOR PRODUCING Gas OR GASES FOR HEATING AND FOR ILLUMINATING PURPOSES
Year: 1875

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to David Adam Fyfe and William Hadfield Bowers,
both of Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, for the Invention
of "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE METHOD OF AND IN APPARATUS FOR PRODUCING
Gas OR GASES FOR HEATING AND FOR ILLUMINATING PURPOSES.”
Sealed the 9th July 1875, and dated the 12th January 1875.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said David Adam Fyfe and
⋅
William Hadfield Bowers at the Office of the Commissioners of
Patents, with their Petition, on the 12th January 1875.·
We, DAVID ADAm Fyfe and William Hadfield BOWERS, both of
Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, do hereby declare the nature
of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE METHOD OF AND IN APPARATUS
FOR PRODUCING Gas or GASES FOR HEATING AND FOR ILLUMINATING PURPOSES," to
be as follows :-
-
Our Invention has for its object in the first place to produce gas
suitable to be employed in puddling and heating furnaces, and in the
furaces of steam generators, and to be otherwise employed in cases
wherein heating properties are more particularly required. In the
Paine 877

page_text: manufacture of such gas we employ a retort similar to the retort described
in the Specification of Letters Patent previously granted to us, and
bearing date the first day of September, in the year One thousand eight
hundred and seventy-three, and numbered (2873). In the said former
Invention sawdust or other substances which were used to absorb alkaline
solutions were fed in at one end of a retort, and were moved along the
heated floor of the retort by means of travelling scrapers, and were dis-
charged at the other end of the said retort.
According to our present Invention we feed the retort mith breeze,
coal dust, culm, or anthracite dust, cannel dust, small coal, or other
substances capable of yielding inflammable gases, or with mixtures of
such substances, and we heat the floor of the retort to a degree sufficient
to effect the entire or partial disstillation or discharge of the gas from the
said substances during their progress from the feeding end to the
delivery end of the retort. The gas as it is produced is conveyed to the
furnace or furnaces in which it is to be consumed as is usual.
An important feature in our present Invention is that we are enabled
to utilise the fine coal dust which at present is of comparatively little
value.
When manufacturing illuminating gas we subject the gas produced,
as herein aforesaid, to heat of a degree suflicient to render it a permanent
gas which can be condensed, or cooled, and purified without losing its
illuminating properties by the condensation or deposit of too large a
proportion of the carbonising properties; as for example, we may cause
the said gas to flow through a retort or pipe, or through retorts or pipes
heated to the necessary extent. The gas may then be cooled and
purified in the ordinary or in a suitable manner.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
and of an Order of the Lord Chancellor, filed by the said David
Adam Fyfe and William Hadfield Bowers in the Great Seal Patent 30
Office on the 24th July 1875.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME. we, DAVID
ADAM FYFE and WILLIAM Hadfield Bowers, both of Manchester, in
the County of Lancaster, send greeting.

page_text: WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Twelfth day of January, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-five, in the thirty-
ninth year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors,
give and grant unto us, the said David Adam Fyfe and William
Hadfield Bowers, Her special license that we, the said David Adam
Fyfe and William Hadfield Bowers, our executors, administrators, and
assigns, or such others as we, the said David Adam Fyfe and William
Hadfield Bowers, our 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 THE METHOD OF AND IN APPARATUS FOR PRo-
DUCING GAS OR GASES FOR HEATING AND FOR ILLUMINATING PURPOSES." upon the
condition (amongst others) that we, the said David Adam Fyfe and
William Hadfield Bowers, by an instrument in writing under our
hands and seals, or under the hand and seal of one of us should par-
ticularly 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 Office within six calendar months
next and immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said David Adam Fyfe, for myself and
on behalf of the said William Hadfield Bowers, 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 and accompanying Drawings, that is to say ;—
Our Invention has for its its object in the first place to produce gas
suitable to be employed in puddling and heating furnaces, and in the
furnaces of steam generators, and to be otherwise employed in cases
wherein heating properties are more particularly required. In the
manufacture of such gas we employ a retort similar to the retort
described in the Specification of Letters Patent previously granted to us,
and bearing date the first day of September, in the year One thousand
eight hundred and seventy-three, and numbered (2873). In the said
former Invention sawdust or other substances which were used to
absorb alkaline solutions were fed in at one end of a retort, and were

page_text: moved along the heated floor of the retort by means of travelling
scrapers, and were discharged at the other end of the said retort.
or with
According to our present Invention we feed the retort with breeze,
coal dust, culm, or anthracite dust, cannel dust, small coal, or other
similar substances capable of yielding inflammable gases,
mixtures of such substances and we heat the floor of the retort to a
degree sufficient to effect the entire or partial disstillation or discharge of
the gas from the said substances during their progress from the feeding
end to the delivery end of the retort. The gas as it is produced it con-
veyed to the furnace or furnaces in which it is to be consumed as is
usual.
An important feature in our present Invention is that we are enabled
to utilise the fine coal dust which at present is of comparatively little
value.
For illuminating purposes the gas produced, as herein aforesaid, may
be subjected to heat of a degree sufficient to render it a permanent gas
which can be condensed, or cooled, and purified without losing its illu-
minating properties by the condensation or deposit of too large a pro-
portion of the carbonising properties.
And in order that our said Invention may be well and readily under-
stood, we have appended hereunto a Sheet of Drawings marked with
letters of reference, corresponding marks indicating the same parts in
the two Figures..
Referring in this place to the said Drawings, Fig. 1, drawn to a scale
of about three eighths of an inch to the foot, represents a side elevation of
the improved gas-producing apparatus; and Fig. 2 drawn to a larger
scale represents a vertical cross section on the line A in Fig. 1. In the
said Figures B is a rectangular retort, the bottom of which is formed by
iron slabs or plates a, to which are bolted or secured iron sides b upon
which are bolted the covering plates c. In the example the retort is
made of cast iron, the slabs or plates a being formed with rebated joints
which are caulked with rust cement or are otherwise made tight. The
castings forming the sides and cover are secured to each other by means
of wrought-iron plates d which are bolted to the castings and cover the
joints, but if preferred the said castings may be formed with flanches
and be secured together thereby by means of bolts, or other variations in

page_text: זי
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the construction may be made so long as the flat. metal bottom is
retained. The bottom of the retort rests upon a floor of fire-clay, slabs e
which is employed to protect the iron floor from the intense heat of the
furnaces and to equalise the said heat. Two Blues f, f, extend below the
retort from end to end or thereabouts, into which flues the heated gases
flow from two furnaces g and h, the one near the centre of the length of
the retort, and the other near one end thereof. The end of the retort
farthest from the furnace g is provided with a feeding hopper i which is
fitted with a pair of rollers which are arranged to crush large pieces of
fuel. The said rollers are geared together and receive motion from a
driving shaft which is actuated by a small engine or is driven by a
strap from a line of shafting, or is otherwise actuated as may be most
suitable to the circumstances of each case. A pinion on the shaft j
gears with a wheel which is fixed on a shaft which passes through
the retort, and on which are fixed chain pulleys." On the said chain
pulleys are mounted two chains 2, l, the links of which are bolted to
scrapers mas in the case of our aforesaid previous Invention. The,said
chains being actuated by the said chain pulleys cause the scrapers to
travel along the floor of the retort from the hopper end to the other end
thereof, that is to say, from the left-hand to the right-hand in the
example illustrated, the returning chains and scrapers being supported
by brackets, one of which is seen at n, in Fig. 1, or by pulleys revolving
loosely on studs, as preferred. The end of the retort farthest from the
hopper terminates in a discharge shute o, the mouth of which is
immersed in water contained in a cistern p. A chain of scrapers q is
employed to effect the discharge of solid matters from the said cistern.
The fuel, say for example coal dust or slack, is placed in the hopper or is
fed into the same by means of a chain of buckets or by other suitable
means, and is gradually fed by the action of the revolving rollers into
the retort and falls on to the floor of the same. The coal is gradually
moved along the floor of the retort by the scrapers m until the residue
falls through the shute o into the water, whence it is discharged by the
scrapers 9. The speed of the scrapers and the heat of the retort should
be so proportioned as that the whole or nearly the whole of the gaseous
matters which the coal is capable of evolving are eliminated from the
matters which constitute the residue before it falls into the cistern-p
The gaseous matters flow through the pipes r, r, into a flues which
conveys them to the furnace or furnaces in which they are to be
consumed. The sides and top of the retort are preferably encased in.

page_text: D. A. FYFE. (L.S.)