IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF GAS FROM PETROLEUM OIL AND WATER, AND FROM CANNEL COALS, BITUMINOUS COALS, SCHISTS, TAR, CRUDE COAL OIL, OR OTHER HYDROCARBONS. AND WATER
Year: 1862

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by George Haseltine at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 17th September
1862. A communication from abroad by James Edward Thomson,
Gas Engineer, and Henry Youle Hind, Professor of Chemistry and.
--Geology, both of the City of Toronto, Canada.
I, GEORGE HASELTINE, of the "International Patent Office," No. 100, Fleet
Street, in the City of London, American Barrister-at-Law, do hereby declare-
the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN APPARATUS FOR THE
MANUFACTURE OF GAS FROM PETROLEUM OIL AND WATER, AND FROM CANNEL COALS,
BITUMINOUS COALS, SCHISTS, TAR, CRUDE COAL OIL, OR OTHER HYDROCARBONS. AND
WATER," a communication to me from abroad by James Edward Thomson,
Gas Engineer, and Henry Youle Hind, Professor of Chemistry and Geology,
both of the City of Toronto, Canada, to be as follows:-
These improvements relate chiefly to the construction of a compound retort,
to be used vertically or horizontally, containing three chambers, so as to admit
of the introduction of water in its spheroidal state into the chamber at the
bottom of the retort at a very high temperature, simultaneously with intensely.
heated hydrocarbon gases and vapors for the formation of permanent illumi-
nating gases, and the prevention of subsequent condensation of volatile
hydrocarbons, or the deposition of carbon in the different parts of the
apparatus. The apparatus employed consists of a generator containing a
fire-box, an ash-pit, and a compound retort. The fire-box is lined with fire-
brick, and the retorts are constructed of cast iron, or other suitable material:

page_text: The retort is fed with crude petroleum, or any fluid hydrocarbon from a supply
tank by two or more syphon tubes, which pass through the lid of the retort.
Water from a supply tank, which tank also serves as condenser, passes
through a syphon tube, and falls through a pipe or chamber cast on an inner
retort. The compound retort consists of two parts. The outer part is con-
structed of cast iron, clay, or other suitable material, of hemispherical or
other convenient form, and may be either vertically or horizontally arranged.
The inner part is of cylindrical form, or other convenient form, and may be
constructed of cast iron, clay, or other suitable material, and also arranged
either vertically or horizontally. The space between the outer and inner part
forms a chamber for the petroleum or other material used. The inner retort
consists of two parts or chambers. These parts are separated by grating.
The part above the grating is filled, or partially filled with charcoal or coke
during the process of gas making. The other part is a chamber, at the centre
of the bottom of which a smooth piece of fire-brick is placed at a high angle.
There are cavities through this part, which communicate between the outer
and inner retorts. A cover extending over both retorts is forced on with lead
joints. An eduction pipe is attached to this cover by a stationary rust joint,
and leads to the condenser. This condenser consists of an iron vessel con-
taining a coil of metal pipe or tubing, through which cold water passes from
a reservoir. The condenser is connected with a supply tank by means of a
pipe provided with a syphon valve and stop cock. The condenser is also con-
nected with a washer by means of an eduction pipe. The waste pipe runs
into the washer or elsewhere, as convenient. All the parts of the apparatus,
with the exception of the rust joint and lead joints at the top of the generator,
are connected by means of water joints, which would instantly yield to any
increase of pressure above that of the column of water they contain, which
need not exceed eighteen inches. Petroleum or any other suitable fluid
hydrocarbon being allowed to flow from the reservoir down the syphon on to
pieces of red-hot coke or fire-brick contained in the outer retort, at the same
time water from the condenser or any other convenient source flows through
the syphon valve, and falls upon a a smooth sloping red-hot piece of fire-brick
placed at the bottom of the outer retort. The upper chamber of the inner
retort being filled with lighted coke, and the retort sufficiently heated, the
petroleum or other fluid hydrocarbon falling upon the coke will be converted
partly into volatile hydrocarbons, and these having no other outlet, pass into
the lower part or chamber, and there meet with globules of water in its
spheroidal state thrown off from the sloping red-hot smooth surface of the
fire-bricks into said chamber. When water is thrown into its spheroidal state

page_text: at a very elevated temperature in an atmosphere of hydrocarbon vapors,
these vapors are converted into permanent gases by the influence of pressure,
or catalysis, thereby preventing subsequent condensation, and with the per-
manent gases previously formed, and vapor of water, pass up through the
grating and through the hot coke in the upper chamber of the inner retort.
Any vapor of water which is not decomposed by the hot hydrocarbon vapors
or gases is converted into gases (carbonic acid, carbonic oxide, and hydrogen,)
by passing over the surface of the hot coke, which gases mingling with the
permanent gases from the petroleum pass on with them to the eduction pipe,
and thence to the condenser. If any part of the hydrocarbon vapors have
escaped conversion into permanent gases when coming in contact with water
in its spheroidal state at a very high temperature, which result is one of the
principal objects of this apparatus to effect, they will be here condensed, and
the resulting fluid pass through a pipe into the petroleum reservoir, thus
preventing loss. The permanent gases will pass on to the waste through the
exit pipe to the gasometer.