IMPROVEMENTS IN PUDDLING AND OTHER FURNACES.
Year: 1875

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to David Roberts, Manager, and James Noble,
Draughtsman, both of the Bittannia Ironworks Company, Lunited,
of Middlesborough-on-Tees, in the County of York, for the Inven-
tion of "TMPROVEMENTS TE DOLINA
AMFER
"
tion of
"IMPROVEMENTS IN PUDDLING AND OTHER FURNACES.
Scaled the 20th December 1875, and dated the 3rd August 1875.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said David Roberts and
James Noble at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with
their Petition, on the 3rd August 1875.
WC, DAVID ROBERTS, Manager, and JAMES NOBLE, Draughtsman,
both of the Britannia Ironworks Company, Limited, of Middlesborough-
on-Tees, in the County of York, do hereby declare the nature of the
said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN PUDDLING AND OTHER FURNACES," to
be as follows
The Invention applies to puddling and other furnaces, the working
bottoms of which are formed of plates of metal, and the object of the
Invention is to reduce or modify the intensity of the heat of such

page_text: bottoms during working. For this purpose we form the under side of
the plate or plates forming the working bottom of such furnaces with
flanges or other suitable projections to dip down into water placed in
position beneath for the purpose.
The water is contained in tanks formed to receive it at one end or
portion and to allow it to pass away at the opposite end, or at some other
part of such trough or tank to insure circulation of such water and its
'being kept thereby comparatively cool and maintained at a desired
lovel.
The surface of water in the tank or holder extends under the entire
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said David Roberts and James Noble in the Great
Scal Patent Office on the 3rd February 1876.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, wc, DAVID
ROBERTS, Manager, and JAMES NOBLE, Draughtsman, both of the
Britannia Ironworks Company, Limited, Middlesborough-on-Tees, in
the County of York, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Third day of August, in the year of
our Lord One thousand cight hundred and seventy-five, in the thirty-
unth year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors,
give and grant unto us, the said David Roberts and James Noble, Her
special license that we, the said David Roberts and James Noble,
our executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as wc, the
said David Roberts and James Noble, our exccutors, 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 PUDDLING AND
OTHER FURNACES," upon the condition (amongst others) that we, the
said David Roberts and James Noble, our executors or administrators,

page_text: In each of the Figures the same letters indicate corresponding parts
wherever they occur.
The botttom plates a, a, are cast with flanges a' or other suitable pro-
jections on the under side of them, but we give the preference to flanges.
These bottom plates a are supported by trough-formed bearers b, b,
having each a flange or projections b¹ formed on the under side thereof.
Underneath those bottom plates a is applied a tank c, into which
is conducted a continuous supply of cold water, and this water may
thence be passed on by means of suitable pipes into the puddler's tank,
or it may be allowed to overflow underneath the furnace for the purpose
of cooling the ashes. We maintain the water level in the tank c about
six inches or thereabouts, below the top side of the bottom plates a with
the flanges a¹ and ' of the bottom plates and of the trough bearers.,
dipping into the water in the tank c, thus keeping the said bottom
plates cool by conduction, and avoiding the violent expansion and
contraction usually occasioned where jets of steam or water are by
pressure thrown or played against the under side of such bottom plates,
or where the water is brought into immediate contact with the under
side of the bottom plates. The risk of explosion in the latter case
being also very great the flanges a¹ and ¹are of a buckstave form,
which by keeping the bottom plates a from buckling tends to preservo
a level upper surface to them and avoids the trouble occasioned by the
puddler's rabble catching where one section of the bottom plates rises
above another often breaking the machine puddling apparatus where
such are used The split draft, as shown on the Drawing, is arranged
so as to take the draft from one double puddling furnace by the two
flue passages d, d, into the vertical boilers e, c, thereby generating as
much steam in such two boilers as if they were working in the ordinary
way by having two single furnaces and two separate flues attached.
Our reason for not working with single draft will be seen by referring
to the Drawings, as the usual draft, nineteen inches in existing vertical
boilers, would not be sufficient for the draft required for our double
furnace, and having the same steam generating power left after con-
version of single into double furnace, practice and theory point out by
the relative grate areas of our double and the ordinary single furnaces
that at least one-third of the fuel is saved by conversion of fuel into
gases, this we attribute to having more complete combustion in the
furnace owing to having an excess of oxygen, as against the ordinary

page_text: single furnace, to avoid the waste by oxidation. We construct the
working portion of the furnace and outlet to boiler flucs in such a
manner that the indraught of air at the stopper holes of the furnace
mixes with the non-consumed carbonic oxide about the fluc budge,
thereby passing clear of the iron in process of balling (at which period
the greatest waste of iron takes place by oxidation) and at the same
time causing complete combustion before the gases pass into the boiler
flucs, hence a better yield in furnace results.
Having thus described our Invention and means which we adopt in
carrying the same into effect, we would have it understood that we do not
confine ourselves to the precise arrangements of parts, as shown and
described, as the same may be varied without departing from the peculiar
character of our Invention, but what we claim is,-—
First The method of keeping the bottom plates of puddling furnaces
cool by forming such plates and the bearings thereof with flanges or
projections to dip into water, substantially as described
Secondly We claim the arranging such furnaces with double flucs or
chimney shafts, as described
Tn witness whereof, wc, the said David Roberts and James Noble,
have hereunto set our hands and scals, this Thirty-first day of
January, in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred
and seventy-six