IMPROVED MEANS FOR UTILIZING WASTE ANIMAL MATTERS, AND ALSO FABRICS OR TISSUES IN WHICH ANIMAL FIBRES ARE COMBINED WITH VEGETABLE FIBRES
Year: 1878

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Alfred Vincent Newton at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 8th May 1878. A communication
from abroad by Constant Auguste Sanceau, of Verviers, in the Kingdom of
Belgium,
ALFRED VINCENT NEWTON, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery Lane, in the
County of Middlesex, Mechanical Draughtsman. "IMPROVED MEANS FOR UTILIZING
WASTE ANIMAL MATTERS, AND ALSO FABRICS OR TISSUES IN WHICH ANIMAL FIBRES
ARE COMBINED WITH VEGETABLE FIBRES." [A communication from abroad by
Constant Auguste Sanceau, of Verviers, in the Kingdom of Belgium.]
This Invention relates to certain modes of treating animal matters, such as hair,
wool, silk, horn, feathers, leather, and whalebone; also waste fabrics containing
animal and vegetable matters, such as carpets, felts, and rags, the object being to
obtain (1), size, or a substance analogous to gelatine; or (2), a nitrogenized manure
soluble or insoluble in water, and also fit for the making of prussiates of potassa or
sulphate of ammonia; and (3), vegetable fibres for conversion into paper pulp. .
To obtain size from waste animal matters the substances are put in an apparatus
closing hermetically and able to resist a high pressure, fitted with a perforated false
bottom. The steam generated in an ordinary boiler is introduced into this apparatus
and maintained for a period of some 4 hours, at a pressure of about 80 lbs. to the
square inch, care being taken first to drive off all the air contained in the apparatus,
and to withdraw from time to time the condensed water to prevent access of water
to the material under treatment. After 4 hours sufficient water, cold or warm, is
introduced into the apparatus to cover the animal matters, and steam at a reduced
pressure, say, from 5 to 10 lbs. per square inch, is maintained for, say, 3/4 of an hour,
to dissolve the animal matters. The solution thus obtained is run off into a tank
to be clarified, and it is then converted by evaporation into a size, which may
advantageously replace ordinary glue in many branches of industry where it is
used. Water is now again introduced into the apparatus and boiled for about
20 minutes in order to rid the vegetable fibres from any gelatinous substance which
may adhere thereto. This solution is run into another tank in order to be used
Din 71

page_text: instead of water in the next operation for dissolving the animal matter, and thus
producing a more concentrated solution.
If the gelatinous solution were evaporated to dryness the result would be a friable
substance, richer in nitrogen than guano, and could be used as manure, but to
produce this result the following plan is less expensive:-To obtain in lieu of the
size a nitrogenized manure, soluble or insoluble, according to requirements, the
substances contained in the closed apparatus are only exposed to the above said
pressure of 5 to 6 atmospheres (about 80 lbs. per square inch), during a time varying
from 10 to 25 minutes, according to the substances operated upon, for example, silk
requiring longer time than hair. In this case the same precautions may be observed
as in making of size as regards the driving away of air and withdrawal of water of
condensation. After this exposure to high-pressure steam the substances are with-
drawn from the closed apparatus and submitted to a beating process in water. The
disintegrated animal matter will first be held in suspension, but when allowed to
settle will deposit, and may be caught in a filtering cloth, and after being removed
therefrom it is to be dried. Or the material when removed from the closed apparatus
may be thoroughly dried at a moderate temperature and then beaten in a suitable
machine, the powder falling through a sieve to separate it from the vegetable fibres.
The powder obtained in a wet way or in dry way is insoluble in water. To
render it soluble it has only to be exposed in a closed apparatus for a few hours at
a pressure of about 80 lbs. per square inch, then withdrawn and dried at a moderato
heat. This powder, soluble or insoluble, can be used in the making of prussiates or
of ammoniacal salts.
The vegetable fibres having been separated from the animal matter either in the
process for making size or in that for making manure can be washed and dried,
and are fit for the making of paper, the fibres not having been damaged in the least
by either process, and being capable of being bleached much more easily than
before.