CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS FOR EXPEDITING THE MANUFACTURE OF WELDED IRON OR OTHER TUBES, AS ALSO IN THE APPARATUS THEREFOR.
Year: 1875

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to William Brownhill, junior, of Walsall, in the
County of Stafford, Managing Director of the Birchill Hall Iron
Company, Limited, and Thomas Henry Smith, Roll Turner, also of
Walsall, aforesaid, for the Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS FOR
EXPEDITING THE MANUFACTURE OF WELDED IRON OR OTHER TUBES, AS ALSO
IN THE APPARATUS THEREFOR.
"
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William Brownhill
and Thomas Henry Smith at the Office of the Commissioners of
Patents, with their Petition, on the 15th October 1875.
We, WILLIAM BROWNHILL, junior, of Walsall, in the County of
Stafford, Managing Director of the Birchill Hall Iron Company,
Limited, and THOMAS HENRY SMITH, Roll Turner, also of Walsall,
aforesaid, do hereby declare the nature of our said Invention for
"CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS FOR EXPEDITING THE MANUFACTURE OF WELDED IRON
OR OTHER TUBES, AS ALSO IN THE APPARATUS THEREFOR," to be as follows (that
is to say)
:―
Our improvements in facilitating the manufacture of tubes apply
more particularly to the description that require being formed in a

page_text: heated condition, such as lap or jump joint welded iron tubes for gas
and other purposes, as also the forming or finishing of open jointed
tubes, and which said improvements are an extension of a Patent applied
for by us on the 27th day of September 1875, No. 3368, for improve-
ments in rolling strip iron for the subsequent manufacture of tubes;
the said strips being advanced from the rolls through shaping dies or
other suitable appliances for forming the said strip as advanced into a
skelp or irregular tube, and our present extension comprehends the
utilizing the heat in the skelp, by subjecting the said skelps as formed
by the process of reheating by passing them, as formed, into a muffle or
furnace from which they are passed through when at a welded heat to
be welded into a tube by any of the approved modes now practiced,
either with or without internal pressure, whereby we effect a considerable
saving in fuel and time.
When forming skelps into what is technically called open jointed.
tube, the reheating enables us to impart more regularity finish than
would otherwise be obtained, thus we manufacture welded and open
jointed iron tube in continuity from the first heating to the rolling,
skelp shaping, reheating, and welding, thereby conserving the heat in
the iron from the first or primary processes, to conduce by reheating to
weld and finish the tubes.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said William Brownhill and Thomas Henry Smith in
the Great Seal Patent Office on the 13th April 1876.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, WILLIAM
BROWNHILL, Junior, of Walsall, in the County of Stafford, Managing
Director of the Birchill Hall Iron Company, Limited, and THOMAS
HENRY SMITH, Roll Turner, also of Walsall, aforesaid, send grecting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Fifteenth day of October, 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 suc-
cessors, give and grant unto us, the said William Brownhill, junior, and
Thomas Henry Smith, Her special licence, that we, the said William

page_text: Brownhill, junior, and Thomas Henry Smith, our executors, admini-
strators, and assigns, or such others as we, the said William Brownhill,
junior, and Thomas Henry Smith, 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 "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS FOR EXPEDITING
THE MANUFACTURE OF WELDED IRON OR OTHER TUBE, AS ALSO IN THE APPARATUS
THEREFOR," upon the condition (amongst others) that we, the said William
Brownhill, junior, and Thomas Henry Smith, our executors, or admini-
strators, by an instrument in writing under our, or their, or one of their
hands and seals, should particularly describe and ascertain the nature
of the said Invention, and in what manner the same was to be per-
formed, 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 we, the said William Brownhill, junior, and
Thomas Henry Smith, do hereby declare the nature of our said Inven-
tion, and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be parti-
cularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement,
(that is to say) :—
Our improvements in facilitating the manufacture of tubes apply
more particularly to the description that require being formed in a
heated condition, such as lap or jump joint welded iron tubes for gas
and other purposes, as also the forming or finishing of open jointed
tubes, and which said improvements are an extension of a Patent applied
for by us on the 27th day of September 1875, No. 3368, for improve-
ments in rolling strip iron for the subsequent manufacture of tubes, &c.;
the said strips being advanced from the rolls through shaping dies or
other suitable appliances for forming the said strip as advanced into a
skelp or irregular tube, and our present extension comprehends the
utilizing the heat in the skelp by subjecting the said skelps as formed
by the process of reheating by passing them, as formed, into a muffle or
furnace, from which they are passed through when at a welded heat to
be welded into a tube by any of the approved modes now practised,
either with or without internal pressure, whereby we effect a considerable
saving in fuel and time.

page_text: When forming skelps into what is technically called open jointed
tube, the reheating enables us to impart more regularity or finish than
would otherwise be obtained; thus we manufacture welded and open
jointed iron tube in continuity from the first heating to the rolling,
skelping, shaping, reheating, and welding, thereby conserving the heat
in the iron from the first or primary process to conduce by reheating to
weld and finish the tubes, or in other words, the bloom, pile, or puddled
bar, as withdrawn (at a white heat) from the mill furnace is so rapidly
broken down, rolled out, and scarfed (when so required) by our improved
mode of rolling (as fully described in our Specification of the 27th day
of September 1875), as to leave the skelp still at a bright heat, which
we purpose utilizing by at once proceeding (as rapidly as the strips are
rolled and skelped) to weld the same into finished tubes, cither jump
joint or lap welded, the said overlaying parts forming the lap being
scarfed by our process of rolling, as described in our former Patent
above refered to, of the 27th day of September 1875.
The skelp (though at a bright heat) is not sufficiently hot for sound
welding. To meet this we erect (in convenient proximity to the delivered
skelp) a suitable furnace for supplying or adding sufficient additional
beat to the skelp for welding, into which furnace the skelps, which are
(from their shape) sufficiently rigid for handling, are advanced and
placed in the furnace through a portable opening (by preference) in a
line and close to the delivered skelps. This opening in the furnace being
arranged with a suitable descending or other door or stopper to exclude
cold air from entering the furnace otherwise than at the time when the
skelps arc introduced. The said skelps when sufficiently heated are
drawn out at the other end of the furnace to be welded by any
suitable or common appliance now in use for welding iron or steel tubes,
as before stated, whether with internal support or otherwise, according
to the description of tube under opperation or being welded. Thus we
produce welded iron or steel tubes direct from the bloom, pile, or puddled
bar as heated from the mill furnace, from which the said tube is being
made, retaining (by our rapid process of rolling and skelping) con-
siderable heat in the skelp, which we utilize by slightly reheating the
skelp to a welding heat, preparatory to the said skelp being welded and
finished into a tube.

page_text: to the rolling and shaping of strip iron, as also the welding of iron
or steel tubes, we wish it understood that what we claim and wish to
protect under these our in part recited Letters Patent is,-
First. The rolling, shaping, and finishing of non-welded or open
jointed iron or steel tubes while the metal is in a heated condition,
as imparted to the bloom, pile, or puddled bar, from which the said open
jointed tube has been made or reduced, or by partially reheating if
required.
Secondly. We claim the manufacture of welded iron or steel tubes
direct from the bloom, pile, or puddled bar, of which they are composed,
by utilizing the heat first imparted from the mill furnace to the bloom,
pilc, or puddled bar, to the finished welded tube (that is to say), the
metal will be at a red heat from the beginging of its rolling and shaping
to the welding or finishing, thus not only expediting the genenal process
of manufacture but also greatly ecconomizing the consumption of fuel
in the manufacture of such tubes.
In witness whereof, we, the said William Brownhill, junior, and
Thomas Henry Smith, have bereunto set our hands and scals, this
Twelfth day of April, in the year of our Lord One thousand
eight hundred and seventy-six.
Witness,
WILLIAM BROWNHILL, JUNIOR. (L.S.)
THOMAS HENRY SMITH.
(L.S.)
JAMES S. COCKINGS,
Patent Agent,
17, Ann St.,
Birmingham.