IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MEANS AND APPARATUS FOR CONVEYING SEWAGE AND OTHER LIQUID OR PARTIALLY LIQUID REFUSE FROM CESSPOOLS, PRIVIES, AND OTHER RECEPTACLES
Year: 1872

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Charles Denton Abel at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
13th December 1872.-A communication from abroad by Alexander
Frederick Booroff, of St. Petersburg, in the Empire of Russia. ¡
I, CHARLES DENTON ABEL, of No. 20, Southampton Buildings,
Chancery Lane, in the County of Middlesex, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MEANS AND
APPARATUS FOR CONVEYING SEWAGE AND OTHER LIQUID OR PARTIALLY LIQUID
REFUSE FROM CESSPOOLS, PRIVIES, AND OTHER RECEPTACLES," to be as follows:-
This Invention relates to the arrangement, construction, and operation
of apparatus for emptying cesspools and receptacles of excreta and other
refuse, and conveying the contents by pipes to localities where they may
be discharged or utilized without permitting the escape of offensive
emanations. For this purpose sewer pipes are laid down like gas or
water pipes, and are made to communicate with the cesspools or other
receptacles to be emptied by branch pipes provided with valves or stop-
cocks. At the sumits of the bends of the main sewer pipes or their
highest points, closed reservoirs are provided for the reception of the
gases evolved from the contents of the pipes, which gases may from time
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page_text: to time be discharged by opening stop cocks in branch pipes leading from
the tops of the reservoirs to suitable furnaces or burners through which
the gases are passed, and by.which 'they are.decomposed.
The main sewer pipe is led to a suitable distance from inhabited
localities to the discharging apparatus which is constructed as follows :—
It consists of a well or shaft, which extends to a depth exceeding 34 feet
below the level of the sewer pipe. In this shaft is placed a vertical
stand pipe with which the main sewer pipe communicates; and at the
top of the vertical stand pipe is a branch pipe leading to the receiver of
an air pump or to a vessel in which a vacuum is formed by condensation
of steam or other means. The vertical pipe is open at bottom and dips
down into the water or other liquid contained in the lower part of the
shaft. When a vacuum is formed by working the air pump or other-
wise in the vertical pipe and main sewer pipe, the liquid-or semi-fluid
contents of any cesspool or other receptacle placed in communication
with the sewer pipe will be forced into and along it by the atmospheric
pressure, and will be conveyed by the sewer pipe to the vertical stand
pipe, in which a column of liquid will be maintained at such a height as
to balance the atmospheric pressure, and from the bottom of which a
quantity of liquid will be discharged into the shaft when a quantity
enters its upper part from the sewer pipe. The contents of the shaft
may be removed by a dredging apparatus or series of buckets mounted
on an endless chain, and these contents may be used either directly for
manuring by irrigation, or may be converted into manure powder, or
manure in other forms in any known manner, or may be discharged
where convenient into the sea.
It is preferred to make the sewer pipes above described communicate
with the water mains, so that when desired they can be flushed, and the
cesspools or other receptacles connected to them can be cleansed by
the admission of water to them.
It is also preferred to place in the cesspools or other receptacles gratings
or screens, by which matters which might cause stoppage of the pipes
are prevented from entering them.
For bringing the before described system of drainage into operation, the
whole system of sewer pipes may in the first instance be filled with
water, and the level of the water in the bottom of the before mentioned
shaft is lowered by means of the dredging apparatus, and with it the

page_text: level of the water in the stand pipe, whereby a vacuum will consequently
be formed in the latter. On opening the valves of the sewer pipes the
sewage will be caused by the said vacuum to flow along the pipes and
down the stand pipe into the shaft.
The said system of sewer pipes may also be made to communicate
with laundries, baths, and underground rooms or cellars that are subject
to inundation, in order to conduct away the water from such localities.