AN APPARATUS, BEING AN IMPROVEMENT FOR FILTERING AND PURIFYING WATER
Year: 1845

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
TRUMAN, of Cromwell Lodge, Brompton, in the County of Middlesex; Gentle-
man, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Tenth day of February, One thousand eight hundred and
forty-five, and in the eighth year of Her reign; did, for Herself, Her heirs and
successors, give and grant unto me, the said Thomas Truman, my exors, admors,>
and assigns, Her especial licence, full power, sole privilege and authority, that I,
the said Thomas Truman, my exors, admors, and assigns, or such others as:
I, the said Thomas Truman, my exors, adiñors; or assigns, should at any time
agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all times during the term
of years therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and
vend, within England, Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, and in the
Islands of Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark, and Man, and also in all Her said
Majesty's Colonies and Plantations abroad, my Invention of "AN APPARATUS,
BEING AN IMPROVEMENT FOR FILTERING AND PURIFYING WATER;" in which said
Letters Patent is contained a proviso, that I, the said Thomas Truman, shall
cause a particular description of the nature of my' said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, to be inrolled in Her said Majesty's
High Court of Chancery within six calendar months next. and immediately..
after the date of the said in part recited Letters Patent; as in and by.
the same, reference being thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear..

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, 1, the said
Thomas Truman, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention,
and in what manner the same is to be performed, are fully described and
ascertained in and by the present Specification thereof, reference being had to
the Drawings annexed, that is to say :-
Figure 1 is an end elevation, and Figure 2 a side elevation, both in section,
of my improved apparatus for filtering and purifying water in its simplest form.
A is a close vessel, of a cylindrical shape, which is made of some natural stone
of a porous quality, such as the ordinary drip stone. Bis a vent air-pipe, which
rises from the vessel A; C, C, is the tank or cistern containing the water to be
purified; D, a standard, on which the close vessel A is mounted; E, a
discharge pipe, which is carried from the close vessel A through the side of
the tank or cistern, and is opened or shut by the tap F. The water by its
pressure on the outside of the stone vessel A forces its way through the pores
of the stone, and is in its progress filtered and purified. When it is desirable
to have the filter portable, the water may be drawn off by means of a syphon,
of the peculiar construction represented in Figure 3. The body of it consists
of a number of small, metallic tubes, of about three-eighths of an inch in
diameter, bound closely together. The short end of it is inserted through an
orifice in the top of the filtering vessel A, which orifice is then made air-tight
by soldering, or by any other suitable means. The air-pipe D is curved like
the syphon, and inserted into. the filtering vessel through the same orifice.
From the interior of A the water is drawn up by the joint force of the atmo-
spheric pressure and of the capillary attraction of the small tubes of which the
syphon consists. For the small metallic tubes or number of threads of cotton
or other fibrous substance capable of acting by capillary attraction, may be
substituted, taking care to enclose, in a metallic tube or other water-tight case,
the portion of them which is exposed to the water in the tank outside of the
filter A. Or, the syphon may be made to act by atmospheric pressure alone,
by making it of one tube of about an inch or two or more in diameter,
provided with such appendages for opening and closing the extremities as
are represented in Figures 4 & 5. G is a ball valve attached to the
short end of the syphon, which on the water in the filtering vessel A falling
below the line a, a, closes the mouth at that end, and H a cup affixed to the
long end, with a tap to it, by the turning of which tap the filtered water is
either drawn or shut off. K is a funnel placed at the highest portion of the
bend of the syphon, by means of which it may be charged previous to water
being drawn off by the tap. Or, the same thing may be accomplished by
opening the filtered water tap, and applying a blast from the mouth to the air-

page_text: pipe D, D, which is provided with a mouth-piece for that purpose. When it
is desired that the filtration should be conducted very rapidly, an air pump is
attached to the vent air pipe D, as shewn in Figure 4, by means of which
the air is time after time exhausted, or nearly so, from the vessel A, and
the percolation of the water through it is thereby proportionally accelerated.
When it is desired to carry the filtered water to any considerable height, as,
for example, from the basement of a house to any of the upper stories, not
beyond the height to which water can be raised by atmospheric pressure, an
arrangement is adopted such as is represented in Figure 6. A is the filtering
vessel and water reservoir, as before; I is another close vessel, placed in the
upper story, which communicates at bottom by a vertical pipe 6, having a self-
acting valve at c with the vessel A, and at top by a pipe d, with an air-
pump L. By working the pump the air becomes exhausted from both the
vessels A. and I, and the filtered water ascends into I. The cock e being then
opened to re-admit the air to the top of I, the filtered water in that vessel may
be drawn off from it by any of the cocks f, g, or h, or by making use of a two-
way tap, such as is represented in Figures 7 and 8; the water may be drawn
off' from I without opening the air tap e; this two-way tap being so constructed
as to admit the ingress of the air through the upper orifice i simultaneously
with the outflow of the water through k. The upper vessel I must of course
be made sufficiently strong to withstand the external pressure to which it is
intended to be subjected.
I have directed that the filtering vessel A should be made of some natural
porous stone, because I consider this substance to be, under most circumstances,
the best suited for the purpose; but I do not restrict myself to the use of that
material, for there are various artificial substances or mediums which may be
substituted for it, and in some cases with advantage, as, for instance, where the
natural porous stone can only be had from a great distance, and at a heavy
expence. The filter might, for example, be made of unglazed stone ware, or
of a number of layers of cloth kept distended by strong hoops, or of two con-
centric metal vessels perforated all over with very minute holes, and baving a
space between them filled up with fine gravel and sand. When natural or
artificial -porous stone is used, it is cleansed from time to time by hard scrubbing
on the outside; and when any other medium is substituted it is cleansed in the
way most suitable to the nature of that medium; water may be conveniently
filtered on a large scale for shipping and other purposes on the same system,
by means of an open barge or floating tank, having slabs of porous stone let
into apertures made in the side of it, or having double-walled sides, the outer
one consisting of wood, as usual, but perforated with a number of holes, and.