IMPROVEMENTS IN FILTERS
Year: 1865

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Richard Archibald Brooman at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
18th February 1865.-A communication from abroad by Gabriel Planche,
of Paris, France.
I, RICHARD ARCHIBALD BROOMAN, of 166, Fleet Street, in the City of
London, Patent Agent, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN FILTERS," to be as follows:-
This Invention refers to filters for filtering large bodies of water, and
consists in constructing them in manner hereafter stated. I construct a reservoir
for receiving the water to be filtered between the supply and the main filter-
ing basin, from which the reservoir is separated by a wall or partition, fitted
at its upper part with sluices, and formed at bottom with a channel closed by
a valve and communicating with the water in the filtering basin. In the
opposite wall of the filtering basin there are similar sluices and a similar
channel also closed by a valve. The filtering basin is formed with sides
sloping towards the bottom of the filter beds, and these consist of a top
layer of stones or pebbles, immediately under which is a layer of sand, below
that of small gravel to prevent the sand descending, then a layer of coarser
gravel, a layer of stones..or pebbles, and under that rough stone slabs not
joined, or perforated plates, to allow the water_to pass through into the space

page_text: provided for it at the bottom of the filtering basin; a conduit leads the filtered
water into a reservoir for the filtered water, from whence it is taken by pump
or otherwise at the outlet, from this conduit there is a slide to stop the flow of
water when required, The working of the filter is as follows:-Water flowing
from the source of supply enters the receiving reservoir in which the heaviest
impurities are deposited, and the sluices near the top of the reservoir being
opened, and the opposite sluices and channel closed water flows into the upper
part of the filtering vessel, passes down through the filter beds into the space
at the bottom of the basin and into the reservoir for the filtered water. When
the filter beds become so charged with impurities as to prevent the filtered
water flowing in sufficient quantity into the filtered water reservoir, it is
necessary to cleanse the filter, and that as follows;-Close the outlet from the
conduit into the filtered water reservoir, open the valves on the inlet and
outlet chamels to allow of the current driving out all mud and dirt deposited;
then, as soon as the water flows clear, close the valve on the outlet channel
and the inlet sluices to the filtering basin, and open the outlet sluices, the
water entering the inlet channel will flow up through the filter beds and
will detach and carry away most of the matter deposited on the sand. To
complete the cleansing, close the valve on the inlet channel and open the
inlet sluice, a current is thus provided over the surface of the filter beds; I
then use a rake or stirrer to act on the sand, and the current carries off the
remaining impurities. The outlet sluices are now closed and the slide on
the outlet of the conduit into the reservoir for filtered water opened, and the
filtering goes on as before.