Improvements in or relating to Manipulating and Washing, Filtering, or otherwise Treating Lime Mud, Black Ash, or other Materials in Bulk during the Course of Manufacture, and in Apparatus therefor.
Year: 1888

page_text: Date of Application, 10th Oct., 1888
Complete Specification Left. 10th July, 1889-Accepted, 10th Aug., 1889
· PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in or relating to Manipulating and Washing, Filtering,
or otherwise Treating Lime Mud, Black Ash, or other Materials
in Bulk during the Course of Manufacture, and in Apparatus
therefor.
We, GEORGE HARRISON BOLTON and THOMAS ALLEN BULLOUGH of the Widnes
Alkali Company Limited's Works, Widnes, in the County of Lancaster, Manufacturing
Chemist and Engineer respectively, do hereby declare the nature of this invention to
be as follows
In the treating of lime mud and other residual products, the lixiviating of
black ash and afterwards obtaining the sulphur from the waste, and various other
chemical industries where a material has to pass through two or more different modes of
treatment requiring at the present time several different apparatuses for the purpose
much expense is entailed by the transferring to a filter and then again digging out
and transferring from the filter to the second apparatus.
Our invention is designed to reduce the intervening labor between the two
processes to a minimum. From the first converter we transfer the material at once
into a filter shaped in the form of a wagon or other equivalent travelling vessel or
barge with a false bottom; the wagon is run underneath the converter or causticizer
or other vessel or vat in which the first process has been carried on, and the material
is blown out or otherwise emptied into the said wagon. The false bottom may be
covered with any filtering material, and the space beneath it is now connected by a
strong flexible hose of an exhausting apparatus. The material is then washed filtered
or treated with solutions in the wagon, the filtrate passing through the falso bottom
being exhausted into the exhaust receiver.
In large works this exhaust receiver may be a long tube or other conduit connected
with an exhaust pump. Along this conduit at intervals stop nozzles are fixed to
which the flexible hoses are attached, and thus several wagons can be exhausted at
the same time.
The material after lixiviating washing filtering or other treatment is now carried at
once on the wagons to the concluding apparatus, though in some cases we may arrange
for the wagon itself to become the remaining apparatus as a cover can be easily fixed
to it and carbonic acid gas or other reagent passed into it by means of the hose
through the bottom or through connections in the cover, the circulation being
by a return pipe in the manner set forth in our Specification No. 14183 of
the 2nd October 1888 the whole of which apparatus in a modified form could be
adopted in this case.
LOL
COL11000
WM. P. THOMPSON & Co.,
Of 6, Lord Street, Liverpool, Patent Agents for the Applicants.
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in or relating to Manipulating and Washing, Filtering,
or otherwise Treating Lime Mud, Black Ash, or other Materials
in Bulk during the Course of Manufacture, and in Apparatus
therefor.
We, GEORGE HARRISON BOLTON and THOMAS ALLEN BULLOUGH of The Widnes
Alkali Company Limited, Widnes, in the County of Lancaster, Manufacturing
Chemists, do hereby declare the nature of this invention and in what manner
the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the
following statement :—
In the treating of lime mud and other residual products, the lixiviating of black

page_text: ash and afterwards obtaining the sulphur from the waste, and various other chemical
industries where a material, has to pass through two or more different modes of
treatment requiring at the present time several different apparatuses for the purpose,
much expense is entailed by the transferring to a filter and then again digging out
and transferring from the filter to the second apparatus.
Our invention is designed to reduce the intervening labour between the two
processes to a minimum. From the first converter or apparatus we transfer the
material at once into a filter shaped in the form of a wagon or other equivalent
travelling vessel or barge with a false bottom; the wagon is run underneath the
converter, causticizer or other vessel or vat in which the first process has been carried
on, and the material is blown out or otherwise emptied into the said wagon. The
space between the bottoms when filtering is required contains a quantity of any
suitable filtering material in layers or otherwise, and the space below the filtering
material connected by a strong flexible hose to an exhausting apparatus. The
material in the wagon is then washed, filtered or treated with solutions which are
supplied by means of perforated pipes or otherwise, the filtrate passing through the
false bottom and filtering material being drawn into the exhaust receiver.
In large works, the exhaust receiver is, by preference, connected with a long tube
or other conduit provided with an exhaust pump. Along this conduit at intervals,
stop nozzles are fixed to which the flexible hoses are attached, and thus several
wagons can be exhausted at the same time.
The following is an example of one method designed by. us of carrying out
our invention, but we do not limit ourselves to the details or dimensions therein
stated.
We take a series of six or eight railway wagons constructed of either metal or
timber, (or partly of each) each one containing from six to eight tons of recovered
carbonate of lime, caustic lime, sludge, or other semi-liquid. In this case the
perforated pipes above mentioned, and which are placed preferably along the centre of
the wagons, and resting on the bottoms thereof, have an internal diameter of two
inches, the internal diameter of the connecting pipe which is placed about the
centre of each wagon is also two inches, the diameter of the pipe leading to the pump
from all the wagons is, in this instance, eight inches, but if applied to a barge or flat
bottomed boat, the perforated pipes would, with advantago, be larger, and the
suction nozzles before named increased in number so as to draw off at two or more
points.
An ordinary eighteen inch vacuum pump working at the required speed, say
60 revolutions per minute, and passing about 1,200 gallons per minute is suitable for
carrying out our process.
A steam blower or jet may instead be applied with success to each wagon separately,
thereby considerably reducing the first cost of the apparatus.
In applying the invention to the treatment of black ash and black ash waste, the
black ash balls are preferably broken up into small pieces by an ordinary stone
breaker or other suitable machine so that the subsequent lixiviation is performed much
quicker than beretofore. These pieces are allowed to fall into, or are conveyed to,
the wagons aforesaid, which thus take the place of the ordinary black ash vats.
The black ash in the wagons is now lixiviated, filtered, etcetera, and the filtrate drawn
off as above described. The wagons, with the contained black ash waste, are now
removed to any desired part. Where Chance's sulphur recovery process is employed,
the black ash waste may be at once emptied into the carbonators or converters
employed in such process, using the said converters or carbonators as vats and the
residual mud afterwards run into the wagons to be filtered. Or the wagons may
themselves form the converters, as they may be closed by air-tight covers, and the
carbonic acid gas or other re-agent may be passed into the waste through the
bottom of the wagons by means of the hose connections above mentioned, or
through connections in the covers, the circulation being by return pipes which
may also be employed, if desired, to empty the wagons after their contents have been
reduced to the consistency of a sludge. By this means the milk of waste mixers

page_text: employed in the "Chance" process are superseded. The weak liquors left in the
bottoms of the wagon converters or carbonators could remain there for the treatment
of the succeeding load, instead of pumping in pure water in the usual manner
previous to the admission of the carbonic acid gas.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of the said inven-
tion and in what manner the same is to be performed, we declare that what we
claim is :-
1. The portable apparatus and connections for manipulating, washing, filtering or
otherwise treating lime mud, black ash, black ash waste or other materials in bulk
in the course of manufacture, arranged substantially as described, whereby a large
part of the labour employed when fixed vats and other fixed apparatus are used, is
made unnecessary and saved.
2. The employment in alkali or other works of a wagon, barge or vat with means
for locomotion, having a false bottom supplied with filtering material, and having pipe
connections for the purpose of lixiviating, washing, filtering or treating with gases or
liquids, black ash or other material in bulk, substantially as described..
Dated this Oth day of July 1889
WM. P. THOMPSON & Co.,
Of 6, Lord Street, Liverpool, Patent Agents for the Applicants.