IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS METERS
Year: 1856

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Charles Barreswil, of Paris, in the Empire of France,
Chemist, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS METERS."
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Charles Barreswil at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
22nd May 1856..
I, CHARLES BARRESWIL, of Paris, in the Empire of France, Chemist, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS
METERS," to be as follows:-
My Invention, which was patented in France on the 22nd of December 1855;
consists of substituting for common water generally used with gas meters
certain liquids that are not liable to be vaporized. The liquids I use are solu-
tions of potash, carbonate or acetate of potash, chloride of calcium, magnesium,
zinc, & deliquescent phosphates, such as phosphate of calcium;. I also use
preferably glycerine, sulphuric & phosphoric acids, which absorb the humidity.
of the atmosphere, & thus dispense with the necessity of renewing water in
the apparatus.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Charles Barreswil in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
21st November 1856.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, CHARLES
BARRESWIL, of Paris, in the Empire of France, Chemist, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-second day of May, in the year of our Lord
One thousand 'eight hundred and fifty-six, in the nineteenth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant-unto me, the said
Charles Barreswil, Her special licence that I, the said Charles Barreswil, my
executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Charles
Barrewil, my 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, iand Isle of Mangian Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS-METERS,"
upon the condition. (amongst others) that I, the said. Charles Barreswil, by
an instrument in writing under my hand and seal, should particularly.describe
and ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the samé
was to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the Great Scal Patent
Office within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the
said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE,that I, the said Charles Barreswil, do hereby declare
the nature of my said 'Invention, and in what inanner the same: is to be
performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement:
My Invention relates to certain improvements in gas meters. The principal
objections to the use of the ordinary water gas meter are,-1st, the lowering
of the level of the water in consequence of the evaporation produced by the
passage of the gas; 2ndly, the freezing of the water in cold weather or, when,
exposed. to.extreme.cold air.
い
are.as
By my.Invention both these objections are obviated. The means' I employ
follows: In chemistry we find a great number of substances that have
the property of imbibing any humidity that may come within a certain range,
and of preventing or rendering more difficult the freezing of the water in
which they are plunged; such, for instance, are the alkalies of potash, soda, etc.;
among acids, sulphuric & phosphoric acids; among salts, carbonate, acetate,
phosphate of potash, and other earthy, alkaline; and metallic salts, chlorides of

page_text: calcium, magnesium, zinc, etc.; among various other substances, glycerine,
residue of the saponification of fatty matters. The watery and concentrated
solutions of these deliquescent or hygrometric substances placed in contact with
damp gas or lighting gas, seize hold of the humidity it contains, and increase
in volume until they have satified their affinity for water. Thus a concentrated
solution of potash, soda, phosphate of potash, chloride of calcium, magnesium,
or glycerine, placed in a gaseous damp atmosphere, will dry it up completely,
but after a certain time this same solution, saturated with humidity, no longer
absorbs, and therefore does not continue to increase in volume. This kind
of relative neutral state of the liquid, resulting from a kind of equilibrium
established between the affinity of the liquid and that of the gas for water, is
precisely the cause of the maintainance of the level of the fluid in the meter;
supposing one of the above-mentioned solutions to be used in a gas meter at
the degree of equilibrium thus produced, the gas may pass through it without
producing vaporization or lowering the level of the water.
The second principle of my Invention consists in the resistance of the liquids
I employ to congelation and evaporation; as, for instance, by the use of
glycerine, or such effects produced by the substances it keeps in solution, such
as potash, chlorides of calcium, magnesium, etc., and generally of all substances
that absorb humidity. I prefer (without excluding other substances) glycerine
for the purposes herein stated.
Having thus described the nature of my improvements in gas meters, I
desire it to be distinctly understood that I do not confine myself to the precise
details herein described, as such may be varied or modified without departing
from the nature of the action thereof; but what I claim as novel, and therefore
as being secured to me by the herein-before in part recited Letters Patent, is, the
application to gas meters of all the liquids above specified (particularly glycerine),
as being capable of resisting more than water, congelation and vaporization.
In witness whereof, I, the said Charles Barreswil, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Tenth day of November, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six.
BARRES WIL. (L.S.)