AN IMPROVED PROCESS AND MACHINERY FOR DISINTEGRATING FIBROUS SUBSTANCES
Year: 1874

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to George Haseltine, of the "International Patent
Office," Southampton Buildings, London, Doctor of Laws, for the
Invention of "AN IMPROVED PROCESS AND MACHINERY FOR DISINTEGRATING
FIBROUS SUBSTANCES."-A communication from abroad by Addison
Henry Laflin, of Herkimer, New York, United States of America.
Sealed the 5th December 1874, and dated the 2nd July 1874.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said George Haseltine at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
2nd July 1874.
I, GEORGE HASELTINE, of the "International Patent Office," South-
ampton Buildings, London, Doctor of Laws, do hereby declare the nature
of the said Invention for "AN IMPROVED PROCESS AND MACHINERY FOR DIS-
INTEGRATING FIBROUS SUBSTANCES," a communication, to be as follows:-
This Invention relates to the disintegration of wood, straw, hemp, flax,
cotton, wool, rags, and other fibrous substances in the manufacture of,
paper and for other purposes, and its main object is to secure uniformity.
in the fibre produced and at the same time preserve its strength and

page_text: elasticity, a secondary object being economy of power, conjoined with
rapidity of operation and a consequent diminution in the cost of pro-
duction.
The said Invention consists in general terms in immersing or mingling
the stock, whether rags, straw, wood, or other fibrous substance, with
water or any other suitable liquid and then subjecting it to the action of
rapidly moving pickers or strikers in such a way that the requisite
resistance to their blows is furnished by the inertia of the material itself
and of the medium in which it is carried.
"
or
In the ordinary rag engine provided with a "mid-fellow," around
which the stock is made to travel, the stock in its approach to the beating
roll or cylinder is caused to pass up an inclined way, in which directly
underneath the roll is located the "bed plate." This bed plate is
generally composed of projecting ribs or corrugations or chisel-edged
knives, which lie transversely to the path in which the stock is moving.
The stock is caught between these ribs or knives and the "
fly bars
blades of the roll, which also are generally made with chisel edges, and
extend longitudinally along the face of the roll, and by the frequent
repetition of the abrading and cutting action thus produced the material
is gradually reduced to "fibre." The immense resistance that the fly bars,
which act like the blades of a paddle wheel, encounter in going through
the water, and more particularly from the masses of fibre that are con-
stantly choking the space between them and the bed plate, renders a
high velocity impracticable.
Behind the bed plate, the inclined way up which the stock has moved
in its passage to the roll, rises to a still greater height, and forms the
structure denominated the "back fall," which is usually concave on the
side next the roll, and falls away somewhat abruptly on the opposite
side.
By reason of the slowness of the revolution of the roll in an
ordinary rag engine this back fall has been deemed a necessary appur-
tenance of the machine, both to facilitate the circulation of the pulp and
to prevent its crowding back upon the roll and impeding its action.
Moreover the action of an ordinary engine in which the material is
caught between the ribs of the bed plate and the knives of the roll is to
crush and bruise and to break and cut the fibres, and thus materially to
impair their strength. A similar result, although perhaps increased in
degree, attends the use of all those processes for the production of paper

page_text: pulp in which the stock is subjected to the action of grinding surfaces,
whether such surfaces are smooth or corrugated, or otherwise roughened.
By all such processes also the fibres will be crushed, or bruised, and broken
so as to impair their natural strength.
By this improved process it is proposed that at the moment when the
pickers are delivered upon the stock to be reduced the stock shall have
no other support than the liquid in which it is held in suspension, and
as thus the only resistance that is afforded to the blows of the pickers
will be the inertia of the stock itself, and of the unstable liquid in which
it is immersed, it is found advisable so to form the pickers that they
will strike into or penetrate the stock as well as strike upon or
against it, and it is absolutely essential so to construct and arrange them
that they can be run with a high velocity. To this end it is preferred to
use for pickers or strikers a series of points or of teeth, both because of
the efficiency with which points and teeth can be made to attack the
stock to be reduced and because of the case with which they can be
driven through the water.
Again, in order to secure the requisite velocity for effective work it
will be found advisable so to locate the pickers that they will act upon
the stock at or near the surface of the liquid in which it is moving,
since thus the pickers will merely dip into the water without being sub-
merged. The larger the proportion of the picker mechanism that is
exposed above the water the lighter and consequently the faster it can
move.
A fibre reducing engine embodying the principle of this improved
process is not necessarily limited to any particular form or dimensions;
these will be mainly determined by the character and amount of work to
be performed. Various devices also may be employed for producing the
requisite circulation of the material to be acted upon, and the pickers or
strikers may be variously constructed, care only being had that they be
made to move with such velocity and that their operative parts be so
formed and so arranged with relation to the other parts of the engine as to
separate the fibres by a whipping, picking, snapping, or tearing action,
as contradistinguished from grinding, cutting, or abrasion.
The process again, according to the nature of the stock to be worked,
may be carried on in an open vat or a closed chamber and under pressure,
the latter mode of working it being specially adapted for the more

page_text: refractory substances, which may be found to require a high temperature
to fit them for the most effective action of the pickers. It is not pro-
posed therefore to limit this Invention to any particular form or
dimensions in the construction of the engines, since the said Invention
consists in a process as well as in the specific mechanisms by which it
is put into practise.
bars can.
In the improved constructions which form a part of this Invention I
dispense with the continuous edged "fly bars" heretofore used upon the
beating roll, and substitute therefor pickers or strikers, composed of or
armed with projecting points, teeth, or angles, which are so shaped as to
pass through the stock and water with much greater facility than fly
I also dispense with the bed plate, which has heretofore been
employed as an antagonizing surface to the fly bars of the beating roll,
and which by the resistance it afforded to the movement of the roll has
made a high rate of revolution impossible. In the said improved con-
struction the only proposed resistance to the blows of the pickers is that
derived from the inertia of the stock itself and of the medium in which
it is moving. This modification of structure to, as well as that. before
mentioned, will facilitate the running of the pickers at very high
velocity.
A still further modification of structure consists in dispensing with
the back fall of the ordinary engines. This is rendered possible by the
high velocity consequent upon the change in the form of the pickers or
beaters, and the omission of the bed plate. The effect of these changes
is such that when the pickers are run at the rate of twenty-five hundred
or three thousand feet per minute the stock will be attacked so violently
and thrown so far behind the pickers as to render a "back fall" entirely
unnecessary, whether as a means of producing circulation or of pre-
venting the back flooding of the picker roll. By thus dispensing with
the back fall a very large saving is effected in the power required to run
the machine, as the consumption of power in lifting the stock over the
back fall of the ordinary engine constituted one of the principal items
in the expense of working it.
I use in combination with the picker or beater roll of a fibre reducing
engine an inclined way, constructed and arranged so as to induce a
circulation of the entire body of the stock into contact with the
pickers, but without affording an opposing surface between which and

page_text: the pickers the stock may be caught and cut, ground, or abraded.
And the stock after coming in contact with the pickers may be carried
directly rearward without being lifted up over a "back fall," as in the
ordinary pulp engine.
I form ventilating apertures in the walls of the picker hood. A steam
pipe enters the said picker hood behind the pickers for the purpose of
heating the water and aiding the circulation.
The engine has two vertical compartments or trunks, which com-
municate at the top and bottom, and one of which is provided with a
series of pickers or strikers, constructed and arranged to operate as
described.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said George Haseltine in the Great Seal Patent Office
on the 30th December 1874.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, GEORGE
HASELTINE, of the "International Patent Office," Southampton
Buildings, London, Doctor of Laws, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her.
Letters Patent, bearing date the Second day of July, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-four, in the thirty-
cighth year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors,
give and grant unto me, the said George Haseltine, Her special licence
that I, the said George Haseltine, my executors, administrators, and
assigns, or such others as I, the said George Haseltine, 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, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "AN IMPROVED
PROCESS AND MACHINERY FOR DISINTEGRATING FIBROUS SUBSTANCES," a communi-
cation to me from abroad by Addison Henry Laflin, of Herkimer,
New York, United States of America, upon the condition (amongst
others) that I, the said George Haseltine, my executors or admini-
strators, by an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of

page_text: their hands and seals, should particularly describe and ascertain the
nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same was
to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent
Office within six calendar months next and immediately after the date
of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said George Haseltine, do hereby
declare the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same
is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and
by the following statement, reference being had to the accompanying
Drawing forming a part of this Specification.
This Invention relates to the disintegration of wood, straw, hemp,
flax, cotton, wool, rags, and other fibrous substances in the manufacture
of paper and for other purposes, and its main object is to secure uniformity
in the fiber produced, and at the same time preserve its strength and elas-
țicity, a secondary object being economy of power conjoined with rapidity
of operation and a consequent diminution in the cost of production.
The Invention consists in general terms in immersing or mingling the
stock, whether rags, straw, wood, or other fibrous substance, with water
or any other suitable liquid, and then subjecting it to the action of
rapidly moving pickers or strikers in such a way that the requisite
resistance to their blows is furnished by the inertia of the material itself
and of the medium in which it is carried.
Or
In the ordinary rag engine provided with a "mid-fellow," around
which the stock is made to travel, the stock in its approach to the beating
roll or cylinder is caused to pass up an inclined way in which directly
underneath the roll is located the "bed plate." This bed plate
is generally composed of projecting ribs or corrugations or chisel-edged
knives, which lie transversely of the path in which the stock is moving.
The stock is caught between these ribs or knives and the "
fly bars
blades of the roll, which also are generally made with chisel edges, and
extend longitudinally along the face of the roll, and by the frequent
repetition of the abrading and cutting action thus produced the material
is gradually reduced to "fiber." The immense resistance that the fly
bars, which act like the blades of a paddle wheel, encounter in going
through the water, and more particularly from the masses of fiber that
are constantly choking the space between them and the bed plate renders
a high velocity impracticable.

page_text: Behind the bed plate the inclined way up which the stock has moved
in its passage to the roll rises to a still greater height, and forms the
structure denominated the "back fall," which is usually made concave
on the side next the roll, and falls away somewhat abruptly on the
opposite side. On account of the slowness of the revolution of the roll
in an ordinary rag engine this back fall has been deemed a necessary
appurtenance of the machine, both to facilitate the circulation of the
pulp and to prevent its crowding back upon the roll and impeding its
action. Moreover, the action of an ordinary engine in which the material
is caught between the ribs of the bed plate and the knives of the roll is
to crush and bruise and to break and cut the fibers, and thus materially
to impair their strength. A similar result, although perhaps increased
in degree, attends the use of all those processes for the production of
paper pulp in which the stock is subjected to the action of grinding
surfaces, whether such surfaces are smooth or corrugated, or otherwise
roughened. By all such processes also the fibers will be crushed, or
bruised, and broken, so as to take from their natural strength.
By the improved process, now for the first time discovered, it is pro-
posed that at the moment when the pickers are delivered upon the stock
to be reduced the stock shall have no other support than the liquid in
which it is held in suspension, and as thus the only resistance that is
afforded to the blows of the pickers will be the inertia of the stock
itself and of the unstable liquid in which it is immersed it is found
advisable so to form the pickers that they will strike into or penetrate
the stock as well as strike upon or against it, and absolutely essential so
to construct and arrange them that they can be run with a high velocity.
To this end it is preferred to use for pickers or strikers a series of points
or of teeth, both because of the efficiency with which points and teeth
can be made to attack the stock to be reduced and because of the case
with which they can be driven through the water.
Again, in order to secure the requisite velocity for effecting work it.
would be found advisable so to locate the pickers that they will act upon
the stock at or near the surface of the liquid in which it is moving, since
thus the pickers will merely dip into the water without being submerged.
The larger the proportion of the picker mechanism that is exposed above
the water the lighter and consequently the faster it can move.
A fiber reducing engine embodying the principle of this improved
process is not necessarily limited to any particular form or dimensions.

page_text: These will be mainly determined by the character and amount of work
to be performed. Various devices also may be employed for producing
the requisite circulation of the material to be acted upon, and the pickers
or strikers may be variously constructed, care only being had that they
be made to move with such velocity and that their operative parts be so
formed and so arranged with relation to the other parts of the engine as
to separate the fibers by a whipping, picking, snapping, or tearing
action, as contradistinguished from grinding, cutting, or abrasion.
The process again, according to the nature of the stock to be worked,
may be carried on in an open vat or a closed chamber and under pressure,
the latter mode of working it being specially adapted for the more
refractory substances, which may be found to require a high temperature
to fit them for the most effective action of the pickers. It is not pro-
posed therefore to limit the Invention to any particular form or
dimensions in the construction of the engines, since the Invention
consists in a process as well as in the specific mechanisms by which it is
put into practice.
In the improved constructions which form part of the subject of this
Patent it is proposed to dispense with the continuous edged "fly bars"
heretofore used upon the beating roll, and to substitute therefor pickers or
strikers composed of or armed with projecting points, teeth, or angles,
which are so shaped as to pass through the stock and water with much
greater facility than fly bars can. I also dispense with the bed plate, which
has heretofore been employed as an antagonizing surface to the fly bars of
the beating roll, and which by the resistance it afforded to the movement
of the roll has made a high rate of revolution impossible. In the
improved construction the only proposed resistance to the blows of the
pickers is that derived from the inertia of the stock itself and of the
medium in which it is moving. This modification of structure, too, as
well as that before mentioned, facilitates the running of the pickers a
very high velocity.
A still further modification of structure consists in dispensing with the
back fall of the ordinary engines. This is rendered possible by the high
velocity consequent upon the change in the form of the pickers or beaters
and the omission of the bed plate. The effect of these changes is such
that when the pickers are run at the rate of twenty-five hundred or three
thousand fect per minute the stock will be attacked so violently and
thrown so far behind the pickers as to render a "back fall" entirely

page_text: unnecessary whether as a means of producing circulation or of pre-
venting the back flooding of the picker roll. By thus dispensing with
the back fall a very large saving is effected in the power required to run
the machine, as the consumption of power in lifting the stock over tho
back fall of the ordinary engine constitutes one of the principal items
in the expense of working it.
Figures 1, 2, & 3 of the accompanying Drawing illustrate an open
engine in which is embodied the improvements herein-after indicated.
Fig. 1 is a plan view of the engine, the hood over the pickers being
omitted; Fig. 2 is a longitudinal vertical section of the machine on the
line xx, of Fig. 1; Fig. 3 is a tranverse vertical section on the line y-y,
of Fig. 1. A is a tub or vat, which is to be built in any convenient
mode and of any desired size, and may be provided in the usual manner
with, pumps, discharge valves, traps, and the various appliances in use
upon pulp engines other than those which are specially mentioned
herein as being omitted. B is the "mid-fellow;" C, the hood that shuts
in the pickers; D, the picker shaft; E, the inclined way up which the
stock passes into contact with the pickers; and a, a, the pickers or
strikers which in Figs. 1, 2, & 3 are shown as of needle form projecting
from the periphery of a hollow drum or cylinder mounted on the picker
shaft.
As already indicated the inclined way E is for the sole purpose of
lifting the material up so as to bring all parts of it into engagement
with the pickers, and thus prevent its forming different strata of uneven
degrees of comminution. As the pickers do not come into close contact
with the crown of this inclined way, and as the pickers themselves con-
sist of points, teeth, or projecting angles, it is plain that the inclined
way can in no degree operate in connection with the pickers as a bed
or antagonizing surface on which a grinding or abrasive action upon the
stock can take place.
The pickers may be made in any form suited to pick, snap, whip, or
tear the stock into fiber without the aid of an opposing and resisting
surface, and they may be secured to the drum or to the shaft in any con-
venient way. Whether made in the form of needles, as shown in Figs. 1,
2, & 3, or of saw teeth, as shown in Figs. 4 & 5, they ought for the best
results to be arranged so as not to follow each other in the same line
of travel.
The arrangement of the picker mechanism. again should be such that

page_text: only a small segment of it small dip into the water, as this will favour a
high velocity.
Naturally the ends of the picker drum or cylinder will be made to
run pretty close to the vertical walls of the hood. In consequence of
this there is a liability that the stock may work in between the ends of
the drum and the sides of the hood, and thus impede the free action
of the machine. This may be prevented by leaving openings around
the picker shaft in the walls of the hood, as shown in the Drawing at m.
When the pickers are driven rapidly the air rushes in through theso
openings, and striking against the closed ends of the drum spreads
laterally, and thus tends to keep the space cleared of all obstructing
matter.
In order to soften the stock, and thus aid the pickers, steam may be
injected into the vat, either live or exhaust steam (though more generally
the latter) being used for this purpose. This will best be introduced
immediately behind the pickers, since at that point the water is to a
large extent broken up into fine particles, and thus by reason of the
large surface exposed will the more readily extract the caloric from the
steam. By giving the steam induction pipe an inclination rearward
from the pickers, or providing the injection orifice with a deflecting
shield, as shown in the Drawing, the jet of steam may be made to aid
the circulation of the stock in the vat. In the Drawings G represents
a steam pipe, here shown as entering the vat through the hood, and pro-
vided with a deflector H. I is a large pipe for permitted the ready
escape from underneath of the steam that remains uncondensed.
Figs. 4, 5, & 6 illustrate a closed engine in which is embodied the
improvement herein-after described; Fig. 4 is a vertical section of the
engine on the line x-x, of Fig. 6; Fig. 5 is a vertical section in a plane
at right angles to that of Fig. 4; and Fig. 6 is a horizontal section just
above the feed screw. The engine here represented consists of a cylinder
of iron or other suitable metal six feet in diameter and eighteen feet in
height, or it may have such other dimensions as may be deemed expedient,
and it should be of sufficient strength to withstand the internal pressure.
Of course it should be provided with a safety valve with steam gauges
and other appliances necessary upon ordinary steam boilers.
cylinder is set in a vertical position, and is divided throughout the
greater part of its height by a diaphragm forming it into two compart-
This

page_text: ments, which however communicate with each other at the top and the
bottom, as shown in the Drawings.
In the upper part of the cylinder and over the right-hand compart-
ment are arranged the pickers or strikers. In the space beneath the
diaphragm and arranged at right angles to the plane thereof is arranged.
a shaft, upon which are supported one or more propeller blades, which
are designed for feeding the material through from one compartment to
the other.
Surrounding the first-named cylinder and concentric with it is another
of somewhat larger diameter, and extending up to about the level of the
lower part of the pickers. The space between the two cylinders is
designed as a hot-air flue.
By placing vertical flue strips in the annular space in the plane of the
diaphragm before spoken of and building a fire under the bottom of the
right-hand compartment, the smoke pipe being at the same time placed
on the other side of the flue strips and near the bottom of the annular
space, the heated products of combustion will be caused to ascend in
contact with the wall of the right-hand compartment and descend along
the wall of the left-hand compartment, and thus as the currents within
the cylinder are ascending on the right of the diaphragm and descending
on the left the heat can be made not only to increase the temperature of
the water, but also to some extent to assist the circulation.
The pickers here shown are a gang of discs arranged upon a shaft
above that compartment in which the currents are ascending, the peri-
pherics of the discs being armed with long teeth. These saw-toothed
dises are of thin metal, preferably of steel, and by means of collars arc
adjusted at a distance of about seven-eighths of an inch apart. The
teeth are bent laterally at various angles of inclination, so that when
moving their several paths will so far as possible be out of the same line
of travel. The edges of the teeth are not made sharp enough to cut the
fibers, but the points are so constructed as to pick, and pull, or tear the
fibers apart, thus leaving them much stronger than if they had been cut
or broken by grinding or abrasion between antagonizing surfaces. These
pickers are so arranged at the top of the right-hand compartiment as to
dip but partially into the surface of the water, and thus they can have
imparted to them a much higher velocity than would be possible were
they submerged, and it is believed can be made to act more uniformly

page_text: upon all parts of the stock. Both the pickers and the feed screw may be
operated by connection with any suitable motive power, the connection
being effected in any of the known modes.
In the top of the cylinder is a man-hole provided with a cover, and a
discharge orifice or orifices for drawing off the charge may be provided.
at any convenient point in the side or bottom of the cylinder.
Referring to the Drawings (Figs. 4, 5, & 6,) A represents the main
cylinder; B, the jacketing cylinder; C, the diaphragm; D, the pickers;
E, the screw; F, the fire-chamber and grate; G, G, the fluc strips;
H, the smoke pipe; and J, the man-hole. S is a pipe by means of which
steam may at any time be admitted to the cylinder.
The operation of this engine is as follows:-After the cylinder is filled
with water to the requisite height the cut wood or other material is
poured in at the man-hole while the engine is at rest or is running
slowly. The man-hole is then closed and the speed of the engine in-
creased. When the revolution of the pickers in the direction of the
arrows draws the fibrous material and the water away from below and
throws it up over the upper part of the diaphragm or septum into the
left-hand compartment, where it descends to the lower aperture of the
diaphragm, through which it returns to its starting point, and thus it is
kept in constant circulation and is rapidly picked to pieces.
This circulation, as already indicated, may be aided by the screw-
bladed shaft placed in the bottom of the cylinder, but any other suitable
device for the same purpose may be substituted for this, or it may be
wholly omitted and still a sufficient circulation for most practical pur-
poses be maintained by the combined action of the revolving pickers and
the gravity of the material.
When wood and other refractory substances are being treated steam
may be let on by the pipe S below, and this blowing up the right-
hand side of the diaphragm accelerates the circulation. The steam
also contributes to create and maintain the requisite temperature and
pressure.
When the temperature and corresponding pressure are raised to the
requisite degree to dissolve the silex the pickers are to be run very
rapidly until the material is thoroughly reduced. The knots on account
of their greater inertia are torn to shreds and reduced to their ultimate
fibers as quickly as any other part of the material, and in all cases the

page_text: large pieces are acted on with the greater violence, the result of which is
a marked uniformity in the pulp produced.
So far as concerns the principle involved in this operation it is manifest
that the two compartments in which the stock is respectively ascending
and descending instead of being separated by a simple diaphragm may
be placed at a great distance apart, providing only that they are con-
structed with suitable connecting trunks or conduits at the top or
bottom.
The pickers, whether in the closed chamber or in the open vat, will
ordinarily be run at a speed of from five thousand to eight thousand feet
per minute, and as the resistance to their blows is furnished by the
inertia of the material as supported in a fluid of great mobility it is
evident that a high speed is absolutely essential before the pickers
can become efficient in separating the fibers.
It is found in practice that with the substances at present used as
paper stock the pickers must be made to move at a rate of not less than
from about twenty-five hundred to three thousand feet per minute, which
is very largely in excess of the speed of the beating roll in an ordinary
pulp engine.
In the closed engine shown on the Drawings the relative position of
the pickers and the water is much the same as that of an ordinary under-
shot water wheel to the stream by which it is driven, and this relative
position will be maintained in applying the Invention to the ordinary open
vat pulp engine. Substantially the same principle of operation however
would be involved if the water which carried the stock were made to
flow against the side or upon the top of the structure constituting the
picker mechanism after the manner. of breast wheels or over-shot
wheels. In such cases it would probably be found necessary to cause
the pickers to revolve in the reverse direction from ordinary breast.or
over-shot mill wheels when driven by the current in order to prolong
the contact of the pickers with the stock, but the reduction of the stock
would still be effected by the percussive and tearing action of. the picker
points, and not by the grinding, abrading, or cutting action theretofore
relied upon in the engines in which the reduction has been effected by
mechanical means. The pickers, whether working in the common open
vat or in a closed vessel, do not cut the fibers in pieces or grind and

page_text: injure them as the common mills do, but they pick, whip, and
out with but little waste of their strength.
snap them
All the beating and grinding processes in vogue tend more or less to
bruise, break, cut, and pulverize the fiber. The new process on the
contrary depends entirely upon the percussive and tearing action of the 5
pickers or strikers, which are so constructed and so arranged in relation
to the other parts of the mechanism as wholly to avoid the grinding
action of opposing surfaces, as well as the cutting and abrasion produced
by the action of blades revolving over or against other and resisting
blades or surfaces in such a way that the material is caught between the 1
two setts or series of blades, and thereby cut or shreded to pieces. In
this process the work is done by the percussive and tearing action of the
pickers, the stock baving no other support when the pickers strike it
than what is afforded by the yielding fluid in which it is floated.
Having thus fully described the said Invention as communicated to 1
me by my foreign correspondent, and the manner of performing the
same, I wish it understood that I claim,-
(1). The process herein-before described of desintegrating fibrous
substances, the same consisting essentially in subjecting them while held
in suspension in or mingled with water or other liquid to the percussive 2
or tearing action of rapidly moving pickers or strikers, the resistance to
the blows of which is furnished by the inertia of the material under
treatment and of the medium in which it is moving.
(2). A fiber reducing engine on which the picker or beater roll is
provided with points, teeth, angles, or equivalent prominences, con- 2
structed and arranged to operate substantially as set forth.
(3). In combination with the picker or beater roll of a fiber reducing
engine an inclined way constructed and arranged substantially as shown
and described, so as to induce a circulation of the entire body of the
stock into contact with the pickers, but without affording an opposing 3
surface between which and the pickers the stock may be caught, and
cut, ground, or abraded.
(4). In combination with the picker or beater roll of a fiber reducing
engine an inclined way constructed and arranged to operate substantially
as shown and described, so that the stock after coming in contact with 3

page_text: the pickers may be carried directly rearward without being lifted up over
a "back fall" as in the ordinary pulp engine.
(5). The ventilating apertures in the walls of the picker hood of a
fiber reducing engine, constructed and arranged substantially as and for
the purpose set forth.
(6). In a fiber reducing engine a steam pipe entering the picker
hood behind the pickers, substantially in the manner shown and
described for the purpose of heating the water and aiding the
circulation.
(7). A fiber reducing engine constructed with two vertical compart-
ments or trunks, which communicate at the top and bottom, substan-
tially as set forth, and one of which is provided with a series of pickers
or strikers, constructed and arranged to operate substantially as and for
the purpose described.
In witness whereof, I, the said George Haseltine, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Thirtieth day of December, in the
year of our Lord 1874.
Witness,
H. J. NOONE.
GEORGE HASELTINE. (L.S.)