Improvements in Heating Burners or Acetylene Gas.
Year: 1897

page_text: Date of Application, 24th Aug., 1897
Complete Specification Left, 24th May, 1898-Accepted, 16th July, 1898
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in Heating Burners
or
Acetylene Gas.
Stoves for Use with
I, FRANÇOIS PIERRE JOSEPH ACKERMANN, of 2, Rue Grignau, Marseilles, in the
Republic of France, Manufacturer, do hereby declare the nature of this invention
to be as follows:-
The object of this invention is to provide means for burning acetylene gas for
heating purposes, so as to render this gas available for incandescent lighting, for
laboratory use, heating soldering irons, and for other useful purposes.
The difficulty hitherto experienced was to obtain a practical mixture of the gas
and air in the proportions desired to produce the blue heating flame and non-
illuminating, it being understood that acetylene gas is denser than coal gas; that
it contains more carbon; and is consumed in a lesser quantity.
For example, if burned in an ordinary Bunsen burner, a blue flame is not
produced; the flame is smoky, or an explosion is caused, and the flame lights
back.
The causes of these inconveniences are the density of the acetylene gas, and the
small quantity that can be used, which does not permit of sufficient air being
drawn in.
It is necesary, therefore, to obtain a burner in which the desired quality of air
can be drawn in, notwithstanding the small quantity of gas that is used.
The apparatus, then, consists in a jet for the gas opening into a chamber, to
which air also enters, and the mixture passes to a long tube through a contracted
opening, and eventually burns at the outer end of the tube.
The jet mouth is exactly opposite the opening to the tube, and the parts are
properly proportioned, to obtain the desired results.
The section of the outlet, is less than that of the tube, but greater than the
contracted opening.
The outlet, instead of being single, may consist of several small tubes, and the
inlet of air may be regulated in any convenient manner.
The burner may consist of a ring attached to the end of the tube, and having
a number of small tubes or jets, a piece of wire gauze being placed inside
the ring, or in the tube below the jet tubes, or, it may be, in the jet tubes them-
selves, in order to prevent lighting back, and also to ensure the proper mixture of
gas and air.
For heating soldering irons, the iron is mounted on a rod fixed to the tube, at a
certain distance from the outlet, to avoid, by reason of its conductibility, the
extremity of the burner rising to a high temperature, and thus having a bad
influence on the flame of the burner.
OL
f A naust 1907

page_text: Improvements in Heating Burners or
Stoves for Use with
Acetylene Gas.
I, FRANÇOIS PIERRE JOSEPH ACKERMANN, of 2, Rue Grignau, Marseilles, in the
Republic of France, Manufacturer, 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 :-
The object of this invention is to provide means for burning acetylene gas for
heating purposes, and to thereby render such gas serviceable for incandescent
illumination, laboratory blowpipes, warming stoves or brasiers, bath-heaters or
geysers, soldering irons, and the like.
The difficulty hitherto experienced was to devise a practical method of mixing
acetylene gas and air in the proportions necessary to obtain a blue heating and non-
illuminating flame; the fact being, that acetylene gas is far more dense than coal
gas; that it contains more carbon, and is supplied for consumption in comparatively
small quantities.
.
By admitting acetylene gas into a coal-gas burner, say, a Bunsen burner, being
the type of burner best known, a blue flame cannot be obtained; what happens,
instead, is either of two things, the flame produced is smoky, or an explosion, and
a consequent ignition of the lower jet, or what is known as "back-lighting," takes
place.
The causes of the failure of previous attempts, were the density of the acetylene
gas, and the slowness with which the gas current is supplied to the burners, and
which prevents such current from taking an adequate supply of air along with it.
It was therefore necessary to devise a burner of such a construction as to render
it capable of making the air move along with the gas under satisfactory conditions,
notwithstanding even a very slow rate of supply of gas.
It is this burner of an improved construction that forms the essential feature of
my invention, and the principle is illustrated at Fig. 1 of the accompanying
drawings.
The novel device consists of certain arrangements for the drawing together of
gas and air, the several parts thereof being so fitted together and proportioned as
to attain the result desired.
It will be seen that the acetylene gas is conveyed to the burner through the pipe g,
having a single orifice f at its upper end, whence the gas issues in the form of a
jet. This jet passes into a chamber e in communication with the atmosphere,
through perforations o; then the jet enters a tube b, in doing which it overcomes
the resistance of that quantity of air which it requires for its combustion, and
eventually burns in the form of a blue flame at the outlet a of the said tube b. This
tube b has a reduced or throttled portion b¹ at its lower end, through which the gas
and air that feed te burner are conducted.
In order that this acetylene gas burner may operate under entirely satisfactory
conditions, it is necessary :-
(1) That the gas jet escaping through the orifice f of the supply pipe g should
be perfectly straight, and arranged exactly opposite the centre of the throttled or
contracted portion 61, without touching the edge of that portion;
(2) That the sectional area of that contracted part b¹, and also the distance
between it and the upper end of the pipe g, should accordingly be proportionate
to the rate at which the gas is supplied, so that the sectional area of the contracted
aperture 6¹ may be sufficiently wide to allow the gas-jet to pass through it, carrying

page_text: along the outer air that enters the chamber e, and that the said contracted
aperture 61 should be near enough to the orifice f to prevent the gas jet, as it
expands, from filling the whole of that contracted aperture 6¹, so that sufficient
room space be at all times left for the passage of the amount of air required for
combustion;
(3) That the sectional area of the tube b should slghtly exceed that of the
contracted part b¹; and
(4) That the sectional area of the outlet a of the burner should be somewhat less
than that of the tube b, but always greater than that of the contracted aperture 6¹.
For certain special purposes, I have deemed it preferable to provide the burner,
not with one outlet a only, but with a number of such outlets, formed by short
tubes or jets kept apart in the manner presently to be stated.
The more carefully these several proportions are maintained, the more intense will
be the heating effect, of the blue flame obtained at the burner orifice a, in
consequence of the combustion of the mixture of acetylene and air.
It will be understood that the chamber e may be square, conical, spherical, or of
any other suitable shape. The air-inlets o may be provided either at the lower
part of the said chamber, as shown in Fig. 1, or in its side walls; and a movable
plate arranged in a convenient position in front of the air inlets o, may serve to
control the admission of air.
As before stated, the improved burner just described is applicable to a vast
variety of purposes in practice, some of the forms which it is capable of
assuming with this object, being shown in Figs. 2, 3, 4, and 5 of the drawings, in
which-
Fig. 2 shows a burner intended for incandescent illumination with acetylene gas.
Fig. 3 is a vertical section of an acetylene gas stove, comprising the same features
as the burner shown in Fig. 2.
Fig. 4 is a plan of the same stove; and
Fig. 5 illustrates the application of the improved burner to a soldering iron.
As will readily be seen by reference to these several figures, whatever the purpose
to which it may be proposed to apply the burner, this burner itself is in all cases
constructed in an identical manner.
Thus, it invariably comprises an acetylene gas supply pipe g, provided with a
single orifice f forming the jet; an air supply chamber e communicating with the
atmosphere through the perforations o, and a tube b, wherein the acetylene gas
and the air which is drawn in, intimately mix. The tube b is throttled or contracted
at the part b¹, through which are conducted the burner-feeding supplies of gas and
air.
Where my burner is applied to incandescent lighting, as shown in Fig. 2, the
mixture of acetylene gas and air is effected in the tube b, in which it rises until it
passes through a sheet of wire gauze h, after which it escapes through a series of
short tubes or jets i (the number of which may vary at will), at the ends of which
jets the gas will burn in the form of a blue flame.
The wire gauze h, arranged in a convenient position within the tube b, serves to
ensure the thorough mixing of the acetylene gas and air drawn in through the
apertures, while it also has the effect of preventing the resulting mixture from
becoming ignited within the burner, or lighting back."
"
In certain applications of my improved burner, the substitution, for the single
outlet a of the tube b, of a series of small tubes i, at the ends of which the mixture
of acetylene gas and air burns in the condition of a corresponding number of blue
heating flames, will give results of high industrial import, for I have observed that
if the flame obtained by burning a mixture of acetylene gas and air was to be a
heating flame, and not a white one, serviceable rather for illuminating purposes,-
it was necessary that the temperature of the part at the end of which the com-
bustion of such inixture takes place, should not be capable of rising unduly. Now,
by arranging the tubes i all around the upper part of the burner, at a predeter-

page_text: -
mined distance apart, as shown in the drawings, this object is accomplished, as,
while the gaseous mixture is being consumed at the ends of the said tubes i, the
cold air drawn in as much by the act of combustion as by the action of the glass
chimney surmounting the burner, will circulate around the said tubes, and, in so
doing, will constantly cool the same, thereby obviating any objectionable influence
which the said tubes might have upon the calorific properties of the flame of the
burner.
Where my improved burner is applied to a stove, as shown in Figs. 3 & 4, the
tube b, through which flows the mixture of acetylene gas and air, opens into an
annular chamber k, fitted internally with a sheet of wire gauze h, which answers
the same purpose as that previously referred to. The upper part of the hollow
ring carries the small tubes i, at the ends of which the gaseous mixture is
burned.
The operation of the burner constructed in accordance with this invention, is
precisely identical with that of the usual incandescent burners.
In some cases, where the improved burners are used for any of the purposes
mentioned above, it may be preferable to mount upon such burners a number of
independent small tubes ¹, such as the one shown in Fig. 3A. These tubes being
internally fitted with wire gauze, as at h¹, would then act in the same manner as
the tubes i previously described, which are integral with the burner.
Where my improved burner is employed in heating soldering irons, as illustrated
in Fig. 5, the gaseous mixture should be made to burn at the end of a piece, such
as 2, screwed on to the tube b; a piece of wire gauze h being gripped between the
two parts.
Here, as in the foregoing examples, in order to prevent the end of the burner
from being heated to excess by conductibility, and exercising an objectionable
influence upon the flame of the said burner, the soldering iron would be mounted
upon a rod m secured on to the tube b in any suitable manner, and at a prede-
termined distance from the piece, which terminates the said tube. Or there
might, for the same purpose, be interposed between the end of the rod m and the
tube b, at their junction, a piece of some material being a non-conductor of heat.
The several examples above given serve to show how my improved burner may
be readily applied to all classes of apparatus in which a heating flame is made
use of.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my said inven-
tion and in what manner the same is to be performed I declare that what I
claim is :-
1. An improved construction of acetylene gas burner, enabling such gas to be
utilized in every description of heating or "blue flame " gas apparatus, such as
incandescent burners, brasiers, or warming stoves, blowpipes, furnaces or retorts,
soldering irons, bath heaters, and the like, such burner comprising a gas supply
pipe g provided with a single orifice, such as f, through which the acetylene gas
escapes in the form of a jet, and whence it rushes into the centre of a tube b,
drawing in with it the quantity of air necessary for its proper combustion at the
outlet a of the said tube, the air supply being derived from a chamber e communi-
cating with the atmosphere, the said tube 6 being reduced or throttled at b¹ in its
lower part, substantially as and for the purpose specified with reference to Fig. 1
of the accompanying drawings.
2. A method of making use of the burner referred to in Claim 1, in practice,
consisting in its application to incandescent burners and to stoves or brasiers, such
apparatus being, for the purpose, fitted with a number of small tubes, such as i, at
the ends of which the gaseous mixture burns, the said tubes being separate from,
and independent of, each other, so as to prevent their being heated to excess, and
being either rigidly secured to, or removable from, the apparatus to which the
invention is applied, as hereinabove described with reference to Figs. 2, 3, and 4,
of the accompanying drawings.

page_text: 3. Another method of carrying the burner arrangement referred to in the Claim 1
into practical effect, consisting in its application to soldering irons, the point of
attachment of the iron being removed or isolated, at will, from the end of the burner,
so as to prevent overheating the latter, as hereinabove described with reference to
Figs. 3 of the accompanying drawings.