IMPROVEMENTS IN WASHING WOOL AND OTHER TEXTILE MATERIALS, AND IN APPARATUS TO BE EMPLOYED FOR SUCH PURPOSE
Year: 1870

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Bristow Hunt at the Office of
the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 6th
September 1870.-A communication from abroad by Auguste
Féron-Flamant, of Roubaix, France.
I, BRISTOW HUNT, of No. 1, Serle Street, Lincoln's Inn, in the County
of Middlesex, Gentleman, do hereby declare the nature of the said In-
vention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN WASHING WOOL AND OTHER TEXTILE MATERIALS,
AND IN APPARATUS TO BE EMPLOYED FOR SUCH PURPOSE," (a communication to
me from abroad by Auguste Féron-Flamant, of Roubaix, France,) to. be
as follows:-
―
Whenever a solution of ordinary soap is mixed with a saline solution
there is formed immediately by double exchange an insoluble soap..
Also whenever in the operations of washing, bleaching, finishing; and
dyeing textile materials, yarns, or fabrics impregnated with soap are
plunged in water containing salts of an earthy or metallic base in solution;
there is immediately formed on the fibres an insoluble precipitate forming
a kind of plaster and opposing itself energetically to the action of the
water and the coloring matter, and hence arise stains, streaks, and other
disasterous mishaps.

page_text: Whenever textile materials, yarns, or fabrics have been passed through
a soap bath they should be well rinsed in pure water to move the excess
of soap which would be prejudicial to the subsequent operations, but in
ordinary practice this rinsing always effected in water more or less impure
only eliminates the soluble soap by converting it into a coating of
insoluble soap which greases the fibres and deprives them of all aptitude
for absorbing water.
It is therefore absolutely necessary to employ none but perfectly pure
water for removing the soap, but all natural waters are more or less
impure and contain in variable proportions earthy and metallic salts in
solution. The corrective agents for these waters are numerous, but the
soap alone can by combining therewith remove from the water all matters
not compatible with the soap, though this reagent is very costly.
The present Invention is based on the employment of soap as an agent
for purifying the rinsing water, but under such conditions that it costs
absolutely nothing, it consists in utilising the soap itself contained in the
materials to be cleansed, which soap has hitherto been completely lost
when rinsing in corrected waters, and was very prejudicial when using
natural or uncorrected waters. To obtain this result a bath of crude or
natural water is corrected by any suitable reagent which commences its
purification, and this purification is completed by means of a solution
of ordinary soap. The water being thus deprived of all salt capable
of destroying or precipitating the soap the materials are placed
therein. The soap with which they are impregnated enters into solution,
runs into the bath, and the water becomes soapy. The bath containing
then an excess of soap on adding thereto a certain quantity of crude or
natural water a reciprocal reaction takes place, and if the quantity of
crude water added has been rightly proportioned the bath will be neither
soapy nor calcareous, it will be pure, and can be used again for rinsing
purposes.
It will be understood; that when once this system is put into operation
the same bath may serve indefinitely without any new expense for re-
agents, each quantity of material furnishing all the soap necessary for
purification.
In order to render this process absolutely practical it is important to
provide a means whereby an ordinary workman can determine exactly
the quantity of crude water to be added to the soapy bath, so that the
double exchange shall be effected, and there shall be no excess either on

page_text: the one part or the other. For this purpose the Inventor has designed
a testing apparatus which he calls a "dosimeter," and which is based
on the property which soapy water possesses of only yielding on agitation
a persistent or lasting froth when it contains at least a ten-thousandth
part of free soap (that is one decigramme of soap to the litre). The vat
or vessel in which the operation is effected is provided with a scale which
divides the contents into equal numbered volumes. A graduated bottle
or flask is also divided into equal volumes. Lastly, a graduated can is
also divided and numbered in volumes equal to those of the flask. By
means of the scale the number of units of the volume of soapy water is
ascertained and the flask is then filled to the corresponding division,
then from the can of crude water filled to "zero," pour into the flask,
drop by drop, until the moment when the froth ceases to be persistent
at this point it is known that there is no salt which will precipitate the
soap and not a ten-thousandth part of soap in excess.
The quantity of crude water added may be read off both on the flask
and the can which serves as a check in case some drops may be lost.
If the two numbers correspond it is certain that the test is correct and
it only remains to pour into the vat or vessel crude water until the level
attains the same division as in the flask. For example, the bath is at
forty-five, which signifies that it contains forty-five equal volumes of
soapy water.
this water.
The flask is then filled to the division forty-five with
The can being filled to " zero" with crude water the
latter is poured therefrom into the flask till the froth ceases to be
persistent, at this moment the flask marks fifty-two, and the can seven,
which indicates that in order to correct the forty-five volumes of soapy
water seven volumes of crude water must be added. This crude water
is then to be poured or allowed to flow into the vessel until the level
reaches the fifty-second division. The flask is thus merely a reduction
of the vessel. In case the vessel should be too full, if for example, the
scale only reaches sixty, and that having taken the test on a bath of
fifty-four, the flask indicates sixty-three, a portion of the bath must be
removed in order to lower its level. The test is then taken again and
the bath being reduced to a level of (say) fifty volumes the test would
naturally indicate fifty-eight and a third.