Improved Process of and Apparatus for Disintegrating or Shredding Sugar Cane, Liquorice, Dye-woods, Tobacco, and the like.
Year: 1889

page_text: Date of Application, 29th Apr.. 1889-Accepted, 29th June, 1889
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION,
Improved Process of and Apparatus for Disintegrating or Shredding
Sugar Cane, Liquorice, Dye-woods, Tobacco, and the like.
I, HENRY ALBERT HUGHES, of Rio Grande, New Jersey, United States of America,
Manufacturer, do hereby declare the nature of my invention and in what manner
the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by
the following statement :-
The invention relates to the disintegration or shredding of cane, (sugar or sorghum)
dye woods, liquorice, tobacco, etc., preparatory to diffusion, and consists in the novel
mode, of treating said material, and in the apparatus for that purpose, all as hereinafter
more particularly set forth.
In the accompanying drawings, Fig. 1 is a general vertical sectional view through
the apparatus, showing the different stages in the treatment of the cane or other material.
Fig. 2 is a plan view of the shredding apparatus. Fig. 3 is a detailed view showing
the arrangement of the knife therein, Fig. 4, a detailed view of one of the knife
cylinders, Fig. 5, a vertical section on the line X X of Fig. 2, and Fig. 6, a vertical
section showing the arrangement of two shredding cylinders. Similar letters of
reference indicate like parts.
Referring first to Fig. 1, the cane stalks are placed butts foremost upon the
traveling apron, a, the upper surface of which moves toward a cutting apparatus, b.
The said cutting apparatus consists of two disks, one of which appears at c. between
which disks are arranged knives, d. The disks c, are mounted on a shaft, e, which
is rotated in the direction of the arrows in bearings or supports. In front of the
disks is a block or support, f. The cane fed forward by the traveling apron, a, moves
over the support, and so comes beneath the rapidly revolving knives d.
apron a.
When sorghum cane is treated, it is necessary to remove therefrom the broom,
heads or seed bodies, in order to separate out the seed and prevent its becoming mixed
with the material as prepared for diffusion. This is done automatically by the follow-
ing simple means. As the stalk is fed in beneath the knives d, it will be apparent
that said stalk is supported at two points; namely, by the support and the moving
Between said support and the end of the apron, there is a free space or
interval, h. As long as any of the stalk rests on the apron, it will be fed forward,
but as soon as the head of the stalk runs off the extremity of the apron, then that end
of the stalk is, of course, no longer supported. Consequently, the head drops into
the space between apron and cutter, and never reaches the cutting knife. A shoot
or conduit, i, is provided beneath this space, into which the heads fall, and are so
conducted to any convenient place of deposit.
is
The cane having been divided by the rotary knives d, passes down through an
opening in the floor beneath the cutting apparatus to an inclined screen k. This
screen is pivoted at 1, and is vibrated at its lower end by means of a cun, m, on a
transverse rotary shaft. Beneath the screen k, and enclosed in a suitable case n,
a fan blower, o, rotated in the direction of the arrow h by any suitable means. The
blast of this fan is delivered directly below the vibrating lower edge of screen k, so
that it passes through the pieces of cane, and leaves, while the latter are falling from
the screen k, to the inclined slide, p. The blast operates to separate the lighter leaves
and sheaths from the heavier masses of cane, and to blow the former into the passage q.
Beneath the blower, o, is an inclined partition, r, which prevents the cane entering the
blower chamber.
After the cane has descended the inclined slide p, it passes upon a vibrating
screen k¹, similar in all respects to screen k, and is submitted to the blast from the
fan blower o¹, similarly arranged to fan blower o, whereby any remaining loose leaves
or sheaths are driven into the passage q¹. Fan blower o¹ has a casing n¹, similar to
casing n, a protecting partition similar to partition r, and the cane, after being

page_text: subjected to the second blast, falls upon an inclined slide p¹. The cane has now been
cut into short lengths and freed from leaves, heads, sheaths and other undesirable
material. It next passes to the shredding apparatus, by which it is reduced to a
disintegrated condition.
The object of this apparatus is not to cut or chop the cane into smaller pieces, but
to scratch or tear its fibers asunder. This preparation of the cane is of great
importance in view of the subsequent diffusion treatment to which the material
is subjected.
Referring to Figs. 2 to 6, A is a supporting frame in which are suitable bearings B
for the horizontal shaft C, on which shaft the knife carrying cylinder is fixed. The
body of said cylinder is made of solid metal, and has two flat sides against which the
knives G are clamped between said sides and the segmental portions F. The bolts E
which secure the knives, pass through recesses in the backs, so that as the
protruding edges of the knives wear away, the bolts E may be loosened and the
knives set forward.
The cylinder periphery is truly circular, and the knife blades are set with their edges
very slightly protruding beyond the said periphery. It will be particularly noticed
that each knife blade lies in a plane produced through the chord of the arc. of the
boundary circle of the cylinder. Therefore, when the edge of the knife meets the
material to be acted upon, it does not cut away a shaving after the manner of a rotary
wood cutter or planer, nor chop off a small mass or block of the cane as would the knife
of an ordinary vegetable or hay cutter ; but it scrapes or shreds away a portion of the
surface of the cane.
The knife-supporting cylinder is disposed in an opening in the horizontal supporting
frame A. Resting upon said frame in front of the cylinder, is a cross bar or block 1.
Bolts J pass through openings in the ends of said bar and through elongated slots K
in frame A. The block I may be entirely of metal, or have a fixed plate, L, secured
thereto. Passing through the upward flange, M, of the frame A, is a set screw,
which bears against the rear side of bar I. By loosening the bolts J and suitably
moving the set screw N, the block I may be adjusted with its edge nearer to or further
from the path of travel of the knife edge.
N,
The cut cane from the fans passes into the hopper O, at the bottom of which is a
sliding gate P, by adjusting which by means of the handle Q, the supply of cane to
the knife-cylinder may be regulated. The cane then falls upon the inclined slide R,
which also may be adjusted nearer to or further from the knife-cylinder, by means of
the set screws S. On reaching the bottom of slide R, the cane meets the swiftly
revolving knife while resting upon the block I. The knife edge travels in close
proximity to the corner or edge of the plate L, so that the effect of knife is to scrape
the cane into shreds sufficiently small to pass between the edge of the knife and the
edge of the cutter plate or of block I if the plate be absent.
The extent to which the knife edge projects beyond the cylinder periphery is of
considerable importance. I have found that there is a point beyond which this
cannot be reduced without causing a clogging or packing of the material being
treated under the knife edge; so that said edge will no longer engage with and tear off
the material. This places a limit on the capability of the single knife cylinder for
fine shredding. There are many substances, however, which it is desirable to shred
to a great degree of fineness, so as to allow of the extraction of certain materials
from them by diffusion at low temperature; such, for example, as logwood. It has
been found that with a single cylinder having knives set with their edges, say 3
millimeters distant from the cylinder surface, about 1000 kilogrammes of cane can be
shredded in 22 hours using two knives on the cylinder. If, however, the above
distance of the knife edge from the cylinder periphery be reduced one half, the yield
of the machine will be reduced to almost nothing. When it is desired, therefore, to
shred to great fineness, I employ two knife cylinders, each constructed in the manner
already described, and arranged substantially as indicated in Fig. 6. The material is
first shredded by cylinder l, the knife G of which is set out a distance, say of
3 millimeters from the cylinder periphery. The now disintegrated material then

page_text: passes to cylinder 2, the knife G" of which is adjusted to one half the above distance
from the cylinder surface. When the material has undergone one shredding, the
second knife despite the narrow clearance will not clog; and thus the material becomes
reduced to a greater degree of fineness. The process may be carried further by
submitting the material to the action of a third knife cylinder having still less
clearance; and thus the substance may be disintegrated to almost any extent.
It will be seen, therefore, that the essential steps in the manufacture are, first, the
cutting of the cane into short lengths, and if the cane be sorghum, or any other
material having a broom or seed top, which it is necessary to get rid of, the removal
simultaneously of such broom or seed tops; second, the removal from the cane so cut
into lengths, of leaves, sheaths and other impurities, which is preferably done by
means of an air blast; third, subjecting the cane thus prepared to fine fibrous
disintegration, by means of such apparatus as is here described. Cane or other
material thus prepared, is then ready for diffusion in any battery or suitable apparatus,
and will be found to give an increased yield in sugar, for example, with great economy
and celerity.
The precise construction of the apparatus for cutting the cane into short lengths,
nor of the fan blowers here described, is not essential.
Having now fully described and ascertained the nature of the said inven-
tion, and in what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that what I
claim is
1. The manufacture of disintegrated cane or other material by first dividing said
cane into short lengths: second, separating therefrom foreign substances or leaves: third,
subjecting the cane to the operation of rotary cutting blades constructed as set forth,
whereby said cane is reduced to a condition of fibrous disintegration.
2. The shredding apparatus hereinbefore set forth, containing a rotary cylinder
having a uniformly circular periphery and a knife set longitudinally upon said cylinder
lying in the plane of a, chord of the arc of the bounding circle of said periphery,
and having its edge set slightly beyond said cylinder surface.
3. The shredding apparatus hereinbefore set forth, containing a rotary cylinder
having a uniformly circular periphery and a knife set longitudinally upon said cylinder
lying in the plane of a chord of the arc of the bounding circle of said periphery,
and having its edge set slightly beyond said cylinder surface, and a support adjustable
nearer to or further from the said cylinder, and receiving the material operated upon
by the knife.
4. The apparatus for removing heads, seed-tops or end sections from cane, herein-
before set forth, containing a traveling apron, and a device for cutting the cane into
lengths, the apron feeding the cane to the cutting device, and a space or interval as
described, between said apron and cutting device, as and for the purpose
set forth.
Dated this Tenth day of April 1889.