AN IMPROVED MODE OF AND APPARATUS FOR EVAPORATING LIQUIDS WITH A VIEW TO OBTAINING THE SACCHARINE, SALINE, OR OTHER SUBSTANCES CONTAINED THEREIN IN A DRY OR CRYSTALLINE STATE
Year: 1867

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Robert Tooth at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 31st December
1867.
I, ROBERT TOOTH, of Fenchurch Street, in the City of London, Gentleman,
do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "AN IMPROVED
MODE OF AND APPARATUS FOR EVAPORATING LIQUIDS WITH A VIEW TO OBTAINING
THE SACCHARINE, SALINE, OR OTHER SUBSTANCES CONTAINED THEREIN IN A DRY OR
CRYSTALLINE STATE," to be as follows:-
This Invention relates to the evaporation of saccharine, saline, and other
liquids for the purpose of rapidly and economically concentrating the liquids
with a view to obtaining the saccharine, saline, or other substances contained
therein in a dry or crystalline state. This I propose to effect by bringing
currents of heated air into contact with descending streams of the liquids
desired to be concentrated.
In carrying out the process of concentration I propose to employ a tower
closed at top by a roof and communicating at bottom with a hot-air furnace;
this tower I propose to line with glazed tiles or an enamelled surface, and at
its upper end I mount a shallow circular vessel pierced with holes and
furnished with a central open tube; surrounding this percolator is an annular
trough, into which I pump the weak liquor to be operated upon, while the
more concentrated liquor I pump into the percolator. It will be convenient
so to arrange these two receptacles that the overflow if any of the weak liquor
will be received into the-percolator, whence it will be discharged with the

page_text: more concentrated liquor down the centre of the tower. The liquor as it falls
is collected at the bottom of the tower and run off to a tank which com-
municates by means of a pipe with a force pump; this pump when in action
draws up the liquor from the tank and transmits it through a vertical pipe
and a branch therefrom to the percolator. Another force pump connected
with the supply tank forces the weak liquor up a vertical pipe and branch
into the annular trough, and from this trough it passes by branches to an
annular pipe pierced with fine holes and situated a little above the vertical
walls of the tower; the liquor therefore as it flows out of the annular pipe
will distribute itself over the whole inner surface of the tower, and thus
expose a large evaporating surface to the ascending currents of heated air,
while the more concentrated liquor will fall in an evenly distributed shower
through the air. For the purpose of heating the liquor before its descent in
the tower the vertical pipes before mentioned may be enclosed in a steam
pipe supplied with steam from an adjacent boiler or from the engine cylinders,
and the steam may be led from this pipe into an air shaft or shafts projecting
through the roof of the tower, and are intended to carry off the ascending air
charged with vapour evolved from the liquor.. By admitting the steam to the
air shafts in the form of jets a partial vacuum will be formed therein, whereby
the rapid ascent of the air, now laden with moisture, will be induced; the air
may also, if desired, be admitted to the tower under pressure. When the
liquor has become sufficiently condensed it is to be drawn off and treated in
the usual way for obtaining the saccharine, saline, or other substances
contained therein in the dry state.