Improvements in the Treatment and Reduction of Oxidised, Car- bonated, or Combined Ores, and in Obtaining Metals therefrom.
Year: 1899

page_text: Improvements in the Treatment and Reduction of Oxidised, Car-
bonated, or Combined Ores, and in Obtaining Metals therefrom.
I, JOHN ARMSTRONG, of Eden Hall, Montpelier Road, Ealing, Engineer, do
hereby declare the nature of this invention to be as follows:-
=
This invention is for the purpose of reducing to the metallic state the ores of
copper, tin, antimony, bismuth, gold and silver separately, or in combination with
each other, or in combination with other ores or gangue.
In my Letters Patent (22361) of October 9th, 1896, for the treatment of sul-
phide ores of lead and zinc, I describe a process which has for its basis the
ingredients requisite to form nascent sodium by a mixture of sodium salts and
carbon. This present invention is a modification of that process for the treat-
ment of other ores as arsenates, silicates, oxides or carbonates or tellurides and
tungstates of metals, and is performed in and by the following method:-
Ores of copper, tin and as above stated when found in the oxidized or carbo-·
nated or suitably combined state are pulverised to a fine powder, and intimately
mixed in a comminated form with coal, coke, or other carboniferous matter
and with carbonate or equivalent salt of soda or potassa or the ingredients com-
monly employed for the formation of crude soda or black ash. This mixture is
placed in a reverberating or other, furnace and heated sufficiently to reduce the
mass to a fluxed or melted condition when it will be found that the metallic con-
stituents of the ores have been reduced to the metallic state which can be tapped
off and the slag containing the silicia and gangue will be found to contain the
alkali employed in the process, and which can be re-covered either in the form
of carbonate or hydrate as most convenient by any of the well known processes.
In dealing with ores of copper, containing any sulphur, the ore is preferably'
roasted to drive off the sulphur previous to treatment. In treating tin ores con-
taining tungsten the slag is found to contain the tungsten in combination with
the alkali which can be washed out and recovered.
Dated the 25th dow of Th
1000
Improvements in the Treatment and Reduction of Oxidised, Car-
bonated, or Combined Ores, and in Obtaining Metals therefrom.
I, JOHN ARMSTRONG, of Eden Hall, Montpelier Road, Ealing, Engineer, do
hereby declare the nature of this invention and in what manner the same is to
[Price 8d1

page_text: In treating the ores containing tungsten the slag is found to also contain the
tungsten in combination with the alkali. On lixiviating the slag the tungstate
and the alkali washes out, and can be recovered.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my said
invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, I wish it to be
understood that I make no claim in this specification for what has already been
covered in my Patent, No. 22361 of 1896, this being a subsidiary patent in which
substantially the same process therein set forth is applied to other ores which I
had hitherto supposed to have been unreducible by this process, and that what
I claim as my invention is
The reduction to the metallic state of ores formed of copper, tin, antimony,
or bismuth, with gold or silver or any combination of these, by heating them
with the materials requisite to form nascent sodium, as for instance carbonate of
soda, and carbon, substantially as described.
Dated the 20th day of November 1899.
WM. P. THOMPSON Co..
Of 6, Lord Street, Liverpool, Patent Agents for the Applicant.