IMPROVEMENTS IN REFRIGERATING AND APPARATUS THEREFOR, PART OF SUCH APPARATUS BEING APPLICABLE TO HEATING PURPOSES
Year: 1877

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Kennard Knott at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents on the 26th September 1877.
KENNARD KNOTT, of 4, South Street, Finsbury, in the County of Middlesex.
"IMPROVEMENTS IN REFRIGERATING AND APPARATUS THEREFOR, PART OF SUCH
APPARATUS BEING APPLICABLE TO HEATING PURPOSES."
The object of this Invention is an improved method and apparatus for refrigerating,
applicable for cooling wort and other cooling purposes in breweries, for condensing
purposes in distilleries, and for lowering the temperature in churches, theatres, and
other large public and private buildings, and dwelling houses generally.
The Invention mainly consists in the employment of a fan blower or blowers so
arranged as to force a current of air through an air pipe or pipes passing into a tank
or freezing box, where it or they is or are formed into a coil or coils, and then
passed out of the tank, the said tank being supplied with suitable refrigerating
agents, thereby cooling the air passing through the said coil or coils, which may
then be used for cooling purposes.
In applying my Invention for refrigerating purposes in breweries I can make use
of the present water refrigerators or like appliances by merely causing the air cooled
as herein-before described to pass through the present water chambers or spaces.
Where one tank is employed for several refrigerators the air from the tank is first
passed into an air chest, from which it is distributed by suitable pipes to the several
refrigerators. The air having passed through the refrigerator may be carried away
into the atmosphere by any suitable means.
For cooling theatres, churches, and other large buildings, I employ a similar
arrangement of apparatus, but the cold air from the tank or freezing box or the air
chest is distributed as required by perforated pipes, so as to equalize and lower the
temperature.
For cooling buildings containing a number of rooms, a main pipe from the tank or
freezing box passes through the building, and returns to the blower; from this main
pipe branch pipes lead into each room, each of these pipes being provided with a
stop-cock, from which passes a perforated pipe passing through or round the room,
so that by merely turning the cock the cold air may be let into (or shut out of) each
room as required; the air thus lost is replaced from the atmosphere through a
suitable valve in the main inlet pipe.

page_text: For cooling the store or refrigerating room or chamber for preserving food or other
perishable articles in such buildings, the said room must be rendered air-tight, and
Jined with non-conducting material; a perforated pipe from the main air pipe passes
across the centre of the ceiling of the chamber, discharging the cold air into the
chamber. I provide two other perforated pipes at the sides of the top of the
chamber, which pass outside into a larger pipe leading to the inlet pipe of the blower.
These two perforated pipes form collecting pipes for conveying the warmer or upper
air from the chamber into the inlet pipe of the blower, a suitable valve allowing it
to enter.
Any suitable motive power may be employed for driving the fans or blowers, and
the tank or freezing box is covered with non-conducting substance; the required
degree of cold in the tank or freezing box is produced by any suitable ice-making
machine, or by the employment of ice and salt, or any other suitable refrigerating
agents.
The coil or coils in the freezing box must be constructed so as to allow of the
introduction of brine or other suitable agent for clearing the inside of the coils of
any rime which may form therein, and for the discharge of the same, such discharged
brine and rime passing into a suitable receptacle, from which it may be raised by a
pump or otherwise into a tank above for re-use.
The apparatus, as herein-before described for cooling buildings, may be employed
for heating such buildings by substituting a boiler for the ice-making machine, the
said boiler supplying hot water to the freezing box, which would now form a heating
box, and the air passing through the coil or coils would be heated instead of cooled,
and distributed in the same manner as the cold air.