IMPROVEMENTS IN PREPARING OR MANU- FACTURING SALT
Year: 1854

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Herman Eugene Falk, of Gateacre House, Liverpool,
Merchant, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN PREPARING OR MANU-
FACTURING SALT."
Sealed the 23rd June 1854, and dated the 21st January 1854.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Herman Eugene Falk
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
21st January 1854.
I, HERMAN EUGENE FALK, of Gateacre House, Liverpool, Merchant, do
hereby declare the nature of the Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN PREPARING
OR MANUFACTURING SALT" to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object the manufacture of salt resembling that
made from sea water on the shores of the Mediterranean sea, and other places.
For which purpose, in place of dissolving rock salt and crystallizing the same
as heretofore, I cause the rock salt to be broken down or crushed to the sizes
of grains desired. And in order to separate the sizes of grains, and also to
remove the impurities, I employ sieves or screens with different sizes of
meshes, and by giving to them a high velocity of movement I am enabled
to separate the impurities. In some cases I add or mix such granular rock
salt artificially crystallized salts, and I also combine or mix with the larger
crystallized salts what is called patent butter salt, thus greatly improving the
weight of the salt produced.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Herman Eugene Falk in the Great Seal Patent Office on
the 20th July 1854.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, HERMAN
EUGENE FALK, of Gateacre House, Liverpool, Merchant, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-first day of January, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-four, in the seventeenth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me,
the said Herman Eugene Falk, Her special licence that I, the said Herman
Eugene Falk, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I,
the said Herman Eugene Falk, my executors, administrators, and assigns,
should at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all
times thereafter during the term therein expressed, should and lawfully might
make, use, exercise, and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "IMPROVE-
MENTS IN PREPARING OR MANUFACTURING SALT," upon the condition (amongst
others) that I, the said Herman Eugene Falk, by an instrument in writing
under my hand and seal, should particularly describe and ascertain the nature
of the said Invention, and in what manner the same was to be performed, and
cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar
months next and immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
-
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Herman Eugene Falk, do hereby
declare the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to
be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the
following statement thereof (that is to say):-.
The objects sought to be secured by my Patent are two-fold,-
First, the production of a salt of a weight or specific gravity hitherto
unobtainable.
Second, the production of a salt imitating Mediterranean produce, and
for this purpose I employ rock salt, which I free from its impurities as here-
after described.
The first part of my Invention consists in the mixture of granulated
crystallized salt with patent butter salt. I take one wheelbarrow, railway
waggon, or basket full of such common salt, or large crystallized salt, or
granulated rock salt, and teem it into the vessel which carries it to the port of
export for abroad. I then take another wheelbarrow, railway waggon, or
basket full of patent butter salt, of exactly the same size, and teem it upon

page_text: the first named, and mix the two together, in trimming the vessel most
intimately and perfectly. The result produced is a penetration of the small
fine patent butter salt in and between the grains and crystals of the other,
and a consequent increase of weight to 80 lbs. per bushel and upwards, a
result hitherto unattainable by any mixture or process of crystallization.
Although I have found the above mode of mixing convenient and economical
for export purposes, I do not confine myself thereto, and the mixture may be
carried on at any convenient place.
I will now describe the second part of my Invention. I take rock salt of
so termed Prussian quality, as it is raised from the mines in Cheshire. I put
this either by spade or mechanical contrivance, as the case may be, into a
hopper. This hopper communicates with a trough of either iron, or wood, or
stone built, lined with iron, and having apertures at either sides or bottom, as
the elevation of the machinery requires, to convey the crushed rock salt. In
this trough works a large mill stone of heavy weight, either all iron or iron
brimmed, filled with stone; a crank pin fastened into the radius of the
crusher and connected with a rod, deriving its motion from either steam, water,
or horse power, furnishes the requisite means of power to crush the salt rock.
The motion given to the crusher is lateral against the ends of the trough,
which are parallel with the crusher. Either scrapers by manual power, or by
elbow motions attached to the crusher or connecting rod, keep the trough
clear of accumulations of crushed salt rock. The size of grain which may
be crushed can be regulated by the distance of the crusher from the ends of
the trough. The process of crushing being performed, I take the crushed
rock from the apertures aforenamed over a horizontally placed riddle, which is
set under the said apertures at a slight angle, and moved by an eccentric
motion supplied by a lever borrowed from some part of the machinery at a
moderate velocity. Such grains of the crushed rock as cannot pass the
meshes of the riddle (which may be altered according to the various re-
quirements of grain) are carried off by a bottomless bag attached to the
inclined side of the riddle, and thus reserved for re-crushing, or other purposes.
The grain of the salt rock being equalized thus, I allow it to fall on another
horizontal screen of very fine wire mesh, or other material, which does not
allow the salt to pass. This screen being also inclined at a slight angle, is
moved by another excentric motion at great velocity, and has at its inclined
side a double mouth, the one to carry off the purified produce of crushed
salt, and the other to carry off the impure parts; for the velocity given to
this screen causes the two substances to assume separate layers on the screen,
inasmuch as the specific gravity of the impure salt differs considerably from

page_text: that of the pure. If one screen is not sufficient more may be added, and
a system adopted to purify the salt thus quite perfectly, or a rotary screen
may be appointed to perform the work of the horizontal one.
I also claim as my Invention the crushing of rock salt in the mines by
hammers and stampers by manual power, and then either shipping it in that
state, after hand picking the impure parts, or riddling it by hand in common
riddles. I say that the produce thus obtained resembles the Mediterranean
salts, and has been exported by me for the purpose of supplying in countries
abroad the place of such salts.
In witness whereof, I, the said Herman Eugene Falk, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Seventeenth day of July, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-four.
Witness,
A. LAUPMANN.
HERMAN EUGENE FALK. (L.S.)