IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR CLEANING AND DECORTICATING WHEAT AND OTHER GRAIN, HULLING, CLEANING, AND POLISHING RICE
Year: 1869

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Augustus Bryant Childs at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
5th June 1869.
I, AUGUSTUS BRYANT CHILDS, of 16, Mark Lane, in the County of
Middlesex, London, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN MACHINERY FOR CLEANING AND DECORTICATING WHEAT AND
OTHER GRAIN, HULLING, CLEANING, AND POLISHING RICE," to be as follows:-
The object of these improvements are to construct a machine so that
the surface or surfaces employed to act on the wheat or other grain for
cleaning, decorticating, hulling, and polishing may be adjusted to each
other for bringing any amount or intensity. of rubbing power on the
grain required from a slight brushing action to a crushing force if
necessary; also retaining the grain between the brushing and rubbing
surfaces the required time for cleaning, decorticating, or other purposes,
and arranging the parts of the machine so as to be all accessable for
removing, repair, and replacing and making it, so that the working parts
will not have an undue wear by ordinary use.

page_text: The machine consists of one or two or a series of pairs of discs, one in
each pair is made to revolve, while the other is fixed stationary with
their surfaces placed in a horizontal position, between which the grain
is passed for cleaning, decorticating, hulling, or polishing, as hereafter
more fully described. In most instances the lower disc will revolve, but
in some cases the upper disc will revolve, and the lower one will be fixed
stationary. The top surface of the under or revolving disc may be
provided with wire gauze grated, corrugated, or toothed surfaces com-
posed of steel or iron in whole or part made of plates, or brushes made
of short steel wire, bristles, cane, whalebone, or other forms of rough
surfaces, or the surfaces of the revolving disc may be composed of any
one, two, or more kinds of surfaces and brushes herein-before mentioned
for rubbing and otherwise acting on the surface of the grain. The
revolving disc are attached to a vertical spindle, which is made
adjustable. The working surfaces of the top or stationary discs are
provided with brushes made in whole or part of steel wire, bristles, cane,
whalebone, or other suitable material; these brushes will be arranged
to the discs, so that they will retain the grain on or pass it rapidly to
the periphery of the discs to suit the amount of rubbing that may be
required for proper cleaning, decorticating, or other purposes. The
stationary discs are affixed to a suitable frame and provided with means
for vertical and lateral adjusting to and from the revolving discs before
mentioned. An opening is made in the centre of the upper disc for
introducing the grain which falls on the lower discs, and by its rotative
action the grain is carried out between the two discs, and is subjected
to a rubbing action by the brushes and roughened surfaces, which partly
effects its cleaning and decortication, it is then discharged at the
periphery and falls into a hopper of a cylindrical shape at the top and
conical at the bottom, and made in whole or part of wire guaze, wire
grate, wire screen, perforated sheet metal, or other material furnished
with perforated openings, and is conducted to the next lower pair of
discs, where it undergoes another rubbing process, and is again dis-
charged into another hopper, and thereby carried to the third pair of
discs, and so on through as many as may be desired for proper cleaning,
decorticating, hulling, and polishing purposes. Just below each revolving
disc a fan is attached to the spindle, independent of the disc if desired,
or made a portion of it by attaching the wings of the fan to the arms of
the disc for drawing or exhausting the dirt and "stive" down through
the opening in the discs; and blowing it out at the side of the hoppers

page_text: In
through the wire guaze grate or screen, or through tubes made for the
purpose into the open air or closed rooms. Each hopper will be fur-
nished with an independant tube for supplying fresh air to be exhausted
through the disc underneath for carrying off the dust or "stive."
providing the revolving disc with rubbing surfaces they will be made or
arranged at such angles or curves compared to the circumference of the
discs so as to retain the grain between the discs as long as may be
desired for cleaning, decorticating, hulling, or polishing purposes, and
in order to make an effective machine with as few pairs of discs as
possible. In some cases when a strong rubbing action is required on the
grain the revolving discs will be furnished with corrugated concentric or
excentrio rows of teeth, brushes, or plates with roughened surfaces, and
the stationary disc will likewise be furnished with concentric or eccentric
rows of steel wire brushes or teeth to act in or across the corrugations
or surfaces in the revolving discs, in order to be certain that by the use
of such surfaces all the grain and its parts will be acted on in its progress
from the centre to the circumference of each pair of discs.