AN IMPROVED PROCESS FOR CLEANING,
Year: 1870

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Charles Théodore Balonchard, Miller and Baker,
and Louis Adolphe Dumars, Merchant, both of Nesle, in the Empire
of France, for the Invention of "AN IMPROVED PROCESS FOR CLEANING,

page_text: Specification, under our hands and seals, fully describes and ascertains
the nature of our said Invention, and in what manner the same is to
be performed:
The nature of our Invention consists in the preparation of a powder
and its application to the preservation and improvement of grain and
seeds, especially of damaged grain and grain attacked or not by caries,
blight, smut, or any other disease, or infected by insects, such as weevils.
Spotted-or-black-corn (that-is-to-say, corn-attacked-by-blight, caries, or
smut) mixed with the powder and passed through a smut mill will be
found entirely purified, rendered as clean as sound wheat, and capable
of giving a first quality flour. Damaged corn cleaned with this powder
reassumes the appearance of a sound corn, and if this corn is not always
fit for producing good flour it is in every case better for the various
other purposes to which damaged corn is applied. If the corn is sound
(which is not always perceptible to the naked eye) cleaning it with the
powder by means of the smut mill ensures a first quality flour. Flour
obtained from corn submitted to this method of cleaning is much
superior to that otherwise obtained, and if the cleaning takes place after
a previous mixing the quality of the flour will be all the better the
longer the mixing has been effected. By mixing the corn with the
powder at least one day before grinding all the weevils and other insects
which might be ground with the corn and would give to it and the
bread a bluish tinge and a disagreable smell and taste arc driven out.
Corn, even the cleanest and soundest, contains fatty and other elements
which may dirty and foul the smut mill, and the use of the powder
obviates this. The fatty elements no longer existing, and the grain and
the millstones being no longer liable to retain them, the millstones
preserve their grinding power much longer and do not require to. be
so often tooled, an operation always injurious to the quality of the
flour during several days. By reason of its impalpability the powder
mixes very intimately with the grain as well as with the residues of
the cleansing and smutting which it appropriates, and of which it
facilitates the expulsion. Mixed with the powder smutty and other
corn improves, becomes wholesome, and preserves for an indefinite
period in heaps, sacks, bins, or otherwise, in a dry or relatively dry

page_text: If the cvil is too inveterate
larger quantities the other
During the hot season it will
place, ventilated or not, exempt from any damage or depreciation,
whether in a market, warehouse, granary, subterranean pit, barge, ship,
or other place. If this operation is effected upon damaged corn it
becomes sufficiently wholesome to be fit to grind if there is no de-
composition of the grain, and if it has not contracted any bad smell
with which the flour would be penetrated.
then the corn becomes fitter to supply in
products which are obtainable from it.
be prudent to ascertain from time to time by sight, touch, and smell if
the corn is still in good condition, for notwithstanding the real properties
of this powder such might not be the case if the proportion of powder
is insufficient or the mixing badly done. When a wheat or other cereal
has remained several years mixed with the powder it may under certain
circumstances be too dry for grinding, in which case it should be first
cleaned and then left in a storehouse possessing a slightly moist
coolness either natural or artificially produced, where by turning it
over from time to time the corn will in a few days have recovered its
elasticity and may be ground in such a manner as to obtain the
complete separation of the flour and the purtenances.
The results of this mixture are:-No more overheating or fermentation.
The usual costly manipulation (turning over by hand or otherwise) and
constant inspection are dispensed with. No more vast warehouses, as
the grain may be stored at any height. The germ of the grain being no
longer subject to an artificial vegetation always preserves its power and
virtue however old. The corn whether sound or unsound improves
as flour, and as grain preserves all its marketable qualities, therefore
its sale is easy at any time without fear of depreciation. The
eilosion of the weevil is no longer possible if the grain has been pre-
pared in time. If they are born these insects and all others are
immediately expelled. All insects and dead bodies dry up without
decomposing or infecting the corn and are expelled in the cleaning.
The flour and the purtenances of the corn are no longer exposed to
injury in the grinding from the tainted remains of insects and their
dejections. The agglomeration of the grain into balls or hard lumps
is prevented, arrested, or destroyed. The preservation of grain in under-
ground and other pits becomes possible. Grain is protected during the
cold season, foggy or rainy, from the humidity in suspension in the air,

page_text: Flour
and is consequently no longer exposed to absorb this humidity injurious
to the quality of the flour and often the cause of the grain covering
itself with fungus or mouldiness, and thus imbibing a bad smell and
taste, the absorption of humidity also renders the grain liable to greater
and more rapid fermentation upon the arrival of the hot season.
obtained from corn mixed or simply cleaned with the powder is drier,
less fermentable, and may be sooner used for panification or bread
making. If the flour is less fermentable the leavening of the bread will
be slower, more easily managed, and souring less quickly will remain
fresh much longer. If the flour is drier the dough will rise better, the
bread will have a better appearance, and require less flour. The corn
is partially preserved from the attack of rodent animals and might
doubtless be totally preserved therefrom if the powder were used in
large proportions. This process is applicable not only to wheat, but to
all the other cereals, and to all grain and seed subject to the same
conditions. This powder would be in nowise injurious to health even if
the corn for grinding preserved some trace of it, which however cannot
happen if a good cleaning apparatus be used, but in the contrary case
the flour would only give a more wholesome bread. Grain for sowing
treated with this powder if attacked by blight, caries, or smut will
nevertheless produce at harvest a sound grain. Finally the powder is a
powerful manure, and may be offered under this title to agriculturists
after it has been used for and with the addition of the residues of the
cleaning and smutting.

page_text: All these various substances may be further combined together in
various ways and give the same advantages.
We claim the use of all these various combinations and proportions,
and notably the essential ingredients which might enter into other
compositions foreign to the above, but intended to produce the same
effect, and the addition of which might serve to cover a piracy con-
stituting a semblance of patentable manufactured produce or be made
with any other motive, which essential ingredients are :-
For Cleaning Grain.-In the first place lime, which is indispensable;
in the second place the clay, which has also an action upon the grain,
but the principal action of which when added to lime is by acting upon
this latter during the cleaning to seize it and facilitate its expulsion.
In the last place the alum and the carbon which purge the grain from
bad smell.
For the Preservation of Grain.-Firstly, the lime, which is an in-
dispensable ingredient acting as absorbent, drying, and preserving;
'secondly, the alum drying and preserving; thirdly, the carbon acting as
disinfectant and absorbing the gases; fourthly, the clay acting as an
absorbent. And all these bodies acting to separate the grain and prevent
its getting into lumps, and by reason of their different nature constituting
a powder of a very smooth or slippery description, possessing little power
of adhesion to the grain, its admixture with which is thus easier.
For the Preparation of Seed Grain.-Firstly, the lime; secondly, the
bay or rock salt; thirdly, the sulphate and the carbonate of soda;
fourthly, the sulphate of copper or of iron; lastly, the salts of tartar or
tartaric acid. The substances should be reduced as far as possible into
an impalpable powder and be very intimately mixed. As regards the
lime it is best to break its grain by plunging it into water, withdrawing
it directly it hisses, and then leaving it to itself. The alum may be
pulverized, but it is preferable to dissolve it in cold, lukewarm, hot,
or boiling water, which will also serve for treating the lime as above:
The clay may be used in its natural state, dried in a kiln or baked.
With the exception of the bay salt, the rock salt, and the sulphate or
carbonate of soda all the other salts of tartar, of copper, and of iron, and
the tartaric acid may be dissolved in the water to be used for treating
the lime as above.

page_text: :
METHOD OF OPERATING.
I. For the Preservation of Grain.-The powder should be mixed with
the grain in the proportion of from 3½ ounces to 2 lbs. 3 ozs. to every
22 imperial gallons, or 2 bushels of corn according to the quality of
the grain, its sound, unsound, or damaged state, the conditions of its
storage, the duration of the storage, or of the carriage or transport of
the grain, atmospherical conditions, the situation of the storing places,
and other circumstances.
II. For the Cleaning of Grain. -Mix the powder with the grain if the
mixing has not been sufficiently done previously; then pass it through
a smut mill once or several times at a speed of from 400 to 500 revolu-
_tions-a-minute-for-unsound-or damaged grain, and from 200 to 300
revolutions for other grain. Sound corn for grinding cleaned at a speed
of from 400 to 500 revolutions will only be all the better. For unsound
or damaged corn less opening should be left for the entrance of corn
into the cylinders of the smut machine to ensure a better operation.
The proportions vary according to the quality of the grain, the degree
of humidity, and its sound, unsound, or damaged state from 3½ ozs.
to 2 lbs. 3 ozs. per 2 bushels. Nota.-The proportions for the pre-
servation and cleaning may be exceeded without ill effect.
III. For the Preparation of Seed Grain.-Grain for sowing may be
prepared in two different ways:-
First method (the result of which is less certain than the succeeding
one). Proceed as for the cleaning with a smut mill at a speed of from
.200 to 300 revolutions a minute so as not to injure the germ. The
proportions of powder are the same as above, and all the various com-
positions of powder may be used in this case.
Second (and more efficacious) method. Dissolve the powder in cold,
lukewarm, hot, or boiling water, and employ the solution either luke-
.warm, hot, boiling, or cold by throwing it on the corn, and turning this
latter over until thoroughly impregnated with it. By using it hot, or
still better boiling, the success is more certain, especially in the case
of corn attacked with blight, caries, or smut.
The corn niay be used at once, but to ensure success it is preferable to
allow the solution to produce its chemical action and sow the corn dry.
For this purpose several days are allowed, the corn being turned over

page_text: once or more each day. The proportions to each 2 bushels of corn
are:-Water from 1 to 2 gallons, powder from 6 to 11 lbs. or
hereabout. Damaged corn having mostly an injured germ it should
not be used for sowing. For preparing seed grain the two methods may
be combined, beginning with the first.
In witness whereof, we, the said Charles Théodore Balonchard and
Louis Adolphe Dumars, have hereunto set our hands and seals,
this Tenth day of February, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and seventy.