APPARATUS FOR EFFECTING THE TURNING OF MALT OR OTHER GRAIN ON THE DRYING FLOORS OF KILNS
Year: 1885

page_text: COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
We ROBERT COOPER SINCLAIR of 3 Adelaide Place in the City of London
Brewers Engineer and JOHN HODSON of Clarence Street Brewery Burton on Trent
in the County of Stafford Brewers Manager do hereby declare the nature of our
invention for "APPARATUS FOR EFFECTING THE TURNING OF MALT OR OTHER
GRAIN ON THE DRYING FLOORS OF KILNS and in what manner the same is to be
performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement:
The object of this Invention is to provide apparatus by which the necessity for
hand labor in turning malt or other grain on the drying floors of Kilns is obviated-
According to this Invention we provide shafts which are furnished with a rake or
rakes or scoop or scoops or both and which are rotated by any suitable gearing so
that the rakes and scoops or both disintegrate loosen and turn over the germinated
grain-At the rear of each rake or scoop or in such a position that it will follow
the action of the same is placed a brush or sweeper made of any suitable materials
preferably metal which removes any grain or malt dust which is so close to the
floor of the kiln as not to be taken up removed or acted upon by the scoops or
rakes. In kilns with square drying floors we may conveniently arrange the rakes
and scoops alternately, upon the revolving shaft, and cause it to travel backwards
and forwards by traversing and reversing gear such as is used for example in
planing machines or any other suitable mode-Where the apparatus is applied to
kilns with circular drying floors we may conveniently provide two shafts arranged
in the line of a diameter of the floor, that shaft at one side of the centre being pro.
vided with scoops and brushes alternately, and the shaft at the other side of the
centre being provided with rakes only, or with rakes and brushes, and the rate of
action of the rakes may be greater than (say double) that of the combined action
of the scoops and brushes. The centre or vertical driving shaft revolves and
imparts the travelling and revolving motion to the horizontal shafts, thus causing
the action of the scoops rakes and brushes.
This Invention is applicable to kilns with either single or double drying floors.
And in order that our Invention may be fully understood we shall now proceed
more particularly to describe the same and for that purpose shall refer to the
several figures on the annexed sheets of drawings the same letters of reference
indicating corresponding parts in all the figures.
Figure 1 is a sectional plan of a round drying floor to which our Invention' is
applied and figure 2 is a sectional elevation of same.

page_text: Figures 3 and 4 are corresponding views of a square or rectangular drying floor
Figures 5 to 9 are transverse sections of the fevolving shafts shewing various
arrangements of the rakes scoops and brushes-Figures 5 and 7 being shewn in per-
spective to better illustrate the said scoops rakes and brushes. Referring to figures
1 and 2, upon the vertical axis A two radial arms or shafts B are carried, one arm
or shaft being provided with scoops C alternating with rakes D as shewn in
Figure 5, and the other arm or shaft being provided with rakes D only as shewn
in Figure 7.
The outer ends of the arms or shafts B are provided with toothed wheels or
runners b gearing with or running upon the ring or rack 62 supported at the outer
circumference of the floor-At the inner ends of the shafts B are toothed wheels b³
gearing with a wheel a on the axis A, which in turn is rotated by the gear a³ driven
from any available source of power. We do not limit ourselves to any particular
arrangement of the scoops brushes and rakes upon the shafts-For example the
arrangement of alternate rakes and scoops may be used on both shafts B if desired
Or the rakes only may be on one shaft as in Figure 7 and scoops only (in either
case however with the brushes hereinafter described) on the other shaft or any
other suitable arrangement may be employed the object being that the rakes shall
disintegrate the grain the scoops follow and turn it over and the brushes follow the
scoops and turn over the grain or malt dust nearest to the floor which has escaped
the action of the rakes and scoops The brushes are shewn at E at the rear of the
scoops C and rakes D the outer edges of the said brushes being at a slightly greater
distance from the centre of the shafts than are the edges of the scoops or rakes so
as to sweep the kiln tiles, the scoops or rakes being fixed at a sufficient distance
from the kiln tiles to prevent breakage or injury to the floor or machinery In the
arrangement for square floors shewn in figures 3 and 4 the shaft is traversed to and
fro by mechanism which may be conveniently like that used in planing machines-
In other respects the operation upon the grain resembles that described with regard
to the circular kilns and like parts are marked with like letters of reference but
the scoops should be arranged in duplicate presented in different directions as
shewn in figure 6 so that the grain is lifted by one set of scoops when the shaft is
traversed in one direction and by the other set of scoops when the shaft is traversed
in the reverse direction.
Figures 8 and 9 illustrate an arrangement in which the rakes are made double
so that by using the hand wheel the one part of the rakes can be moved over the
other part so as to cover the spaces between the prongs of the said rakes and thus
constitute or convert them into scoops.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of our said
Invention and in what manner the same is to be performed we declare that what
we claim is
In combination with the drying floors of kilns, a shaft or shafts carrying a rake
or rakes or scoop or scoops or both together with brushes all arranged and operating
substantially as and for the purpose hereinbefore described with reference to the
accompanying drawings.