IMPROVEMENTS IN BREWING AND IN BREWING APPARATUS
Year: 1852

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JOSHUA
CROCKFORD, of Southampton Place, in the County of Middlesex, Gentleman,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Eighth day of March,'
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-two, in the fifteenth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said Joshua Crockford, my exors, admors, and assigns, Her especial licence,
full power, sole privilege and authority, that I, the said Joshua Crockford,
my exors, admiors, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Joshua Crock-
ford, my exors, admors, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and
no others, from time to time and at all times during the term of years
therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend,
within England, Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention
of "IMPROVEMENTS IN BREWING AND IN BREWING APPARATUS;" in which said
Letters Patent is contained a proviso that I, the said Joshua Crockford, shall
cause a particular description of the nature of my said Invention, and in
what manner the same is to be performed, by an instrument in writing under
my hand and seal, to be inrolled in Her Majesty's High Court of Chancery
within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said
in part recited Letters Patent, as in and by the same, reference being thereunto
had, will more fully and at large appear.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Joshua Crockford, hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention,
and in what manner the same is to be performed, are fully described and
ascertained in and by the present Specification thereof, reference being had
to the Drawings hereunto annexed, that is to say:-
Firstly, my Invention has reference to the process of mashing and apparatns
employed therein, and consists in certain improved modes of construction and
manipulation, which have for their object to produce and keep up a constant
state of mechanical circulation among the particles of the liquor, whereby I am
enabled to obtain a considerable increase in the quantity of extract, and also to
ensure that the beer produced shall be of the best quality. A mash tun,
constructed according to this part of my Invention, is represented in the
Drawings annexed.
Figure 1 is a ground plan, and Figure 2 a sectional elevation on the
line a, b. A is an open circular vat, and B a perforated false bottom, beneath
which a coil of tubing C is laid, through which either steam, or hot water, or
hot air may be circulated. So far the apparatus is the same as the mash tun
in use, but, for the purpose of my Invention, the following additions and
modifications are made:-
. In the centre of the vat there is placed vertically a screw (of two, three, or
more blades) D, which is enclosed in a casing or well E, which is perforated
for about half its length downwards with numerous small holes, and communi-
cates at bottom through a circle of holes c, c, with the hollow space beneath
the false bottom of the vat. And on to this casing or well there is a collar K
fitted, which carries, radiating from it, a channelled and perforated dia-
phragm G, which fits exactly into the circular space between the exterior of
the well or casing and the inner periphery of the vat, yet not so exactly but
that the diaphragm G shall be at full liberty to be moved up and down on the
well or casing of the screw as on a spindle or guide rod, and so as to close more
or less the upper perforated portion. This diaphragm G is wholly separate
and distinct from the false bottom, and raised and lowered independently of it
by means of weighted chains and pulleys H, I.
The mode of manipulating with the apparatus, as thus improved, is as
follows: The grist is thrown into the tun in the usual way, and the chan-
nelled and perforated diaphragm G lowered to within a few inches of the grist
by means of the chains and pulleys H, I. The quantity of liquor required for
the brewing in hand is then taken over, at any temperature under one hundred
and sixty degrees Fahrenheit, and the steam, hot water, or hot air (whichever
is the heating medium employed), is then made to circulate through the

page_text: tubing coiled under the false bottom. The screw is now caused to revolve at
a considerable rapidity, which may be done either by hand, or by a strap
connected with a steam engine or other first mover. As the liquor becomes
heated it is forced by the rotation of the screw up through the superincumbent
grist, and through the holes in the perforated diaphragm G, from the surface
of which it is conducted by a number of converging channels e, e, into the well
or casing of the screw, whence it is once more spread over the coil of heating
pipes. And so the operation goes on unceasingly, until the mashing is com-
pleted; all fresh accessions of heat by the liquor being successively and equally
diffused or circulated throughout the entire mass. I have directed the liquor
to be taken over at any temperature under one hundred and sixty degrees
Fahrenheit, but, instead of this, it may be taken over quite cold, and its
temperature afterwards raised by. means of the steam, hot water, or hot air
tubes. I consider the means and apparatus which I have directed to be used
for keeping up continuous circulation of the heated liquor to be the best
adapted for general use, but any other equivalent mechanical means may be
substituted for them, as, for example, a common forcing-pump or fan-blower.
Secondly, my Invention has reference to the instrument employed for ascer-
taining the quantity of alcohol in wines, beers, ales, and cordialized spirits,
commonly known by the name of Field's Alcohol-meter. The principle on
which this instrument is constructed is, that the boiling point of every liquid
is dependent on the quantity of alcohol which it contains, entirely irrespective
of any other matters which may be combined therewith, and the practice in
using it is to ascertain that boiling point by immersing a thermometer
in an open boiler filled with the liquor to be tested. But this practice is open
to the objection that a portion, more or less, of the alcohol is sure to escapo
before the boiling point is reached. To obviate this source of error I add to
the boiler a condenser of any approved form, collect therein whatever portion
of the alcohol is exhaled previous to actual ebullition, and return it to the
sample of liquor under examination, to be included in the general estimate.
And having now described the nature of my said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, I declare that the improvements which I
claim as constituting and included in said Invention are as follows:-
First, I claim the causing, in the process of mashing, the fresh accessions of
heat to the liquor to be successively and equally circulated or diffused through-
out the entire mass, by the continuous application of mechanical force, as
herein-before exemplified and described.
Second, I claim the improved mash tun before described, in so far as respects
the employment therein, for the purpose of my Invention, of the screw (or