IMPROVEMENTS IN PURIFYING COAL GAS
Year: 1860

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Thomas Richardson, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, for the
Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN PURIFYING COAL GAS."
Sealed the 28th December 1860, and dated the 3rd July 1860.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Thomas Richardson at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 3rd
July 1860.
I, THOMAS RICHARDSON, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, do hereby declare the
nature of the Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN PURIFYING COAL GAS," to be as
follows:-
The Invention has for its object improvements in purifying coal gas, and
consists in employing metallic iron in a fine state of division, moistened with
water either alone, or mixed with a porous material, lime, magnesia, or the
sulphates of these earths, in the ordinary gas purifiers.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Thomas Richardson in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
31st December 1860.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
RICHARDSON, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Third day of July in the year of our Lord One

page_text: thousand eight hundred and sixty, in the twenty-fourth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said
Thomas Richardson, Her special licence that I, the said Thomas Richardson,
my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said
Thomas Richardson, 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 PURIFYING COAL GAS," upon the condition (amongst others) that 1
I, the said Thomas Richardson, my executors or administrators by an
instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of their hands and seals,
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 Thomas Richardson, 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:-
These improvements consist in employing metallic iron in a fine state of
division moistened with water either alone, or mixed with a porous material,
lime, magnesia, or the sulphates of these earths in the ordinary gas purifiers.
To obtain the iron in a fine state of division I take cast iron cylinders
about three feet long, with a rim of about four inches thick, and a bore of
about one inch in diameter, and place them vis-a-vis, in a lathe. I then bring
the surfaces of the rims in contact, and grind the iron to powder, while the
cylinders are making 500 to 1000 revolutions per minute, or it may be
obtained from the old metal tubing, which has been used in pit shafts or old
metal from any other source of a similar character, which is sufficiently soft
to be reduced to powder by grinding, or it may be obtained by sifting the iron
produced in fitting shops, in the filing, turning, or boring operations, through
a sieve with about 1000 holes to the inch. I then moisten this finely divided
iron with water and place it on the trays of the ordinary dry lime purifiers,
where it is employed in the manner already in use when purifying coal gas by
means of the oxides of iron. Or I mix it with about three times its own bulk
of sawdust, charcoal powder, small coke or any other porous material, and
use the mixture as above described. Or I mix it with sifted slaked lime
or the lime and magnesia obtained by burning magnesian limestone, in the

page_text: proportion of 1 part of these earths, to 3 parts of the finely divided iron.
Or I mix 1 part of finely ground gypsum, or 1 part of rough Epsoms with
3 parts of the iron powder, and employ any of these mixtures as already
explained.
When the iron powder, or any of the above mixtures, has become impaired
in its purifying action by the saturation of the iron by sulphur, I submit it to a
strong red heat in a close furnace so as to drive off the impurity and the
residue is again fit for further use.
I claim the use of finely divided iron either alone' or mixed with any of the
substances described for purifying coal gas.
In witness whereof, I, the said Thomas Richardson, have hereunto
set my hand and seal this Twenty-Fourth day of December, in the
year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty.
Sigued, sealed, and delivered in the
presence of
WILL. CHATER, Sol",
Newcastle, Tyne.
THOMAS RICHARDSON. (L.s.)