IMPROVEMENTS IN MEANS OF EVACUATING CONDENSERS OF STEAM ENGINES, AND APPARATUS THEREFOR, PART OF WHICH IS APPLICABLE TO THE PURPOSE OF GASs EXHAUSTING
Year: 1872

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Henry Davey at the Office of the
Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 30th October
1872.
I, HENRY DAVEY, Engineer, of Tanfield Street, Leeds, in the County
of York, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for
"IMPROVEMENTS IN MEANS OF EVACUATING CONDENSERS OF STEAM ENGINES, AND
APPARATUS THEREFOR, PART OF WHICH IS APPLICABLE TO THE PURPOSE OF GASs
EXHAUSTING," to be as follows:-
:-
This Invention relates to means of removing the air and the water of
condensation and injection from the condensers of steam engines, which
Invention is in part applicable to the purpose of exhausting or partially
exhausting gas from one vessel and passing it into another. I work the
air pump of a steam engine by a water or hydraulic engine, the action
of which may be similar to that of the pumping engine described in the
Specification of a Patent granted to me, dated the 1st February 1871,
No. 277. The water discharged from the hydraulic engine may be
employed for condensation either by injection or by circulation in a
surface condenser. The air pump so worked may be employed to
withdraw the air alone from the condenser, the water being drained off

page_text: by a waste pipe of sufficient height to overbalance the atmospheric
pressure, or it may be employed to withdraw the air and water together
in the usual way.
For other than pumping engines, or in cases where there is no
available pressure of water sufficient to work the air pump, I employ an
engine for that purpose constructed in a manner similar to that described
in the Specification of the Patent granted to me on the 1st February
1871, No. 277, but worked by steam instead of water, the exhaust steam-
thereof passing into the main condenser.
I also utilise water pressure for evacuating the condensers of steam
engines in the following manner :-I provide a turbine which has on it a
set of blades or channels whereby when it is made to revolve it acts as
a pump; I drive the turbine by water, arranging it in connection with
the condenser so that the water which has driven it comes in contact
with the steam and condenses it, while its blades or channels rotating act
as a pump to withdraw the water and air from the condenser. This
part of the Invention is also applicable as a gas exhauster for withdraw-
ing gas from one vessel, such as a retort, and passing it into another.
For this purpose the gas pipe is at some convenient part of its length
expanded into a cavity in which a turbine pump, such as is described
above, is made to work; from the side or upper part of this cavity a
pipe leads off the gas drawn into the cavity by the action of the turbine
pump, while a pipe at the lower side of the cavity drains off the water
which has worked the turbine. This pipe is of such length, and its
discharge end is immersed in water to such depth, that there is a
sufficient column inside or outside the pipe to render the action of the
exhauster independent of the atmospheric pressure. It will be seen
that the water discharged from the turbine being dispersed through the
gas in the cavity to a certain extent will cool and purify the gas drawn
from the retorts.
For 'the condenser of a pumping engine I provide a vessel which bas
at its bottom openings fitted with valves opening outwards, and into the
upper part of which the exhaust steam flows from the cylinder. This
condensing vessel communicates with the water pump by an injection
pipe, which in the the case of a double acting pump has branches to both
ends provided with check valves, so that water can flow from the pump
to the condenser, but not in the opposite direction. When the piston of
the engine is at the end of its stroke, the pump being then inactive, no

page_text: water flows from it to the condenser, and the exhaust steam from the
cylinder entering the condenser expels the air and water from it. When
the piston begins to move, the pump being thereby put in action, sends
a jet of water into the condenser whereby the exhaust steam is
condensed and a partial vacuum is formed, the valves at the bottom of
the condenser closing against access of air from without.