IMPROVEMENTS IN TREATING WASTE RAILS, TYRES, INGOTS, CROP ENDS OF RAILS, AND OTHER SCRAP OF BESSEMER
Year: 1869

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to James Cartmell Ridley, of Newcastle-upon-Tyne,
Engineer, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN TREATING WASTE
RAILS, TYRES, INGOTS, CROP ENDS OF RAILS, AND OTHER SCRAP OF BESSEMER
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION filed by the said James Cartmell Ridley
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition
and Declaration, on the 22nd April 1869, pursuant to the 9th Section
of the Patent Law Amendment Act, 1852.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JAMES
CARTMELL RIDLEY, of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Engineer, send greeting.
WHEREAS, I am in possession of an Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS FOR
TREATING WASTE RAILS, TYRES, INGOTS, CROP ENDS OF RAILS, AND OTHER
SCRAP OF BESSEMER AND SIMILAR STEEL IN ORDER TO UTILIZE THEM," and
have petitioned Her Majesty to grant unto me, my executors, adminis-
trators, and assigns, Her Royal Letters Patent for the same, and have
made solemn Declaration that I am the first and true Inventor
thereof.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said James Cartmell Ridley, do hereby
declare that the following Complete Specification, under my hand and

page_text: seal, fully describes and ascertains the nature of the said Invention, and
in what manner the same is to be performed, in and by the following
statement thereof, that is to say:-
I take crop ends of Bessemer or other similar steel rails, imperfect
ingots, tyres, or any scrap of Bessemer steel, or waste steel of a similar
nature to that known as Bessemer's steel. I propose in the case of rail
ends to take them as they are cut at the rolling, heat and roll them into
a flat bar or other convenient form for piling. I then take the pieces
and cut them into suitable lengths for piling, according to the nature of
the required finished article, whether for plates, bars, angles, or other
forms. I pile as closely as possible the pieces upon a slab of wrought
iron either formed of a plate or bar (whether puddled, scrap, or other
iron or steel), and cover them with another slab of the same or a similar
material. Sometimes I fill the spaces between the pieces forming the
pile with powdered or reduced glass or pure silicious sand, or I sprinkle
each layer of the pieces forming the pile with the glass or sand previous to
placing the top slab on. The piles so formed are heated in an ordinary
iron or steel heating furnace and then manipulated between suitable
rolls or under hammers in order to weld the entire mass. The glass or
sand serves as a flux for the oxide of iron on the surfaces of the steel or
iron within the pile. The silicate of iron formed is expelled during the
treatment it undergoes in the rolls or under the hammer and brings the
clean metallic surfaces of the pile into contact, so that a weld is effected.
When properly heated the iron slabs forming the top and bottom of the
pile became more carburized by the partial decarburization of the steel
in immediate contact. In making piles for angles, bars, and other forms,
I prefer to form a box pile, that is to say, I place slabs at the sides of
the piles as well as at the top and bottom.
In witness whereof, I, the said James Cartmell Ridley, have here-
unto set my hand and seal, this Twenty-first day of April, in the
year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-nine.
J. CARTMELL RIDLEY. (L.S.)