IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF SUGAR, AND IN APPARATUS EMPLOYED THEREIN
Year: 1864

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Richard Archibald Brooman at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
.
21st September 1864.-A communication from abroad by Adolphe
Lequime, of Plagny, France.
I, RICHARD ARCHIBALD BROOMAN, of 166, Fleet Street, in the City of
London, Patent Agent, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for ." IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF SUGAR, AND IN APPARATUS EMPLOYED
THEREIN," to be as follows:-
This Invention is based upon the desiccation of beetroot and other vegetable
matters, and on the employment of alcohol to extract the sugar which they
contain. These two operations are well known, and the object of this Inven-
tion is to carry them on in a more efficient manner.
I perform the extraction of sugar from beetroot and other vegetable
matters, dried and reduced, in manner and under circumstances which allow,-
1st, of leaving no appreciable trace of sugar in the residual matters.
2nd, of obtaining the saccharine or sugary extract of such a density that
during its cooling it deposits spontaneously the greater part of the sugar
which it contains, and that in the form of sugar pure and colorless, or
nearly so.
3rd, of producing no sensible loss of alcohol, although I employ it at a
sufficiently high degree to obtain the coagulation of the mucilaginous matters,
and at a temperature approaching its boiling point.

page_text: 4th, of obtaining residual matters (which have been deprived only of
sugar, resinous matters, and a part of the salts originally contained in the
beetroot or other vegetable,) impregnated with very little water, but entirely
deprived of alcohol, and containing all the nutritious parts of the beetroot or
other vegetable.
To carry out this Invention I employ an apparatus constructed in such
manner that it is very easy to keep up constantly in interior thereof a
temperature sufficiently-high-to allow-alcohol-to-enter-and-leave-the-apparatus,
and that the apparatus may be hermetically closed during the whole time the
operation is being carried on, so as to render loss of alcohol impossible, either
by contact with the air or by partial evaporation.
The alcohol is heated by preference in a copper vessel fitted with brass
tubes, and the mother liquors are heated in a similar vessel. I arrange any
convenient number of extracting vessels, and enclose them in a wooden or
metal case or jacket; these vessels have bottoms and covers provided with
stuffing boxes; a vertical shaft furnished with a fly wheel passes. through
each, and carries inside the vessel a mixer or agitator and a brush. The
extracting vessels are also provided with man-holes and metal cloth, and are
each fitted with a four-way cock for the entrance into and exit from the
vessel as required of alcohol, saccharine extract, and mother liquors. I also
fit to the exit side of the vessels indicating apparatuses or gauges, for showing
the levels of liquid in the vessels. Pipes lead from the alcohol heating vessel
and the mother liquor heating vessel to the four-way cocks, and other pipes
from the four-way cocks to the bottom of the extracting vessels, and others
again from the extracting vessels to draw off the liquids when required; there
is also a pipe leading from the top of each extracting vessel to the four-way
cocks, and another pipe from the top of each extracting vessel, for carrying
off the evaporated liquid, if required, to any convenient receptacle.
The advantages obtained from the mode of operating above described are,-
1st, the production at one operation in a pure and white state of 70 or 80
per cent. of the sugar originally contained in the beetroot, and consequently
without having recourse_to_filtration by animal charcoal, and to baking or
boiling, having only to submit to these operations about 4th of the sugary
matter.
2nd, the reduction to the minimum of the quantity of molasses, that is to
say, of the syrup rendered uncrystallizable by the presence of a small quantity
of salts of a solubility in alcohol equal to that of sugar, and consequently
extracted simultaneously with the sugar.

page_text: 3rd, the obtaining of residual matters, which contain besides a large
portion of the salts, all the nutritious parts of the beetroot or other vegetable
matter, and consequently of much greater value than the residual matters
obtained by the processes hitherto followed, by which nearly all the muci-
laginous matters are lost.