CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN SEPARATING THE FATTY AND OILY FROM THE MEMBRANOUS PORTIONS OF ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE SUB- STANCES
Year: 1844

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, ROBERT
MOLLETT, of Shacklewell, in the County of Middlesex, Gentleman, and JESSE
BRIDGMAN, of Hackney, in the County of Middlesex, Gentleman, send
greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Twenty-eighth day of March, in the seventh year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto us,
the said Robert Mollett and Jesse Bridgman, our exors, admors, and
assigns, Her especial licence, full power, sole privilege and authority, that we,
the said Robert Mollett and Jesse Bridgman, our exors, adiñors, and assigns,
and such others as we, the said Robert Mollett and Jesse Bridgman, our
exors, adiñors, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and no others, from
time to time and at all times thereafter, during the term of years therein
expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within
that part of Her Majesty's United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
called [England, Her Dominion of Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-
Tweed, our Invention of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN SEPARATING THE FATTY
AND OILY FROM THE MEMBRANOUS PORTIONS OF ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE SUB-
STANCES;" in which said Letters Patent there is contained a proviso that we,
the said Robert Mollett and Jesse Bridgman, shall cause a particular descrip-
tion of the nature of our said Invention, and in what manner the same is to
be performed, under our hands and seals, or under the hand and seal of one of
us, 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

page_text: Letters Patent, as in and by the same, reference being thereunto nad, will more
fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, we, the said
Robert Mollett and Jesse Bridgman, do hereby declare that the nature of the
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 :-
We first subject the animal or vegetable substance, the fatty or oily portions
of which are required to be separated from the membranous portions thereof, to
mechanical disruption and pressure by passing it through a machine of the
description represented in the said Drawings.
Figure 1 of these Drawings is a side elevation, and Figure 2 an end
elevation of this machine. A, A, is the standard or framework; B1, B2, is a
pair of sharp-toothed or narrow-grooved rollers, which are mounted in this
framework, and work one into the other, the barrel parts of these rollers
terminating at each end at a little distance from the bearings of their respec-
tive axles. C³, C2, is a similar pair of interlocking rollers, fixed below B', B2,
but with broader grooves, of the sort called U-grooves. Both of these pairs
of rollers are heated interiorly by steam introduced through channels in the
axles, or by any other suitable means. D is a driving wheel fixed on one end
of the axle of the roller B', by which motion is communicated from a steam
engine or any other first mover to the first pair of rollers B1, B2, whence it
is transmitted by means of the spur gear E, F, to the second pair of rollers
C¹, C². G is a hopper, by which the crude tallow or other substance is
supplied to the rollers; H, a vessel for the reception of the fatty or oily
portions which are expressed or separated from the others; and I, an inclined
screen on which the membranous parts of the substances fall after passing
between the lower pair of rollers, and by which they are carried off to the
outside of the machine. The fatty or oily matter, as it is squeezed out, flows
chiefly over the ends of the rollers, that is, over into the open spaces left
between the ends of the barrels of the rollers and their bearings, and thence
into the general receiver H. The membranous portions delivered by the
screen I, if not quite exhausted of fatty or oily matter, are passed a second
time through the machine, or through a pair of plain rollers mounted in a
separate framework, and heated by steam or otherwise. The plummer blocks
at each end of the rollers B', B, C, C, are provided with pinching screws, by
means of which their distance from each other can be varied according to the
coarseness or roughness of the materials to be operated upon. The fatty or oily
matter which collects on the receiver H is still further heated, by means of
steam pipes carried through the receiver (but not seen in the Drawings), till

page_text: it acquires such a degree of liquification that the whole or nearly the whole of
the grosser impurities still contained in it fall to the bottom. The supernatant
liquid is then carefully drawn off, and strained through some textile fabric,
such as flannel, cotton, or linen sheeting, haircloth, &c., after which it is finally
filtered through a bed of animal or vegetable charcoal (but preferring the former).
Should the purified fatty or oily product thus obtained exhibit any traces of the
charcoal it is again strained through some textile fabric as before. Instead of
passing the crude tallow or other substance through rollers, such as before
described, it may be passed between reciprocating flat plates of heated metal,
but we prefer the rollers as being more generally applicable and convenient.
And having now described the nature of the said Invention, and in what
manner the same is to be performed, we declare that we lay no claim to the
diffusing of heat by means of pipes through the substances operated upon, nor
to passing the same through textile fabrics, or through animal or vegetable
charcoal; but that what we claim is the separating of the fatty and oily from
the membranous portions of animal and vegetable substances by the combina-
tion of methods before specified; that is to say, by passing the same succes-
sively through grooved and heated rollers (or any suitable mechanical
equivalents), through vessels in which they are raised by heating pipes to a
melting temperature, through textile fabrics, and through animal or vegetable
charcoal, all as herein-before described, or by the combination of any two of
the said methods, the passing them through grooved and heated rollers, or
any suitable mechanical equivalents being one of such two methods.
In witness whereof, I, the said Jesse Bridgman, on behalf of myself
and the said Robert Mollett, have hereunto set my hand and seal,
this Twenty-seventh day of September, One thousand eight hundrod