AN IMPROVEMENT OR IMPROVEMENTS UPON BOILERS FOR GENERATING STEAM, OR HEATING WATER OR OTHER FLUIDS, FOR USEFUL PURPOSES
Year: 1835

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JOEL
SPILLER, of Battersea, in the County of Surrey, Engineer, send greeting.
WHEREAS His present Majesty King Williain the Fourth, by His Letters
Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Twenty-fourth day of September
now last past, did give and grant unto me, the said Joel Spiller, His especial
licence, full power, sole privilege and authority, that I, the said Joel Spiller,
my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Joel
Spiller, my executors, administrators, 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 England, Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my
Invention of "AN IMPROVEMENT OR IMPROVEMENTS UPON BOILERS FOR GENERATING
STEAM, OR HEATING WATER OR OTHER FLUIDS, FOR USEFUL PURPOSES;" in which
said Letters Patent there is contained a proviso obliging me, the said Joel
Spiller, by an instrument in writing under my hand and seal, particularly to
describe and ascertain the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, and to cause the same to be inrolled in His said
Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six calendar months next and
immediately after the date of the said recited Letters Patent, as in and by
the same, reference being thereunto had, will more fully appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Joel Spiller, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention, and the

page_text: manner in which the same is to be performed, are fully described and ascer-
tained by the following description thereof, reference at the same time being
had to the annexed Drawings, that is to say :-
I construct in the interior of each boiler an internal cavity or chamber
(which I shall herein-after call the tube chamber), to the upper part of which
chamber I attach the chimney or egress flue (for the smoke), which may pass
out of the boiler through the top, or in any other convenient direction. Within
and near the bottom of this cavity or tube chamber I place the furnace or fire
bars in the usual manner, and at a suitable height or distance above and over
the said fire or furnace bars I place a number of straight or nearly straight
tubes or pipes across the said tube chamber, and I insert the ends of the said
tubes or pipes into the opposite sides of the said tube chamber, so that both
ends of all the said tubes or pipes being made to pass through the opposite
sides of the said tube chamber, are open to and communicate with the whole
body of water contained within the external casing of the said boiler.
I place
the said tubes or pipes in several rows, one row above another row, leaving
sufficient spaces between all the said tubes or pipes and rows for the free passage
of the flame or heated air from the fire, and I insert as many of the said rows
of tubes or pipes, one above the other, as I find requisite to absorb the heat
that is generated by the combustion of the fuel employed; and I insert all the
aforesaid tubes or pipes, so that as many of them as form one of the said
rows shall be parallel to each other, and in the same plane or nearly so, and
that all the rows thereof shall lie in inclined planes parallel to each other, and
one above another, and so as that the axes of all the said tubes or pipes shall
lie in an inclined position, or at an angle with the horizon. By the inclination
of the said tubes or pipes a very rapid and constant circulation of the water
through them is produced, so long as the fire is kept properly burning, for the
great buoyancy of the steam causes it to ascend to the higher end of the said
tubes or pipes, and to draw after it a constant and copious supply of water
from the lower ends of the said tubes or pipes, whereby the heat is as quickly and
as continuously absorbed by the water as the said heat is transmitted from the
external to the internal surfaces of the said tubes or pipes, which will more
clearly appear on reference to the annexed Drawings, viz-Fig. 1 is a
vertical section of a circular boiler through the line S, S, (see Fig. 2); Fig. 2
is a front elevation of the boiler, without the door (J, J, Fig. 1); Fig. 3, a
side elevation of the boiler; Fig. 4, a section of the boiler through the line
T, T, Fig. 1; Fig. 5, a section of the boiler through the line U, U, Fig. 1;
Fig. 6, a plan of the boiler A, A, A, A, outside of boiler or casing; B, B, plate
forming bottom of casing and top of ash-pit or air chest; C, C, air chest or

page_text: ash-pit; D, air or ash-pit door; E, E, E, furnace and tube chamber, which is
united to the side of the casing by the mouth branch F, the chimney I, I,
and bottom plato B, B; G, G, furnace or fire bars; H, H, top of tube
chamber; I, I, flue pipe or chimney; J, J, door or man-hole for the facility
of cleaning the inclined tubes or pipes; K, K, mouth piece or furnace door;
L, L, L, inclined tubes or pipes, the ends of which are shewn in Fig. 2, where
the boiler is represented with the door or man-hole taken off'; M, dashing
plate or disc to prevent the water being carried up with the steam; N, N,
plates covering openings for removing the deposit from the water, as shewn,
Figs. 2 and 3; O, the pipe conducting the air from the blower to the air chest.
The dimensions of every part of the said boiler may be ascertained with suffi-
cient accuracy for any practical purpose by the scale on the Drawings. Fig. 7
represents a sectional elevation of my said improved boiler applied to an
ordinarily constructed furnace and chimney of brickwork; Fig. 8 is a plan of
the same, taken at O, O, (Fig. 7.)
The foregoing Drawings exhibit the construction of my said improved
boiler so distinctly that any persons accustomed to such work will easily com-
prehend the same. The steam, exit, and water supply pipes are not shewn, as
no deviation from the ordinary mode of constructing and applying these parts
are required for my improved boiler.
I may, however, add that I adopt
the ordinary and well-known means of putting the various parts of the said
boiler together, and which I make of the usual thickness of either plate iron
or copper, as the case may be. I fasten the tubes or pipes into the ends or
sides of the tube chamber by collars on the inside and screwed rings on the
outside thereof, or by any of the ordinary and appropriate means for effecting
a steam-tight joint. I also incline the two sides or ends of the said tube
chamber into which the said tubes or pipes are inserted so as to meet the
direction of the said tubes or pipes at right angles for the better convenience
of fastening the same, as shewn at Fig. 1, for the purpose of more effectually
absorbing the heat. I prefer (in all ordinary cases) increasing the number
of pipes or tubes rather than greatly to extend their angles with the horizon,
so that the inclination of the sides or ends of the tube chamber from the
vertical line may be as little as possible; and, in cases where it may be required,
I strengthen the sides of the said tube chamber by introducing cross ties
between the inside of the said boiler and the exterior of the said tube chamber,
or by fixing several ribs of angle iron across the sides of the said tube chamber
within the boiler, except the sides, into which the ends of the said tubes or
pipes are inserted, and which are thereby sufficiently strengthened against the
force of the steam. For marine engines and certain localities, where it is not

page_text: convenient to adapt a chimney of sufficient height, I apply to the ash-pit
(which I in such cases use as an air chest) a blower or wind fan, or other
ordinary means of urging the fire to the required temperature. I also state
that by several experiments with a circular boiler of the construction described
in the annexed Drawings (Figs. 1 to 6), and of the under-written dimensions,
I have obtained, as the average result per hour of the same, the evaporation
or conversion into steam of four hundred and fifty pounds weight of water
with fifty pounds weight of common gas coke, the air being supplied to the fire
by means of a blower or wind fan eighteen inches diameter and four inches
wide, making about seven hundred revolutions per minute. The dimensions
of the said experimental boiler herein above referred to are as follows; viz*,
diameter two feet six inches, height five feet, the tube chamber seventeen
inches square, the tubes or pipes, sixty in number, of one inch internal
diameter and seventeen inches long, the area of the furnace bars being also
seventeen inches square.
And, lastly, I do hereby declare that I do not claim the several parts
herein-before described as constituting a complete boiler in their separate
and individual character as forming my said Invention; but I do claim
the peculiar manner of constructing the interior part thereof, namely, the
said tube chamber and the inclined tubes or pipes above or beyond the
fire or furnace bars, which I have shewn in the said Drawings and
described in the reference to the same, where such said tube chamber and
such inclined tubes or pipes shall be used in combination with each other,
and enclosed in an external casing or general reservoir for containing the
requisite quantity of water and steam in such a manner as that the whole
body of the water in the said boiler shall have access to both ends of all the
said inclined tubes or pipes, and produce, by the angle of position of the said
tubes or pipes with the horizon (when the fire is applied), a circulation of the
water; and although I have described one precise form of constructing this
part of a boiler, which I claim as my Invention, and have also delineated the
angle between the horizon and the line of direction in which the axes of the said
tubes or pipes lie, which said form and construction I have found to answer
very well, and which said delineated angle I have found to cause a sufficiently
rapid circulation of the water through the said pipes or tubes, yet, as it is
evident that a variation in the form and dimensions in the said tube chamber,
and also in the angle, dimensions, and direction of the said pipes or tubes,
may be made in particular cases of the application of this my Invention, I
do not confine myself in the construction of these my improvements on boilers
to the precise form or position of the tube chamber, nor to the particular

page_text: ngle or direction of the said pipes or tubes herein-before set forth, so that
e form of the said tube chamber be such as that both ends of all the said
abes or pipes be inserted into the opposite sides of the said tube chamber,
assing continuously through the said tube chamber, and so that all the said
ubes or pipes be inclined at an angle with the horizon sufficient to produce
he required circulation.
In witness whereof, I, the said Joel Spiller, have hereunto set my hand
and seal, this Twenty-sixth day of November, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and thirty-five.