IMPROVE- MENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF FATTY AND OILY Acros
Year: 1855

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Charles Humfrey the younger, of No: 14, Terrace,
Camberwell, in the County of Surrey, for the Invention of "IMPROVE-
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION. left. by the said Charles Humfrey at the
Office of the. Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 27th
August 1855..
I, CHARLES HUMFREY the younger, of No. 14, Terrace, Camberwell, in the
County of Surrey, do hereby declare the nature of my Invention for "IMPROVE-
MENTS IN THE MANUFACTURE OF FATTY AND OILY Acros" to be as follows:-
The object of my Invention is to obtain from palm oil (a highly coloured
substance) fatty and oily acids nearly colourless.
This object has hitherto been obtained by the well-known processes of
acidification and distillation, whereby fatty and oily acids of good colour are
obtained, but with considerable loss in quantity, and by the use of expensive
apparatus; while by my process, herein-after described, the resulting fatty and
oily acids are obtained with no more loss in weight than that due to the loss
of the glycerine, and the whole operation is simple and economical, and the.
products hardened as well as bleached.,
I obtain these results by the following processes :-I take (say) one hundred
hundredweights of palm oil, and boil it by free steam in a vat, such as is used
in the ordinary process of stearine making; to the proper quantity of slacked
lime to saponify this quantity of palm oil, I add and well mix about five
hundredweights of chloride of lime (the precise quantity depends on the

page_text: quality of the palm oil), and having made this mixed hydrate and chloride of
lime into a thin cream with water, I add them to the melted palm oil.
Into the boiler which supplies steam to this vat I introduce a perforated
pipe, terminating below the surface of the water, and by means of an air pump
force in considerable quantities of air. At the begining of the operation
but little steam need be employed, but a full blast of air, and as the combina-
tion of the lime and the oil proceeds, and the charge becomes pasty, the
current of air may be diminished and the steam increased, and as soon as
the mass becomes stiff the air blast may be altogether discontinued, and the
saponification completed by free steam alone.
If the above operation be conducted carefully the "rock" will be of a very
light colour, and if decomposed would yield fatty and oily acids of a pale
yellow colour, and by pressing these white stearic acid can be obtained.
But in order to obtain fatty and oily acids nearly white without pressing, I
further bleach the rock by the following process:-It must be first reduced
to a fine powder, which is easily effected by a mill; a mill of the con-
struction of a common coffee mill answers the purpose perfectly, but the
finer the powder the better. It is then to be transferred into the bleaching
vat and mixed with water, and made to boil and kept boiling by free steam
mixed with a full blast of air. This alone will greatly bleach the rock;
but that result is best obtained by using, during this bleaching boil, from
one to two hundredweights of chloride of lime, adding it. mixed with water
by small quantities at a time. This bleaching operation is quickly performed
if the rock be in fine powder, and will render it as white as bleached yarn.
Nothing more is required than to decompose this bleached rock with dilute
sulphuric acid by the usual process, and the resulting fatty and oily acids will
be both white and hard. It is of course requisite to refine them, by re-boiling
them with very dilute sulphuric acid, and they will then be fit for use.
I have described my process as applied to palm oil, and it may be advan-
tageously applied to other fats and oils.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Charles Humfrey in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
27th February 1856.
ΤΟ
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, CHARLES
HUMFREY the younger, of No. 14, Terrace, Camberwell, in the County of 3
Surrey, send greeting.

page_text: WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-seventh day of August, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-five, in the nineteenth year of Her
reign, did, for 'Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said Charles Humfrey, Her special licence that I, the said Charles Humfrey,
my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Charles
Humfrey, my executors, administrators; and assigns, should at any time agree
with, and no others, from time to time and at all times thereafter during the
term therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and
vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel
Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE MANUFAC-
TURE OF FATTY AND OILY ACIDS," upon the condition (amongst others) that I,
the said Charles Humfrey, my executors or administrators, by an instrument
in writing under my, or their, or one of their hands and seals, should parti-
cularly describe and ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in what
manner the same was to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the
Great Seal Patent Office within six calendar months next and immediately
after the date of the said Letters Patent.
.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Charles Humfrey, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement theroof, that is to say:
The object of my said Invention is to obtain from palm oil, which is a
highly colored substance, fatty and oily acids nearly colourless. This object
has hitherto been obtained by the well-known processes of acidification and
distillation, whereby fatty and oily acids of good color are obtained, but with
considerable loss in quantity, and by the use of expensive apparatus; while by
my process, herein-after described, the resulting fatty and oily acids are obtained
with scarcely more loss in weight than that due to the loss of the glycerine,
and the whole operation is simple and economical, and the products hardened
as well as bleached. In order to explain my said Invention as completely as
possible, I now proceed to describe the processes practised by me of manu-
facturing fatty and oily acids, which processes have been found, to answer well
for effecting the objects of my said Invention.
PROCESS OF MANUFACTURE.
I introduce, say, 100 cwt. of palm oil and about 2,000 gallons of water into a
wooden saponifying vat; I conduct the steam from an ordinary steam boiler
into an intermediate vessel, made of iron or other suitable material, which

page_text: vessel I call the condenser. Into this same condenser I force atmospheric air
by means of an ordinary condensing air pump; the pipes employed for supply-
ing steam and air are furnished with stop-cocks, to enable me to regulate the
quantities admitted. On the top of the condenser I place a safety valve, and
also a stuffing box, through which passes a thermometer for ascertaining the
temperature. The condenser is also provided with draw-off cocks to discharge
the condensed water. The air pump is now put into motion, and the-steam
admitted into the condenser in sufficient quantity to raise the temperature of
the mixed air and steam to 150° Fahrenheit, and the two together are forced
through the charge in the saponifying vat by means of a coil of pipe perforated
with holes placed at the bottom thereof, and I thus raise the temperature of
the palm oil and water to the temperature of the air and steam, or thereabouts.
I take about 5 cwt. of lime, which I slack and make into a cream with about
300 gallons of water, and add it to the palm oil; I also take about 4 cwt. of
chloride of lime mixed with about 100 gallons of water, and add that also
to the palm oil. The mixed air and steam produce very violent agitation, and
the process is continued about three hours, during which time I add about
4 cwt. more of chloride of lime; I then add about 9 cwt. more lime made
into a cream as before with about 500 gallons of water, and raise the tempe-
rature in the condenser by admitting more steam to 170° Fahrenheit: The
process is continued for about 5 hours, during which time I gradually raise
the temperature in the condenser to 200° Fahrenheit. The saponifying vat
is then covered close, and allowed to stand till the following day, when the
water is run off by a plug hole at the bottom of the vat. The times, quanti-
ties, and temperatures above specified may be a little varied, but if the heat
much exceeds that above mentioned there will be great risk of injuring the
color of the product. The rock obtained as above may be further bleached by
the following process:-It must be first reduced to a fine powder; this is easily
done by a mill like a coffee mill, or by a pair of millstones, similar to those
used for grinding wheat. The ground rock is mixed with about twice its bulk
of water, and put into a wooden vat, with a coil of perforated pipe on the
bottom. A blast of air and steam at about 200° Fahrenheit is passed through
the mixture, and as soon as the heat of the charge is about 180° Fahrenheit
I add about two pounds of chloride of lime for every one hundredweight of
palm oil. The process will be complete in about an hour, and care should be
taken that the temperature does not at any time exceed 200° Fahrenheit. In
decomposing, commonly called separating, the fatty acids from the rock, I
proceed as follows:-If I operate on the rock as produced by the first process,
pass it between rollers to break it up into small pieces (the bleached rock is
I

page_text: of course sufficiently fine); I use a wooden vessel, and about 2 pounds of
ordinary brown sulphuric acid to every pound of lime employed, and a suffi-
cient quantity of water I force through it, the mixed blast of air and steam
producing a very violent agitation, and take care that the temperature in the
condenser does not exceed 200° Fahrenheit, or thereabouts. The separated
fatty acids thus obtained must of course be refined, by boiling them with very
dilute sulphuric acid, and they will then be fit for use. In all these processes
of saponifying, bleaching, and separating, I find it essential to keep down
the temperature; for if steam alone is used, or so much steam as to raise the
thermometer in the condenser to the boiling point of water, the resulting
fatty and oily acids are more or less. injured in color. I have described my
process as applied to palm oil, and it may be advantageously applied to many
other fats and oils. I have also described the saponifying as effected by lime,
and the bleaching by chloride of lime, and I believe them to be the best; but,
as is well known, fats and oils can be saponified by alkalies and other alkaline
earths, and bleached by other chlorides. By pressing these products, hard
stearic acid can be obtained, fitted in all respects for the manufacture of
candles; the liquid portion or the oleic acid can advantageously be applied to
the manufacture of soap, for burning in lamps, and for dressing wool.
Having now described the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, I hereby declare that what I claim as the
Invention intended to be secured by the said Letters Patent is, the manufac-
ture of fatty and oily acids as above described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Charles Humfrey the younger, have
hereunto set my hand and seal, this Twenty-seventh day of February,
in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six.
Witness,
CHARLES HUMFREY THE YOUNGER.
(L.s.)
ALEX PRINCE, Patent Agent,
4, Trafalgar Square, Charing Cross.