A NEW CONSTRUCTION OF A GRATE TO BE USED IN OR OUT OF A CHINNEY
Year: 1791

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, BENJAMIN
CHARLES COLLINS, of the City of Salisbury, in the County of Wilts, send
greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third, did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Eighteenth day of March, in the thirty-first year of his reign,
give and grant unto me, the said Benjamin Charles Collins, my executors,
administrators, and assigns, His especial licence, full power, sole privilege
and authority, that I, the said Benjamin Charles Collins, during the term of
years thereiu expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and
vend, within that part of the Kingdom of Great Britain called England, the
Dominion of Wales, and Town of Berwick upon Tweed, my Invention of a
"A NEW CONSTRUCTION OF A GRATE TO BE USED IN OR OUT OF A CHINNEY," in
which said Letters Patent there is contained a proviso obliging me, the said
Benjamin Charles Collins, under my hand and seal, to describe and ascertain
the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, by an instrument in writing under my hand and seal, and cause
the same to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery, within one
calendar month next and immediately after the date of the said recited Letters
Patent, as in and by the same, relation being thereunto had, may more fully and.
at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in pursuance of and compliance with the said
proviso, I, the said Benjamin Charles Collins, do hereby declare that the nature
of my said Invention, and the manner in which the same is to be performed,
is herein-after described and set forth, that is to say:-

page_text: The said Invention is calculated to encrease the action of air upon fire by
augmenting and inverting its passage through the same, whereby is combined
in an extream degree the nitre of atmospheric air with the sulphur of fuel, for
it is understood that nitre and sulphur produce the strongest fire known, and
that when the Invention is applied so that no air shall pass but through the
fire the strength thereof is augmented, so that it shows a perfect white heat;
and as the draught of air is necessarily very great, all or nearly all of the
unignited smoke is carried down into the fire and there consumed, instead
of passing off, as it would do in a common way; thus, 1 convert the smoke
into fire, and am also enabled to produce a fine clear fire from such refuse
fuel as other open fire grates will burn with difficulty only. The principles
which claim an exclusive right of under the Patent are these, of an air
flue or air flues, and a stop or stops, whereby I at pleasure encrease the
draught of air in that 'degree which 1 may require for a strong bright fire, or
indeed any degree of fire exceeding the strength of common fires; these flues
may be made of any size, or shape, upright, inclining, circular, or in any
other mode, so that the passage of air be not improperly impeded thereby; they
may also be made, of any metal, or of stone, brick, or of any other production
of nature or art, so that the same does not burn or consume; and they may be
affixed to the grated part of the grate or repositary for ignited matter, as they
may be made in any chimney or other place serving for the purpose of a
chimney for burning of fuel; the stops are applied to increase and, to regulate
the draught of air in whatever manner such increase or regulation may be
required, and may be made of any metal, stone, earth, or any other applicable
production of nature or art, and grates completed with these flues and stops are
perfectly applicable to the various uses of all sorts of rooms and places where
fire is required in dwelling-houses and other places or houses, and may be
made of any size or shape at the pleasure and discretion of the person wanting
them; they are no less applicable to lighthouses and other places requiring
a strong light, also for laboratories, brow-houses, smelting furnaces, glass-
houses, vinegar makers, and all and every persons requiring such fire as may
be hereby produced, and as the application of the said flue or flues and stop or
stops is most casy to every sort of grate when their principles are known, I
therefore proceed to the description how the same may be applied for the use
of rooms in dwelling houses, and it is thus:-I suppose that there is a room
having a fire-place three feet wide and four feet high, and twenty inches in
depth, from the front to the back; for this fire-place, I order a workman to
make what is denominated a grate front, being the same size in width and
heighth as the fire-place, leaving a proper space in the middle of the front for

page_text: the insertion of a receptacle of fuel intended to be burned therein, the same
receptacle as in common use and generally known by the name of the grateing
or grated part; this space I suppose to be twenty inches wide and three feet
four inches high, so that the left and right hand sides of the said front are eight
inches wide; the top part of the said front is also eight inches wide crossways;
to the inside inner edges of the left and right hand sides of the said front I
fix a flat check, that is, a flat cheek to each side front; this cheek. may .be
about half an inch thick; or more or less, and solid, excepting in those parts
where the air is to draw away after passing through the fire, and those parts
must be open according to the degree of draught wanted, and it is best that
they should be open from the hearth to within about three inches of the
bottom of the grating or receptacle holding the fire, as thereby the atmo-
spheric air must then descend through the burning fuel to ascend the flues;
these cheeks being fixed, I next fix two other cheeks within half an inch of the
inner outside edges of the aforesaid side fronts; the second cheeks should be
solid and about half an inch thick, more or less, and should be carried up
within an inch to the top of the said fronts; this done, I put a strong back,
made as other grate backs are, and of any materials preferred, extending in
heighth from the hearth to the top of the cheeks, and in width so as to receive
and connect or become as a strong back to both pair of cheeks above mentioned;
this done, I drill a hole in each left and right handed front, which are now
become the fronts of flues according to the principle of my Invention. I also
drill other holes in the back opposite to the hole in each front, whereby I may
insert in each front a spindle or rod, shewing a small handle or screw on the
outside for turning the same; after this I affix to each spindle a thin plate, as
an apt regulating stop to the inside of each flue, so that either or both may be
occasionally applied to the intent of regulating or stopping the draught of air
passing up the same, or if preferred, I apply an apt valve to each flue, regu-
lating the same by a leaver or screw; this done, I insert the grating or recep-
tacle, which, being of the same kind as in general use, I do not describe; this
grating being fixed at the usual distance from the hearth, I learn what space
remains open before the ash-pit; this space I close up either by a stop plate, by
sliding doors, or by any other mode preferred, for by such closing up the
common air is prevented passing up the said flues when a strong fire is wanted,
but this stop plate, sliding doors, or other mode preferred should be so applied
as to move easily and altogether or in part, for thereby the strength of the fire
will be the better regulated. Further, I apply, when preferred, a laying door
or flat plate after the manner of a common register, with a leaver or screw to
raise or depress the same at pleasure; further, where hearths are decayed or

page_text: layed upon timber, I apply a plate of metal or a stone, covering the whole
space for greater safety. Grates having these flues and stops may be made to
burn fuel out of a chimney in an equal degree as in one, by affixing to the
tops of them a canopy of metal or other production of art or nature to the
height of six feet, or more or less, with an aperture at the top of the said
canopy suitable to the discharge of the draught passing off from the flues
and fire..
In witness whereof, I, the said Benjamin Charles Collins, have hereunto
set my hand and scal, this Sixteenth day of April, in the thirty-first
year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord George the Third, by the grace 1
of God of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the
Faith, and so forth, and in the year of our Lord One thousand seven
hundred and ninety-one.
BENJAMIN CHARLES (L.B.) COLLINS.
Sealed and delivered by the within-
named Benjamin Charles Collins
(being first duly stampt) in the
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the same Sixteenth day of April, in the
year above mentioned, the aforesaid Benjamin Charles Collins came before our
Lord the King in His Chancery, and acknowledged the Specification aforesaid,
and all everything therein contained, in form above written. And also the
Specification aforesaid was stamped according to the tenor of the Statute in
that case made and provided.
Inrolled the same Sixteenth day of April, in the year above mentioned.