IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS BURNERS
Year: 1852

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, WALTER
RICARDO, of the Firm of A. & W. Ricardo, of the City of London, Share
Brokers, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Fourteenth day of
October, One thousand eight hundred and fifty-two, in the sixteenth year of
Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto
me, the said Walter Ricardo, my exors, adñors, and assigns, Her especial
licence, full power, sole privilege and authority, that I, the said Walter
Ricardo, my exors, admors, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Walter
Ricardo, my exors, admors, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and no
others, from time to time and at all times 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, the Invention of
"IMPROVEMENTS IN GAS BURNERS," communicated to me by a Foreigner residing
abroad; in which said Letters Patent is contained a proviso that I, the said
Walter Ricardo, shall cause a particular description of the nature of the said
Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, by an instrument
in writing under my hand and seal, to be inrolled in Her said Majesty's

page_text: High Court of Chancery within six calendar months next and immediately
after the date of the said in part recited Letters Patent, as in and by the
same, reference being thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Walter Ricardo, hereby declare that the nature of the said Invention, and
in what manner the same is to be performed, are fully described and ascer-
tained in and by the present Specification thereof, reference being had to the
Drawings hereunto annexed, that is to say:-
Whereas there is at present in common use a gas burner (called a bat's-
wing burner) which has a single slit through which the gas issues in a flat
stream or sheet. And also another kind of burner (called a fish-tail or union
jet burner) which has two small orifices, through which the gas issues in two
diverging jets or thread-like streams. Now, my improvements consist in
forming gas burners with two or more slits, through which the gas issues in
two. or more flat streams or sheets. These slits may be either parallel, when
the issuing streams of gas will also be parallel, or they may be inclined to
each other at any such angle or angles that the streams of gas issuing through
them may converge and meet together. In either case the gas. when ignited
produces a single flame, from which more light is evolved in proportion to the
gas consumed than is obtained from bat's-wing or fish-tail burners of the
ordinary construction. The Drawings annexed represent the improved burners
constructed according to the said Invention.
Figure 1 represents an external elevation, and Figure 2 a section of a
burner with two parallel slits A, B. Figure 3 represents an external
elevation of a burner having three such parallel slits A, B, C. The streams
of gas are in each of these cases parallel. Burners with four or any greater
number of slits might have been represented in the same manner.
Figure 4 represents an external elevation, and Figure 5 a section of a
burner with two slits A, B, inclined to each other, so that the sheets or flat
streams issuing through them converge and meet together. Burners with
three or any greater number of such inclined slits might have been similarly
represented. The slits are to be formed so as to communicate (as shewn in
the Drawings) with the central channel or chamber of the burner, as in the
bat's-wing burner; but I should prefer that as to their size they should
be rather narrower than the slits in the hat's-wing burner, by which I
mean that they should allow thinner sheets of gas to pass through them.
These slits may be either any or all of them parallel to the axis of the burner,
or inclined to it at any angle or angles, provided that their planes, and there-
fore the streams of gas, are either parallel or converge, and meet in one line,

page_text: and I prefer that this line, towards which the streams converge, and in
which they meet and coalesce, should be very near to the end or top of the
burner.
And having now described the nature of the said Invention, and the manner
in which the same is to be performed, I declare that I claim as the improve-
ments in gas burners,―
Firstly, the manufacturing of gas burners with two or more parallel slits
at their ends or tops, so that the gas may issue through them in parallel sheets
or flat streams.
Secondly, the manufacturing of gas burners with two or more slits at their
ends or tops, so inclined towards each other that the issuing sheets or flat
streams of gas may converge and meet together, forming a single flame.
In witness whereof, I, the said Walter Ricardo, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Fourteenth day of February, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-three.