HOT-AIR APPARATUS FOR HULLING AND EXTRACTING OILS FROM OLEAGINOUS Janna
Year: 1857

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to William Wilber, formerly of New Orleans, now of
New York, in the United States of America, for the Invention of
"HOT-AIR APPARATUS FOR HULLING AND EXTRACTING OILS FROM OLEAGINOUS
Janna"
Sealed the 24th November 1857, and dated the 29th May 1857.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said William Wilber at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 29th
May 1857.
I, WILLIAM WILBER, formerly of New Orleans, now of New York, in the
United States of America, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "HOT-AIR APPARATUS FOR HULLING AND EXTRACTING OILS FROM OLEAGINOUS
SEEDS," to be as follows:-
My Invention consists in a new arrangement of machinery for the purpose
of extracting oil from oleaginous seeds in cases where dry heat is to be
employed, and in a new construction of some of the parts of that machinery.
In this arrangement, the oleaginous seeds are fed from a hopper into a tem-
pering mill, where they are crushed between stone surfaces, and heated by the
application of hot air; thence they are passed on to an endless belt, which
carries them between rollers of peculiar construction, which express the oil
and deliver the cake in fit condition for being cut up for use. Throughout
their whole course the seeds are heated either by the direct application of

page_text: blasts of hot air, or by contact with surfaces heated by currents of hot air.
These currents are kept up by a fan, the blades of which are constructed to
draw air in through the centre of its journals and drive it out at its periphery.
Just after passing from the fan, the air is driven through a coil or worm of
tubes in a chamber in the bottom of the tempering mill, which is beated by
Here it becomes heated before passing to an air chamber connected
with a system of tubes, by which it is distributed to all parts of the machine;
after giving up its heat it returns to the air chamber, and thence to the fan, to
be a second time heated and circulated.
The rollers are made generally of cylindrical form, slightly hollowed in the
middle of their length, and are composed of staves of iron, placed upon an
inner cast-iron roller. This inner roller is slightly bulged in the middle of its
length, and the staves in order to fit it are thicker at their ends than in the
middle. Five or six of these staves are made in one casting, and they are
held in their places by end plates. The necessary holes and spaces are left to
allow the oil to pass to the interior of the cylinder and run out at its ends.
The rollers are covered entirely with strong hair cloth, or its equivalent, of
one half to one inch in thickness.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said William Wilber in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
28th November 1857.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, WILLIAM
WILBER, formerly of New Orleans, now of New York, in the United States of
America, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-ninth day of May, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven, in the twentieth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the
said William Wilber, Her special licence that I, the said William Wilber,
or my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said
William Wilber, or 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 "HOT-AIR APPARATUS

page_text: FOR HULLING AND EXTRACTING OILS FROM OLEAGINOUS SEEDS," upon the condition
(amongst others) that I, the said William Wilber, or my executors or adminis-
trators, by an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of their hands
and seals, should particularly 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 William Wilber, do hereby declare
the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement, reference being had to the accompanying Drawings:-
Figure 1 is a perspective view of my improved apparatus; Figure 2 is a
plan; Figure 3 is a longitudinal vertical section through the middle of the
apparatus; Figure 4 is a transverse section of the pressing rollers, on an
enlarged scale; Figure 5 is a transverse section of the tempering mill;
Figure 6 is a side view of the conical roller of the tempering mill; Figure 7
is a longitudinal section of the fan; Figure 8 is an end, and Figure 9 is a
side view of the fan, with is journals working on friction rollers; Figure 10
is a section, and Figure 11 a side view of the double air chamber. The same
part is indicated in all the Figures by the same letters of reference.
The nature of my Invention consists in a new construction of pressing
rollers for extracting oil from the pulp, and the arrangement of a system of
chambers and tubes, in connection with a fan, or other blowing or exhausting
apparatus, to the circulation of hot air through various parts of the machinery,
and its direct application to the seeds and pulp.
In the accompanying Drawing, A, A, is the bed plate of the machine, and
B, B, the framing. The framing supports a main shaft and pulleys, which,
being driven from any suitable prime mover, impart motion to the crushing
mill, fan, and pressure rollers, by means of belts or gearing. This shaft with
its pulleys is not shewn in the Drawings, as the mode of driving forms no part
of my Invention, and is not necessary to be represented in order to a complete
understanding of the machine. I is the bed of the crushing and tempering
machine; it is made of granite, and its form is clearly shewn by the section,
Fig. 5. I is the runner of the tempering machine, and is also made of granite,
its surface being worked into spiral grooves, as seen in Figure 6. I make these
parts of granite or other suitable stone, because when saturated with oil the
ground seeds will not adhere to that substance, whereas they stick to a cast-iron
surface. The tempering machine is furnished with a cover D, of thin metal,

page_text: and a hopper C, from which the seeds are fed. On the inside of the cover is a
scraper h, which keeps the runner clean. The runner is driven by the pulley
E by a belt from the main shaft. Below the bed H of the runner is a steam
cylinder n, n, connected by a pipe o with the boiler. Through this chamber
runs the spiral coil of pipe m. A pipe p carries off the water of condensation
from this chamber. The object of this part of the apparatus is to impart heat to
the air which is circulated through the machine, in the manner hereafter to be
described. J is a fan, with hollow journals, and with curved vanes or blades;
it is driven by the pulley P, and when in motion draws air in through both
journals, and expels it at the periphery of the vanes. Two pipes k connect the
journals of the fan with the double air chamber R, and a third pipe / connects
the periphery of the fan with the coil m in the steam chamber n; another pipe
g connects the other end of said coil with the centre of the air chamber R;
another pipe t with its branches connects the air chamber R with the hopper
C, the tempering mill H, and the under side of the endless belt v¹, where
the pulp passes in between the rollers. The tri-branched air chamber R is
made with two separate compartments (see Fig. 10), one to receive the hot air
through pipe 9 and distribute it to the rollers, &c., and the other to receive the
air that has parted with its heat, and return it to the fan, to be again driven
through the coil, heated, and circulated. The ends of the branches of this
chamber are fitted over the journals of the pressure rollers G, G¹, G", by
stuffing boxes, which make a tight joint and permit free motion to the rollers.
The hot-air compartment of the chamber is connected by a tube r with the
further end of the rollers G, &c. (see Figure 4); the cold-air compartment is
connected with the interior of said rollers by the shorter tube s. X is the cold-
air supply pipe, and admits the external air to the cold-air compartment of
chamber R.
The pressure rollers G, G¹, G", are formed by placing upon a hollow internal
cylinder staves of iron of the form shown in transverse section at d in Figure 3,
and covering the whole with thick hair cloth closely fitted to the surface of the
staves. Several of these staves may be made in one casting, and the compound
stave thus formed is applied to the surface of the internal cylinder, and held
there by end pieces or plates. The internal cylinder is bulged in the middle,
and the staves are increased in thickness at the ends, not only to compensate
for this bulge, but so much as to make the roller slightly hollow in the
middle. The staves have numerous holes through them for the passage of oil
to the interior cylinder, the oil also passes in between the joints of the staves.
The staves project a short distance beyond the internal cylinder, and are held

page_text: in place by end plates, which, at their junction with the cylinder head and
staves, form a channel for the passage of oil to a receiver placed below to con-
tain it. In the Drawings, only one roller is represented as made of staves, as
above described, but one or more may be used, as the case may require.
The operation of the machine is as follows: The seeds to be crushed are
placed in the hopper C, whence they are fed into the crushing and tempering
mill. In the hopper they receive a blast of hot air from the pipe w, and
as soon as they pass into the tempering mill they are again subjected to the
action of the hot air from the pipe t. After being crushed, they pass in
the state of pulp on to the endless belt v, which conducts its load between
the rollers G, G¹; here the pulp is again heated by a hot blast from the
long narrow orifice at the end of the branch pipe u. The rollers are them-
selves kept at a high temperature by the hot air circulating through them,
and contribute to heat the pulp passing between them. After having the oil
expressed from it between rollers G and G', the pulp passes over the bridge y,
and is subjected to a second pressure between G and G", and then passes out
on to the delivery board in a fit state to be cut up for use. The oil from the
pulp passing through the hair cloth and the staves on the inner cylinder, runs
to the ends of said cylinder and falls into the channel in the end plates, and
passes thence into a reservoir prepared to receive it.
The heating apparatus operates as follows:-Steam passes from the boiler
through pipe o into the steam chambers n, n, through which the coil m passes;
it parts with its heat to the coil and becomes condensed, and the water of
condensation is drawn off through the pipe p. The fan J being put in opera-
tion draws cold air from the cold-air compartment of air chamber R, and
drives it through pipe 7 and coil m; here the air becomes heated, and passes
through pipe q into the hot-air compartment of chamber R, whence it is dis-
tributed as follows:-A portion of it goes by pipe r to the farther ends of the
rollers, and after heating them returns by pipes to the cold-air compartment.
Another portion is driven through pipe t, and supplies by one branch pipe u
the blast between the rollers, and by another w that in the hopper C, pipe t
itself supplying the crushing and tempering mill. The air lost in these opera-
tions is supplied by pipe X communicating with the cold-air compartment of
chamber R.
What I claim under the herein-before in part recited Letters Patent is,
the arrangement herein described, of a system of chambers and tubes, in con-
nection with a fan, or other proper blowing or exhausting apparatus, for the
purpose of circulating hot air through various parts of the machine and

page_text: applying it directly to the seeds and pulp, substantially in the manner herein-
before specified.
In witness whereof, I, the said William Wilber, have hereunto set
my hand and seal, on this Twenty-eighth day of November, A. D. One
thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven.
WILLIAM WILBER. (L.S.)