IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT OF METALLIC ORES AND COMPOUNDS
Year: 1868

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Thomas Gibb, of Jarrow-on-Tyne, in the County
of Durham, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE TREATMENT
OF METALLIC ORES AND COMPOUNDS."
Sealed the 19th January 1869, and dated the 22nd July 1868.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Thomas Gibb at the
Office of the commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
22nd July 1868.
I, THOMAS GIBB, of Jarrow-on-Tyne, in the County of Durham, do
hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE
TREATMENT OF METALLIC ORES AND COMPOUNDS," to be as follows:-
This Invention consists in certain improvements in the treatment of
ores containing copper or other metal in combination with sulphur,
whereby the oxides of copper or other metal are converted into
sulphates.
In the first instance a portion of the ore under treatment is calcined;
the calcination may be effected in any form of furnace, having one end
thereof maintained at a considerably higher temperature than the other
[Price 8d.]

page_text: end. For example, a reverberatory furnace heated by a fire at one end
and so managed that near the flue the furnace may be at a dull red heat,
is well adapted for the purposes of this Invention. The ore containing
sulphur, as before mentioned, is placed on the part of the bed near the
fire-bridge, and there calcined in a current of atmospheric air until the
sulphur is expelled, or until the ore is, as it is technically termed,
"dead;" it is then moved towards the flue end of the furnace, and a
fresh charge of ore placed on the hot bed. The sulphurous acid gas
produced in calcining the latter charge passes in mixture with the excess
of atmospheric air over the previously calcined ore at a lower heat, and
changes the oxides of copper or other metal contained in the latter into
sulphates. When this reaction is considered to be complete the charge
is drawn from the cooler part of the bed, and the calcined ore on the
hotter portion is moved in its turn to the cooler part, whilst a fresh
charge is placed at the bridge end of the bed.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent,
filed by the said Thomas Gibb in the Great Seal Patent Office on
the 21st January 1869.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, THOMAS
GIBB, of Jarrow-on-Tyne, in the County of Durham, send greeting.
of
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Letters Patent, bearing date the Twenty-second day of July, in the year
Our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-eight, in the thirty-second
year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and
grant unto me, the said Thomas Gibb, Her special licence that I, the
said Thomas Gibb, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such
others as I, the said Thomas Gibb, 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 TREATMENT OF

page_text: METALLIC ORES AND COMPOUNDS," upon the condition (amongst others)
that I, the said Thomas Gibb, my executors or administrators, 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 Thomas Gibb, 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, that is to say:-
My said Invention consists in certain improvements in the treatment
of ores containing copper or other metal whereby the oxides of such
metal or metals are converted into sulphates preparatory to their
separation in solution from other components remaining insoluble.
In treating ores or compounds containing sulphides I employ for the
purposes of calcination a furnace of any form, having one end thereof
maintained at a considerably higher temperature than the other end.
For example, a reverberatory furnace heated by a fire at one end, and so
managed that near the flue the furnace may be at a dull red heat, is well
adapted for the purposes of my said Invention. The ore containing
sulphur, as before mentioned, is placed on the hotter part of the bed
near the fire-bridge, and there calcined until the sulphur is expelled, or
until the ore is, as it is technically termed, "dead." It is then moved
towards the flue or cooler end of the furnace, and a fresh charge of ore
placed on the hot bed. The gases produced in calcining the freshly
charged ore pass over that previously charged, and change the oxides of
copper or other metal contained in the latter into sulphate. Should this
effect not be completely obtained by the sulphurous acid gas produced
in caleining the ore sulphurous acid gas otherwise produced may be
passed through the furnace. It will be generally found more convenient
to effect the transference of the ore by several stages from the hotter
to the cooler end of the furnace.
In the case of ores which contain no sulphides, or in which the
sulphides have been calcined, I expose in a furnace maintained at a low
red heat to a current of mixed atmospheric air and sulphurous acid gas
until the metal to be removed is changed into sulphate.

page_text: I am aware that the simple calcination of ores containing sulphides has
before been practised in order to obtain metals as sulphates, but by the
method of working herein-before described the metals are obtained as
sulphates with greater certainty and rapidity than by the means hitherto
adopted.
Having thus declared and ascertained the nature of my said Invention,
and the manner in which it is to be performed, I would observe in con-
clusion that what I consider novel and original, and therefore claim as
constituting the Invention secured to me by the said herein-before in
part recited Letters Patent is, the treatment of metallic ores and com-
pounds, substantially as herein-before described and set forth, or any
mere modification thereof.
In witness whereof, I, the said Thomas Gibb, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Twentieth day of January, in the year of
our Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-nine.
THOMAS GIBB. (L.S.)