A CERTAIN IMPROVEMENT OR CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN STEAM ENGINES
Year: 1834

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, ERNST
WOLFF, formerly of Stamford Hill, in the County of Middlesex, now of Cam-
berwell, in the County of Surrey, send greeting.
WHEREAS I did, by petition, represent to His most Excellent Majesty
King William the Fourth, that I had received a communication from a
certain foreigner abroad, of the knowledge of an Invention of "A CERTAIN
IMPROVEMENT OR CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN STEAM ENGINES," and His said
Majesty, being willing to encourage all useful Inventions, did cause to
be issued His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain,
bearing date at Westminster, the Twenty-sixth day of April, in the fourth
year of His reign, whereby His said Majesty did, for Himself, His heirs and
successors, give and grant unto me, the said Ernst Wolff, His especial license,
that I, the said Ernst Wolff, my exors, adññiors, and assigns, or such other per-
sons as I, the said Ernst Wolff, my exors, adññiors, and 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 that part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain called
England, the Dominion of Wales, the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, the
said Invention; in which said Letters Patent there is contained a proviso
obliging me, the said Ernst Wolff, by an instrument in writing under my
hand and seal, particularly to describe and ascertain the nature of the said
Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, and to cause the
same to be enrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six
calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said recited

page_text: Letters l'atent, as in and by the same, reference being thereunto nau, win
more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Ernst Wolff, do hereby declare that the nature of the said Invention, and the
manner in which the same is to be performed, are described and ascertained in
the manner following, that is to say:-
The Invention consists in the arrangement and adaptation of two or more
steam engines, each complete in all its parts, as a separate machine in a
series, so that the first receiving steam of one, two, or more atmospheres of
pressure from the boiler, the next engine in succession shall be worked by
the expansive force of the steam received from the escape pipe of the preced-
ing engine, until, in the last engine in the series, the steam shall be con-
densed as in an ordinary condensing engine, or the spent steam shall pass
off into the air, as it does commonly from high-pressure engines; and the
power of these several independent engines may be employed either in com-
bination, by being directed upon the same crank shaft, or upon two or more
crank shafts connected together by gearing or other mechanical contrivances,
or the power of each engine inay be made to act upon a separate crank shaft,
so that the engines may be severally applied to distinct purposes. In previous
modifications of the steam engine, in which the same quantity of steam has
been made to act in succession in different cylinders, as in those invented by
Woolf and others, the piston rods of the several cylinders were connected with
the saine working beam in such a manner as to form together one steam
engine, having two or more cylinders with their pistons and valves, the strokes
of which were therefore necessarily to be made in the same time. In such
forms of the steam engine the machine was made more complex and costly,
and the increased number of working parts required more attention, and
caused greater wear and tear than in the more generally adopted forms of the
steam engine; and in cases in which, to obviate the use of a fly wheel, engines
are worked in pairs upon a two-throw crank, or acting at a right angle to cach
other upon the same crank, the superior complexity of Woolf's and similar engines
almost universally precludes their employment; this is especially the case in
steam boats and steam carriages, where the greatest simplicity of mechanism
is desirable; but as in steam vessels, and in many other situations, two dis-
tinct engines are commonly worked in conjunction, the present Invention
described in this Specification is in such cases peculiarly applicable, as fur-
nishing means of economizing fuel without augmenting the complexity or
cost of the machinery already employed, and even rendering lighter and
more simple, in most cases, the engines, by dispensing with some heavy and

page_text: cumbrous parts, such as a condenser and its pumps, conducing thus to an
easier draught of water in steam boats, in consequence of which they will be
propelled with less expense of power, and may perform longer voyages with
the same consumption of fuel as they now incur.
As no variation is called for by the application of the present Invention in the
construction of the several forms of steam engine now generally used, beyond the
means of transmitting the steam from cylinder to cylinder, the nature of the
Invention, and the mode of applying it under any circumstances, will be readily
comprehended by seeing its adaptation to a pair of steam boat engines; such
an arrangement is shewn in the accompanying Drawing. On one side of the
boat is the engine with the smaller cylinder a, which is worked by steam
directly from the boiler of one, two, three, or more atmospheres of pressure
passing into the cylinder by the steam pipe m. The engine on the opposite
side of the boat is provided with a cylinder of larger capacity; this is marked c.
The steam may pass from the first to the second cylinder through a simple
pipe; but this second cylinder it is preferable to surround with a casing or
jacket, which may serve as the immediate recipient of the steam from the
first cylinder by the exit passage o, and along the connecting pipe n. From
the casing the steam is admitted into the second cylinder through the slide
valve
P, and thence it passes to the condenser. is the air pump by which
the condensed water is raised to the hot water cistern, from whence it is
taken to feed the boiler. The piston rods of the two engines act on the
same crank shaft r, by two cranks at right angles to each other, which shaft
carries the paddle wheels. Sometimes it is useful to have betwixt the com-
municating cylinders a steam chamber, as an intervening reservoir of this
kind tends to produce a more regular movement in the engines; such a steam
chamber may frequently be placed with advantage in or about the lower part
of the chimney, in order to profit by the heat there escaping, to keep up or even
raise the temperature and tension of the steam in its transit from one cylinder
to the other; for the same object it may even be desirable, in some instances,
to have a separate fire expressly to act upon the steam in the intermediate
reservoir. It is in most cases necessary to have a direct communication
through a steam pipe furnished with a stopcock betwixt the boiler and the
intervening steam chamber or jacket, or second, third, &c. cylinder, in
order to afford the means of blowing steam directly through this part of the
apparatus to heat it, before the engines are set to work, as well as to be able
to start the engines in any position of the cranks. When the temperature
of the chamber is sufficiently raised, the direct communication from the boiler
may be cut off by the stopcock; but it will frequently occur that it will operate

page_text: beneficially on the power of the engines to enable them to overcome a tem-
porary augmentation of resistance to open this direct channel for the steam
from the boiler to the second or other following engine; and even it may be
used permanently when the boiler gives a sufficient supply of steam, and it
is thought necessary to work the first engine at a lower pressure than that
to which the power of the boiler is fully adequate.
From what has been stated, it will be apparent to those conversant with
steam engines in what way the present Invention is to be made available for
an arrangement of two or more engines of any of the ordinary forms, bearing
in mind that the first engine in the series must be constructed as a high-
pressure engine without a condenser and its usual adjuncts, but furnished
with an exit steam pipe to convey its steam either directly to the second
engine, or through a steam chamber, either forming a jacket to the second
cylinder, or being a detached vessel communicating by pipes. The second, or
whichever may be the last engine in the series, may be worked either as a
condensing engine, or it may throw off its spent steam into the atmosphere;
the boiler for the supply of steam to the engines working on the system of
successive expansion now introduced must be of course constructed for the
generation of high-pressure steam.
The present Invention of working a series of steam engines by the
successive expansion of the same quantity of steam may be beneficially
resorted to for the economizing of fuel, or for the augmentation of power,
in almost every case which calls for the use of steam power; for instance,
a common low-pressure engine may gain an increase of power from the
same quantity of fuel, by having interposed betwixt its cylinder and the
boiler a small high-pressure engine, which should take its steam first from
the boiler at a somewhat higher tension, and, having used it, transmit
the same to the cylinder of the low-pressure engine, the additional power
required from the high-pressure engine being brought to act in concert with
the previously existing machinery. If necessary, the strength of the boiler
must be augmented, to provide for the supply of steam at a higher pressure
than was before called for. When it is wished to gain an accession of power
to a high-pressure engine already erected it will only be necessary to join
with it, upon the principle of this Invention, an ordinary low-pressure engine,
to be worked by the discharged steam of the high-pressure engine. On steam
boats, and in other situations where a pair of low-pressure engines is employed,
to profit by this Invention it will be necessary to substitute for one of the
low-pressure engines a high-pressure one, through which the steam will be
first worked from a high-pressure boiler, and then passed to the low-pressure

page_text: cylinder. If on board of steam boats, or in other places, as in steam loco-
motive carriages, two high-pressure engines be employed, greater available
power may be obtained from the same consumption of fuel, by resorting to
the principle of this Invention in superadding one or more low-pressure
engines, or engines of adequately large cylinders, to be worked by the dis-
charged steam of the two high-pressure engines. Thus it will be seen that
the principle of this Invention may be beneficially and readily adopted in
every case of the employment of steam power, and that it may equally advan-
tageously be applied at a comparatively easy cost to already existing engines
of every form. The particular modifications of apparatus which will be most
suitable in the adaptation of the principle to the various cases will readily
suggest themselves to any competent engineer; such a person will have no
difficulty in suiting his arrangements to the various forms of steam engine now
in use in almost any situation.
The Invention which I claim under the Letters Patent granted to me by His
present Majesty King William the Fourth, bearing date at Westminster, the
Twenty-sixth day of April, in the fourth year of His reign, consists in the
employment of two or more steam engines, of whatever form of construction or
principle of action, so arranged in a series or order, and having suitable con-
nection one with the other, as that they shall be successively acted upon and
made to work by the same quantity of steam which has been received from
the boiler or steam generating apparatus in a state of high pressure, by the
first engine in the series being allowed to exert its remaining expansive force
of the piston of the second engine in order, and so on though the series if
more than two shall be employed; such arrangement allowing also, when
deemed useful, of the admission directly from the boiler of an auxiliary quantity
of steam to the cylinder of the second or of any subsequent engine; and the
powers of these several engines may be either associated in one common object,
the action of their pistons being directed upon one and the same driving
shaft, or their respective motive forces may be applied separately to distinct
purposes.
The Invention does not consist in the transmission of a portion of steam in
succession through two or more working cylinders forming parts of one steam
engine, and having their several piston rods connected with the same working
beam, which has been done before. I do not claim as part of this Invention
any novelty or peculiarity in the form of parts, or in the construction of any of
the several kinds of steam engines. My claim is confined to the arrangement
and connection of two or more steam engines of any class or form in such a
manner as to admit of their being wrought by the same quantity of steam