AN IMPROVED METHOD OF REMOVING AND PREVENTING THE FORMATION OF CALCAREOUS AND SALINE DEPOSITS IN STEAM BOILERS
Year: 1861

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Alfred Vincent Newton, of the Office for Patents,
66, Chancery Lane, in the County of Middlesex, Mechanical Draughts-
man, for the Invention of "AN IMPROVED METHOD OF REMOVING AND
PREVENTING THE FORMATION OF CALCAREOUS AND SALINE DEPOSITS IN STEAM
BOILERS." A communication from abroad by Lewis Baird, of Cambridge,
Ted States of A
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Alfred Vincent Newton,
at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
25th November 1861.
I, ALFRED VINCENT NEWTON, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery Lane,
in the County of Middlesex, Mechanical Draughtsman, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention for "AN IMPROVED METHOD OF REMOVING AND
PREVENTING THE FORMATION OF CALCAREOUS AND SALINE DEPOSITS IN STEAM
BOILERS," to be as follows:
In order to prevent the incrustation of steam boilers where sea water or
other water holding. calcareous or saline matters in solution is used, it is
proposed to introduce tobacco, or a decoction or preparation of the same, into
the boiler. This may be done in various ways, for example, the leaf or

page_text: pressed tobacco may be introduced directly into the boiler, it being so secured
in a bag of canvas, or otherwise, that it shall not get to the machinery or
beneath the valves; or a decoction of tobacco may be made and introduced
at intervals with the feed water or by a separate injecting pump employed for
the purpose, the proportion being varied according to the nature of the
water and strength of the decoction employed. This application of tobacco
will be found also available for the removal of incrustations already formed in
-boilers.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Alfred Vincent Newton in the Great Seal Patent Office
on the 20th May 1862.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS. SHALL COME, I, ALFRED
VINCENT NEWTON, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery Lane, in the County.
of Middlesex, Mechanical Draughtsman,-send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twenty-fifth day of November, in the year of our
Lord 1861, in the twenty-fifth year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her
heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said Alfred Vincent
Newton, Her special license that I, the said Alfred. Vincent Newton, my
executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the said Alfred
Vincent Newton, 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 of
"AN IMPROVED METHOD OF REMOVING AND PREVENTING THE FORMATION OF
CALCAREOUS AND SALINE DEPOSITS IN STEAM BOILERS," a communication to him
from abroad by Lewis Baird, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the United
States of America, upon the condition (amongst others) that I, the said
Alfred Vincent Newton, by an instrument in writing under my hand and seal,
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 Alfred Vincent Newton, do hereby
declare the nature of the said Iuvention, and in what manner the same is to

page_text: be performed, to be. particularly described and ascertained in and by the
following statement (that is to say):-
My Invention has for its object to prevent the incrustation of steam boilers
where water holding calcareous' or saline matters in solution is used, and
consists in the introduction within the boiler of tobacco or of a decoction or
preparation of the same. This may-be-done-in-various ways, for example,
tobacco in the leaf or pressed or otherwise manufactured or prepared, may be
introduced directly into the boiler, it being so secured in a bag of canvas, or
otherwise, that it shall not get to the machinery or beneath the valves; or a
decoction of tobacco may be made and introduced at intervals with the feed
water, or by a separate injecting pump employed for the purpose. The form
in which I prefer to apply the tobacco is that of a concentrated extract for
which Letters Patent of the United States were granted to George Jacques
on the 27th day of December 1859. This preparation is concentrated and
transportable, and its use dispenses with the necessity of making the decoction
or of introducing the tobacco into the boiler. For a first application one
pound of the preparation, which corresponds to about four pounds of the
natural tobacco leaf, is sufficient for about one ton of sea water; this is
sufficient to cover the interior surface of the boiler with a glazing or varnish
which effectually prevents the adhesion of any incrustation upon the metal ;
after this covering or glaze is once produced a considerable reduction of the
quantity of the tobacco may be made as compared with the quantity of water
employed, it being simply necessary to preserve the glazed or varnished
surface thus produced, and for this purpose a smaller proportion of the tobacco
is required. The quantity of future additions thus required to preserve the
boiler entirely free and clean, will vary somewhat with the extent to which
the water is changed by blowing off. No definite rule can therefore be given,
but it will never equal the quantity required at first (where sea water is
employed) for the purpose of first preparing the surface of the boiler. It is
manifest also that the amount of tobacco required in any case will vary
with the density of the water employed, or with the different amounts of saline
or calcareous matter which they hold in solution. The above proportion,
however, I have found to be entirely sufficient with those waters with which
I have experimented, while no injurious results follow where the amount of
tobacco employed is very considerably increased. This introduction of tobacco
into steam boilers in any of the ways above described, I have found to be a
perfect preventative of incrustation, and where the boiler has previously
become incrusted it will effectually scale and cleanse it.
Having now set forth the nature of this Invention, and-explained the

page_text: manner of carrying the same into effect, I wish it to be understood that under
the above recited Letters Patent, I claim the employment of tobacco, or a
decoction or extract of the samé, for the purpose of preventing the incrusta-
tion of steam boilers, or of removing the scale therefrom.
In witness whereof, I, the said Alfred Vincent Newton have hereunto
set my hand and seal, the Sixteenth day of May in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and sixty-two.
Witness,
J. W. MOFFATT,
66, Chancery Lane.
A. V. NEWTON. (L.S.)