AN IMPROVED METHOD OF RECTIFYING SPIRITS
Year: 1879

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Friedrich Hermann Felix Engel, Civil Engineer and Patent
Agent, in the City of Hamburg, Germany, for the Invention of "AN IMPROVED
METHOD OF RECTIFYING SPIRITS." A communication from Joachim Emil
Berlien, Doctor of Philosophy, of Altona, in the German Empire.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Friedrich Hermann Felix
Engel at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents on the 17th March
1879.
FRIEDRICH HERMANN FELIX ENGEL, Civil Engineer and Patent Agent, in the
City of Hamburg, Germany. "AN IMPROVED METHOD OF RECTIFYING SPIRITS."
A communication from Joachim Emil Berlien, Doctor of Philosophy, of Altona, in
the German Empire.
This Invention relates to the rectifying of spirits'; heretofore the crude spirits
prepared from potatoes, corn, maize, or other substances, have been impregnated
with different bad scents, for the destroying of which different methods of rectifying
or refining are in use.
This improved method of rectifying crude spirits consists of adding to the same
a small quantity of nitrate of silver, according to quality and strength, in a
proportion of from 20 grammes to 50 grammes of nitrate of silver to 10,000 litres
of spirit.
t
For the practical application I preferably use a solution of ten parts of nitrate of
silver in hundred parts of water.
After the addition of nitrate of silver has been made as before described, the
crude spirit is transformed into fine spirit by treating the former in either one or
other of the apparatuses hitherto used for this purpose.
The rectified spirit thus produced is scentless in a degree hitherto unattainable,
and is completely free of the before mentioned bad scents.
Those spirits rectified after either of the methods hitherto in use are very seldom
completely free of the above mentioned bad scents of the crude spirits. This Inven-
tion is likewise applicable for destroying these scents for the purpose of refining
these spirits.

page_text: An addition of 05 gramme of nitrate of silver to 500 litre of spirit is sufficient
for the worst product known in the market, whilst fine spirit made out of good raw
material will readily be freed of these scents by an addition of '005 gramme of
nitrate of silver to 500 litres of spirit. The addition may, as before described, like-
wise be applied in form of a weak solution of one part of nitrate of silver in from 5
100 to 10,000 parts of water.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent filed by
the said Friedrich Hermann Felix Engel in the Great Seal Patent Office on
the 17th September 1879.
FRIEDRICH HERMANN FELIX ENGEL, Civil Engineer and Patent Agent, in the City
of Hamburg, Germany. "AN IMPROVED METHOD OF RECTIFYING SPIRITS." A
communication from Joachim Emil Berlien, Doctor of Philosophy, of Altona, in
the German Empire.
This Invention relates to the rectifying of spirits; heretofore the crude spirits
prepared from potatoes, corn, maize, or other substances, have been impregnated
with different bad scents, for the destroying of which different methods of rectifying
or refining are in use.
This improved method of rectifying crude spirits consists of adding to the same
a small quantity of nitrate of silver, according to quality and strength, in a propor-
tion of from 20 (twenty) grammes to 50 (fifty) grammes of nitrate of silver to
10,000 (ten thousand) litres of spirit.
For the practical application I preferably use a solution of ten parts of nitrate of
silver in one hundred parts of water.
After the addition of nitrate of silver has been made as before described, the
crude spirit is transformed into fine spirit by treating the former in any of the
apparatus or by any of the processes (filtration, distillation, or dephlegmation)
hitherto used for this purpose.
The rectified spirit thus produced is scentless in a degree hitherto unattainable,
and is completely free of the before mentioned bad scents.
Spirits which are rectified after either of the methods hitherto in use are very
seldom completely free of the above mentioned bad scents of the crude spirit. This
Invention is likewise applicable for destroying these scents for the purpose of
refining those spirits.
An addition of 05 gramme of nitrate of silver to 500 litres of spirit is sufficient
for the worst product known in the market, whilst fine spirit made out of good
raw material will readily be freed of these scents by an addition of 005 gramme of
nitrate of silver to 500 litres of spirit. The addition may, as before described, like-
wise be applied in form of a weak solution of one part of nitrate of silver in from,
100 to 10,000 parts of water,

page_text: Having now described the said Invention in such wise that the same may be
readily carried into practice, I claim,―
First. The method of rectifying crude spirit by an addition of nitrate of silver, in
the manner as described, and
Secondly. The method of fining spirits which are rectified after any of the pro-
cesses hitherto known or in use by a very small addition of nitrate of silver,
substantially as described.
-
In witness whereof, I, the said Friedrich Hermann Felix Engel, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Fourteenth day of September, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and seventy-nine.
F. H. F. ENGEL.
(L.S.)