Specification of Henry Bright : drying sewage.

  • Bright, Henry.
Date:
1872
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Specification of Henry Bright : drying sewage. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Provisional Bright's Improvements in Apparatus for Drying Sewage, 8fC. vajoours given off therefrom during the process of drying shall be entirely destroyed before the vapours pass into the atmosphere; it consists mainly in causing heated air to pass over a layer of the substance to be dried, which air after taking up moisture is then withdrawn at one or more points in proximity to the surface of the material, and is caused 5 to pass through a furnace or fire-place so as in entering into combustion with the fuel to entirely destroy the noxious vapours carried off by the air. For this purpose I prefer to employ apparatus of the following arrangement:—I construct a drying room or shed of any convenient 10 shape, which can be closed as nearly air-tight as possible, with the exception of the openings herein-after mentioned, through which the current of air is admitted and extracted. In connection with such room I erect a stove or “ cockle ” (by preference Whittaker’s convoluted stove), surrounded by an enclosed space or jacket which communicates at the 15 bottom with the surrounding atmosphere and at the top with the upper part of the drying room, so that the air in passing into such jacket becomes heated by contact with the stove, and then passes into the upper part of the room. The fire-box of the stove is closed in front, with the exception of the necessary openings for feeding and cleaning, 20 and communicates below the grate with a flue leading to a number of openings in or near the floor of the drying room, while the top of the fire-box communicates with a flue leading to a chimney shaft. The operation of the apparatus is as follows :—The sewage or other matter to be dried is spread on the floor of the drying room, the door of 25 which is then closed as air-tight as possible, and a fire is then lighted in the stove. The heated fresh air passes from the jacket of the stove into the room, raising the temperature therein rapidly, and at the same time the suction resulting from the draught of the stove causes the air that is in close proximity to the layer of sewage, and that is charged with the 30 noxious vapours evaporated from the latter, to be drawn off through the before-mentioned openings and to be passed through the fire of the stove, whereby any noxious smell of such air is entirely destroyed before it passes into the chimney. The fresh air newly heated always rises to the top of the chamber, and in descending replaces that which has 35 become cooled by contact with the moist surface of the sewage or other material, and which being heaviest and nearest the floor is sucked away by the draught of the stove. This constant current of hot air over the