Specification of Joseph Wass : construction of smelting furnaces.

  • Wass, Joseph.
Date:
1855
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Specification of Joseph Wass : construction of smelting furnaces. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    6/12 (page 4)
    Wasss Improvement for Smelting or Calcining Lead Ore, $c. the smelting furnaces are not at work, by a man entering at the door below and passing up the winding staircase shewn at d in the plan, Fig. 1, which conducts to the lodge floor above, when, by a shovel, the deposited matter is thrown down the well of the chimney and thence drawn off by barrows to be roasted and afterwards smelted. The flues of the furnaces must be supplied with dampers 5 or shutters, as shewn at 0, 0, Fig 2, in order to cut off the communication with the chimney of any one of the furnaces which may not be at the time in use. By the employment this improved apparatus smelting and calcining fur¬ naces are divested of their pernicious effects, and such works may in future be erected in any convenient situation, either near to dwelling-houses or by the sides of public roads, on the banks of navigable rivers or canals, and thus, in many cases, produces a very great economy in the expence of carriage. The saving effected by this apparatus in preserving a quantity of valuable matter which would otherwise, as heretofore, escape, to the injury of the neighbourhood, would of itself amount in one year, where four lead furnaces are employed, as described in the plan, to a sum equal to the entire cost of the improved appa¬ ratus, that is, of the upper part of the tower, with its roof, cap, vane, shutters, and appendages. Among other advantages, I propose that the tapping sides of my furnaces shall be opposite to each other, as shewn at e, e, and e, e, Fig. 1, so that, when required, the hot lead from both may be run into pigs or conveyed into one receiver, and from thence into a mould, so as to be formed into thick sheets ready for milling or rolling, by which a great saving of labour and ex¬ pence will be effected, and the trouble and waste of remelting the lead avoided. I have, for the better understanding of my improvement, described many parts (as the furnaces) which are not new, but I wish it to be clearly understood that my Invention consists simply of the apparatus described as placed above the ordinary chimney of the smelting furnace, and the various parts of which are marked in the Drawing and referred to by capital letters, which apparatus I believe to be perfectly new as applied to that object, and therefore claim under my Patent the sole and exclusive right of employing the same. In witness whereof, I, the said Joseph Wass (party hereto), have hereunto set my hand and seal, the Eighth day of October, in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and twenty-two. JOSEPH (l.s.) WASS.