Improvements in method and apparatus for extracting the liquid or soluble constituents from disintergrated vegetable materials / [John Ennis Jnr. Searles].

  • Searles, John Ennis Jnr.
Date:
1890
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Improvements in method and apparatus for extracting the liquid or soluble constituents from disintergrated vegetable materials / [John Ennis Jnr. Searles]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 JSTO 19,002 A.D. 1889 Date of Application, 26th Nov., 1889—Accepted, 1st Feb., 1890 COMPLETE SPECIFICATION. Improvements in Method and Apparatus for Extracting’ the Liquid or Soluble Constituents from Disintegrated Vegetable Materials. I, John Ennis Searles Jr., of 810 St. Marks Avenue, Brooklyn, in the county of Kings, and State of New York, United States of America, do hereby declare the nature of my invention and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement:— This invention relates first, to a method of extracting from disintegrated vegetable materials their liquid or soluble constituents ; and, secondly, to certain forms of apparatus by which said method can be carried into effect. The new method by which the desired result is accomplished consists in confining the disintegrated material which is to be operated upon in a suitable chamber, herein called the compression chamber, and therein subjecting it to compression between a compressing plunger on one side and a body of liquid, herein called a liquid anvil, upon the other side of the material operated upon, the liquid products of such compression being discharged either through perforations in the said plunger or in the portions of said cylinder adjoining the place where the plunger concludes its compressing stroke. The said body of liquid being either itself closely confined in a reservoir connected with said chamber, or held therein under a prescribed degree of pressure, serves as an abutment or anvil which partially supports the mass of disintegrated material against which the thrust of the plunger is delivered. The disintegrated material operated upon, which for the sake of brevity it is con¬ venient to call the ‘‘fibre,” forms a plug which closely fits the bore of the cylinder, or compression chamber in which the plunger reciprocates. The said “ plug ” is composed of bodies of fibre which are successively fed into the path of the plunger, and which by the working strokes thereof are compressed one upon another in the form of wads. At each working stroke of the plunger a wad of fibre is added to the adjacent end of the plug, and the plug being thereby increased in length is driven bodily forward into the liquid anvil which partially supports it. Therefore, at each stroke of the plunger a certain portion of the liquid composing the anvil is displaced, and by reason of the pressure which the said liquid is under is compelled to exude through the com¬ pressed material composing the plug The exuding liquid drives before it any liquid which it finds present in the plug, and by being brought into enforced contact with the soluble constituents of the material operated upon, dissolves and carries those soluble constituents with it through the ping and through passages formed either in the plunger or in the part of the cylinder adjoining the plunger, to suitaole channels leading to a receiving tank. The formation of the plug by successive strokes of the plunger is assisted by the frictional hold of the fibre upon the wall of the compression chamber. The degree of density acquired by the plug depends partly upon the said frictional hold and partly upon the pressure at which the liquid composing the anvil is maintained. The liquid against which the plug is compressed thus performs two functions, that of an anvil against which the fibre is driven by the working strokes of the compressing plunger, and also that of a solvent or washing fluid which by being compelled to exude through the plug as an avenue of escape from the pressure which it is under dissolves or drives before it soluble or liquid matter which it finds therein contained. The characteristic features of apparatus for carrying out this process embrace a compres¬ sion chamber in which the plug is formed by the compression of successive bodies of fibre ; a reciprocating plunger preferably provided with perforations to serve as the outlets for the liquid products of compression ; a chamber for containing the liquid lPrice lld.j