Something about sugar : $b Its history, growth, manufacture and distributionRolph, George M. (George Morrison)
History
Something about sugar : $b Its history, growth, manufacture and distribution
Rolph, George M. (George Morrison)
Sugar
To obviate these conditions the juice is boiled in a multiple evaporator,
the invention of Norberto Rillieux, whose first construction in New
Orleans in 1840 was a double effect horizontal submerged tube apparatus
which has since undergone many changes and improvements. The theory
of evaporation _in vacuo_ was extended to two or more cells or vacuum
bodies, using the steam or vapor from the first to heat the juice or
syrup in the second and so on. At the present time the quadruple effect,
or four-cell evaporator, is most commonly in use, although sextuple
effects are not rare. The ordinary practice is as follows:
The juice enters cell No. 1 and covers the heating tubes, to which is
admitted sufficient steam—generally exhaust from the engines—to cause the
liquid to boil. The steam or vapor liberated from this first boiling is
conducted through the vapor pipe directly into the heating tubes of cell
No. 2, while the juice from cell No. 1 is passed into the second, or cell
No. 2, and surrounds the heating surfaces which contain the hot vapor
given off from the same juice in cell No. 1.
[Illustration: DELIVERING BAGASSE TO FIRE-ROOM]
[Illustration: GENERAL INTERIOR VIEW OF MODERN RAW-SUGAR MILL]
As there is little or no pressure above the liquid in the first cell, the
juice boils at from 215 degrees to 220 degrees Fahrenheit. By maintaining
a vacuum of five inches in the second cell, the temperature at which the
liquid will boil is reduced to 203 degrees, and the vapor from cell No.
1 is hot enough to boil the juice in cell No. 2 without any addition of
heat. The vapor from cell No. 2 in the same way enters the heating tubes
of cell No. 3, while the juice entering this cell is exposed to a vacuum
of fifteen inches, which reduces the boiling temperature to 180 degrees,
so that the difference of 23 degrees between the conditions of cell No.
2 and cell No. 3 causes a third boiling and evaporation without any
additional steam being added.
A vacuum of twenty-six inches in the last cell, No. 4, brings the final
boiling temperature down to about 150 degrees. The vapor from this last
cell enters a condenser, where it is exposed to a spray of cold water,
is condensed and passes down a pipe not less than thirty-four feet long,
terminating in a water seal, and called the Torricellian tube, after
Torricelli, who discovered that mercury would rise thirty inches in a
tube while water would rise thirty-four feet with a perfect vacuum.
The juice in passing through these evaporating cells is boiled to a syrup
containing about thirty-five per cent of water and sixty-five per cent of
solid matter. It is pumped out of the fourth cell into the receiving tank
for the vacuum pan.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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