area can be provided. This boiler supplies the
steam not only for the engine, but also for heating
and damping the seed in the kettle. The engine
is vertical, with 8 in. cylinder and 12 in. stroke,
with high speed governors, and stands on the cast iron
bed-plate of the mill. This bed-plate, which
is in three sections, is about 30 ft. long, and is
planed and shaped to receive the various machines,
which, when the top is leveled, can be fixed in their
respective places by any intelligent man, and when
the machines are in position they form a support for
the shafting. The seed to be crushed is stored
in a wooden bin, placed above and behind the roll
frame hopper. The roll frame has four chilled
cast iron rolls, 15 in. face, 12 in. diameter, so
arranged as to subject the seed to three rollings,
with patent pressure giving apparatus. These
rolls are driven by fast and loose pulleys by the
shaft above. After the last rolling the seed falls
through an opening in the foundation plate in a screen
driven from the bottom roll shaft by a belt.
This conveys the seed in a trough to a set of elevators,
which supply it continuously to the kettle. This
kettle, which is 3 ft. 6 in. internal diameter and
20 in. deep, is made of cast iron and of specially
strong construction. There is only one steam
joint in it, and to reduce the liability of leakage
this joint is faced in a lathe. The inside furnishings
of the kettle are a damping apparatus with perforated
boss, upright shaft, stirrer, and delivery plate,
and patent slide. The kettle body is fitted with
a wood frame and covered with felt, which is inclosed
within iron sheeting. The crushed seed is heated
in the kettle to the required temperature by steam
from the boiler, and it is also damped by a jet of
steam which is regulated by a wheel valve with indicating
plate. When the required temperature has been
obtained, the seed is withdrawn by a measuring box
through a self-acting shuttle in the kettle bottom,
and evenly distributed over a strip of bagging supported
on a steel tray in a Virtue patent moulding machine,
where it undergoes a compression sufficient to reduce
it to the size that can be taken in by the presses,
but not sufficient to cause any extraction of the oil.
The seed leaves the moulding machine in the form of
a thick cake from nine to eleven pounds in weight,
and each press is constructed to take in twelve of
these cakes at once. The press cylinders are 12
in. diameter and are of crucible cast steel.
To insure strength of construction and even distribution
of strain throughout the press, all the columns, cylinders,
rams, and heads are planed and turned accurately to
gauges, and the pockets that take the columns, in the
place of being cast, as is sometimes usual, with fitting
strips top and bottom, are solid throughout, and are
planed or slotted out of the solid to gauges.
The pressure is given by a set of hydraulic pumps
made of crucible cast steel and bored out of the solid.
One of the pump rams is 21/2 in. diameter, and has