Abstract: A means for producing extremely high pressures especially adaptable for use in the art of diamond making, such means employing the expansion characteristics of materials and includes a member expandable in response to heat for applying pressure to diamond producing material.

Abstract: A process for recovering and using fines of flux, such as limestone, used in a metallurgical process, such as oxygen steelmaking, is described. The process involves collecting fines from a receiving zone, e.g., with blower and baghouse equipment. The fines so collected are then conveyed, as by a dense-phase conveyor, to a first processing zone containing a first screening means for screening flux material which is to be fed to the process. Material not passing through said first screening means is fed to the metallurgical-process vessel, but fines passed by the first screening means are collected and formed into briquettes. The briquettes are conveyed to a second processing zone which is located above the conveyor which leads from the receiving zone to the first processing zone mentioned above. The second processing zone contains a second screening means and means for storing and releasing to the said conveyor the briquettes or portions thereof which have not passed through said second screening means.

Abstract: A novel reactor configuration is described for the conversion of wet-process phosphoric acid and anhydrous ammonia into an ammonium polyphosphate product having a high proportion of the total P.sub.2 O.sub.5 in the polyphosphate form. This novel reaction system, includes a first reaction stage comprising a jacketed free floating reaction tube having an inlet end which terminates inside the jacket and a second reaction stage comprising a vertically oriented reaction chamber equipped with an internal heat exchange coil and a sparger for injection of ammonia. A portion of the reactant ammonia which has been preheated in the heat exchange coil of the second reaction stage is injected into the first reaction stage via an injection tube which extends through the jacket into the inlet end of the reaction tube, said injection tube being sized to leave an annular space for fluid communication between the reactor tube and the jacket.

Abstract: A regenerative coke oven battery that produces a coke cake having a low vertical temperature differential throughout its mass. The heating flues are defined by header walls having ducts for air or lean gas and outlet slots incorporated along the vertical length of the header wall which slots connect the ducts with the flues. The flues are combined into groups connected at their upper ends with a horizontal bus channel which communicates by a cross-over duct with a similar horizontal bus channel on the opposite side of a coking chamber.

Abstract: In thermal regeneration incineration apparatus having a main combustion chamber in communication with at least one heat-exchange section to which inlet and outlet ducts are connected, each duct having an associated valve, purified effluent from the output of the apparatus is fed back to blanket at least one side of one or both of the valves. This helps to prevent unpurified effluent applied to the input of the apparatus from leaking through the valves when nominally closed and thereby avoiding passage through the main combustion chamber.

Abstract: This disclosure is directed to an economical system for the pyrolysis of municipal solid waste to recover valuable by-products while reducing the putrecibility and bulk of the residue requiring disposal. Prior to this treatment, the solid waste has been processed to remove most of the metallic components, and shredded, which steps are not part of the invention disclosed. The pyrolysis and by-product recovery technology is complicated by (a) the inherent variability of the chemical and physical characteristics of the shredded solid waste as received at the pyrolysis plant and (b) the relatively low heat value of said waste as thus received.

Abstract: An apparatus for effecting the thermal conversion of gypsum to calcium sulfate hemihydrate includes a reactor having a series of fluidized bed compartments containing separate heat exchangers and defined by partitions each provided with an opening which is selected so that the material undergoing treatment progresses, without return movement, through the series of fluidized bed compartments. The apparatus is further constructed so as to permit recycling of fine gypsum particles from the outlet to the middle of the reactor.

Abstract: Latex-rich plants such as Guayule or extracts thereof pyrolyzed in an inert nitrogen atmosphere in inorganic salt melts such as a LiCl/KCl eutectic at a temperature of about 500.degree. C. yield over 60% of a highly aromatic, combustible hydrocarbon oil suitable for use as a synthetic liquid fuel.

Abstract: Apparatus is disclosed for the carrying out of gaseous phase reactions, illustrated by way of example by the preparation of sulphur hexafluoride of high purity, starting from elemental fluorine and sulphur, both in gaseous phase. One of the gaseous reactants, e.g., the fluorine, is fed into a reaction chamber through inlets in a metal plate, maintained at between 30.degree. and 70.degree. C. while the other, e.g., sulphur in gaseous phase, is fed in through the nozzle of a burner, e.g., by regulating a current of an inert gas which is saturated with sulphur by passing same through a zone containing molten sulphur at a temperature between 250.degree. and 500.degree. C., and subsequently superheating the inert gas thus saturated with sulphur to a temperature between 300.degree. and 550.degree. C.

Abstract: A specimen collection assembly comprising a cup member having a body portion and an open end closure portion. The assembly also includes a cap member having a closure portion adapted for engagement with the cup closure portion to effectuate a seal between the cap member and the cup member to thereby seal the interior of the cup body portion. The cup and cap members each have an outer protective wall thereon extending past and covering the outermost extremities of the closure portions of the cup and cap members to protect the closure portions from hand and body contact.

Abstract: In an apparatus for contacting fluid with subdivided contact material, such as a radial-flow catalytic reactor, means having a substantially horizontal surface is attached to a lower portion of a vertically movable member within the reactor, the member being selected from center pipes and particle-retaining screens. The weight of contact material on the means restrains upward movement of the member during temperature cycling, and thus prevents problems caused by the upward movement.

Abstract: The device for conditioning a sample of liquid for medical analysis which comprises a plurality of calibrated peripheral cells connected to a central receptacle by way of ducts including an air inlet orifice for conveying the sample from the receptacle to the cell and to completely fill the cell by centrifugal action and employing an air escape orifice in each cell within a wall closer to the axis of rotation than that wall bearing the inlet orifice, carries a filter disposed between the central receptacle and the calibrated peripheral cell for prevention of solid particles in suspension from passing with the sample liquid from the central receptacle to the calibrated peripheral cells.

Abstract: Crushed oil shale is segregated into a major portion of relatively large particles and a minor portion of "fines," such as will pass through 1/8-inch screen openings. The large particles are subjected to retorting in an upflowing bed in countercurrent contact with a downflowing hot eduction gas, while the fines are fed onto and controllably transported across the hot planar surface of a free-standing truncated cone of spent shale at the top of the retort.

Abstract: In an apparatus for oxidizing an alkyl-substituted aromatic compound in the liquid phase with a molecular oxygen-containing gas in a lower aliphatic carboxylic acid solvent in the presence of an oxidation catalyst, said apparatus comprising a reaction vessel, a gas exhaust port at the top of the vessel, an inlet at the bottom of the vessel for feeding said molecular oxygen-containing gas, an inlet for feeding said solvent, an inlet for feeding said catalyst, an inlet for feeding said alkyl-substituted aromatic compound, an outlet for withdrawing the oxidation reaction product, and an agitator within the vessel, said agitator consisting of a rotating shaft provided along the axial direction of the vessel and a plurality of stages of agitating blades secured to said rotating shaft at spaced intervals; the improvement wherein at least one stage of agitating blades consists of comb-like flat blades each of which is composed of a plurality of comb tooth-like pieces aligned at spaced intervals.

Abstract: A solid carbonaceous material is pyrolyzed in a descending flow pyrolysis reactor in the presence of a particulate source of heat to yield a particulate carbon containing solid residue. The particulate source of heat is obtained by educting with a gaseous source of oxygen the particulate carbon containing solid residue from a fluidized bed into a first combustion zone coupled to a second combustion zone. A source of oxygen is introduced into the second combustion zone to oxidize carbon monoxide formed in the first combustion zone to heat the solid residue to the temperature of the particulate source of heat.

Abstract: The invention relates to a method and device for producing polycrystalline silicon. The method consists in particular in purifying a bath of molten silicon which contains impurities by bubbling a mixture of chlorine and oxygen and in progressively crystallizing the purified silicon in a receptacle (22) which is moved vertically downwards in a vertical gradient of temperatures which increase towards the top. Application to manufacturing solar photocells.

Abstract: The invention relates to a multiple phase flow tube for evaporating and reacting components in compound mixtures in which a spiral pipe is arranged within a multiple phase flow pipe. The components are propelled by means of an internally flowing gas stream in an annular shaped passage formed by a spiral tube and a second tube arranged as a core of the spiral tube. The second tube contains a heat exchange medium. The spiral tube is arranged within a cylindrical casing which contains a heat exchange medium. A gaseous stream of a reduced amount is then sufficient for carrying out the particular chemical process desired.

Abstract: A technique for simulating the thermal appearance of objects. Electrical rgy is applied to conductive material that is attached to a mounting surface shaped in the form of the selected object. The conductive material is placed to simulate the radiation pattern that the object has been shown to demonstrate.

Abstract: A mixture of a high density particulate inorganic heat source and a low density particulate carbon containing residue formed in the pyrolysis of a solid waste is passed along with some entrained pyrolytic oil to a fluidized bed of particles, where a gas is injected to strip the entrained pyrolytic oil from the particles, and a mixture of a high density particulate heat source and low density particulate carbon containing solid residue of pyrolysis are separated from an intermediate point of the fluidized bed and passed to a decarbonization zone, where the carbon containing solid residue of pyrolysis is decarbonized to form a high density particulate inorganic solid heat source for use as the source of heat in the pyrolysis of organic solid waste.

Abstract: A maintenance and repair station for the maintenance and repair of charging cars of coke oven batteries comprises an elevator which has a cage with a trackway which forms a portion of the roof trackway over which the charging car operates and which may be shifted to a different elevation, for example, downwardly to position another trackway portion identical in length with the first in a position in which it forms a portion of the trackway over the coke oven battery. In this matter a charging car may be loaded onto the elevator and lowered to a repair station or raised to a different repair station while another track may be orientated in a place taken by the trackway portion of the elevator which also forms a portion of the trackway over the coke oven roof.