A Practical Manual On Sea Water Distillation
With A Description Of The Necessary Machinery For The Process

167 CHAPTER X . GAS AND OIL STOVES FOR EVAPORATORS. 1. Before considering the multiple distilling apparatus, a few words may be devoted to the use of gas and oil stoves in distilling on land—e.g., in houses or industrial establishments. This type of distilling apparatus is necessarily very small—i.e., suited for a small supply of water, say 1 or 2 gallons per hour ; but this small quantity is produced very pure, as the steam is usually generated from water that is impregnated with only small quantities of chalk or other impurities, yet sufficient to make such water objectionable in many cases, either for drinking purposes, or industrially, where absolutely pure water is required. The distilled water can be filtered so as to render it agreeable to the taste, but for use with accumu- lators it is best unfiltered. Fig. 21 (p. 168) shows an apparatus of the above description complete with a filter. 2. A small apparatus of this kind must necessarily be worked automatically ; otherwise it would soon get out of order, or require an inordinately expensive attendance. 3. The working of the apparatus represented in Fig. 21 is as follows :— (1 ) When the gas at (A) is ignited, the impure water in the generator over it is boiled and converted into pure steam. This steam passes over, by pipe (C), into the tubes inside the distilling condenser (D), where it is con- densed into pure distilled water, which flows away at (E).