Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

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Patent No. 4255457A: Method And Apparatus For Preventing Buckle Of Beer Cans During Pasteurization

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Today in 1981, US Patent 4255457 A was issued, an invention of George J. Collias, assigned to the Kepros-Ganes Company, for his “Method and Apparatus for Preventing Buckle of Beer Cans During Pasteurization.” Here’s the Abstract:

A method is described for preventing buckling of beer-can tops and bottoms during pasteurization of the beer. Prior to the pasteurization, an anti-buckle ring is mated with each beer can such that the ring captures the base portion of the can’s bottom. The ring permits the bottom’s panel to bulge outwardly while preventing radial displacement of the bottom’s base area and, hence, buckling of the can bottom, when the heat applied during pasteurization causes the internal pressure of the can to increase. To prevent buckle of the beer can’s top, another anti-buckle ring may be mated with the top of the can such that the latter ring captures the double-seam area on the top of the can to prevent radial displacement at key points of the top. After pasteurization, both rings are automatically removed from the can for use with another can.

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Patent No. 2033326A: Method Of Impregnating Beer Wort With Yeast

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Today in 1936, US Patent 2033326 A was issued, an invention of William F. Clark, for his “Method of Impregnating Beer Wort with Yeast.” There’s no Abstract, but it’s described in the introduction:

This invention which relates generally to the art of brewing is concerned with certain improvements in a method of and apparatus for produce ing beer or any liquid in which fermentation is an essential part of the process. For its objects, my invention aims to accelerate the fermenting process by the maintenance of conditions most favorable for the purpose, the utilization of apparatus which is simple, relatively inexpensive, and compact in size, and the production of a brew which is uniform at all times, which is superior in taste and flavor, which is free from turbidity and improved as to clarity, and in which a lesser amount of yeast or other fermenting agent is required.

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Patent No. 914787A: Wooden Barrel Or Keg And Head Therefor

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Today in 1909, US Patent 914787 A was issued, an invention of James W. Brainard, for his “Wooden Barrel or Keg and Head Therefor.” There’s no Abstract, but the first paragraph tells the tale, sort of (the OCR didn’t do the best job and I had to do a fair bit of guessing):

The prime object of the present invention is to equip an ordinary barrel or keg made up of wooden staves, with an improved head which detachably held in plate in a simple and effective manner, without the employment of extraneous fastening means, and is arranged to stiffen and strengthen the barrel without detracting from any of its essential features. It is proposed to form the head from single blank of sheet metal, and to shape the some so as to permit of the convenient application and removal thereof without making the barrel material change or alteration in in this connection, the head is arranged rel. to embrace the chime of the barrel or keg so as to incase the same in a metal shield, which rotc’cts the extremities of the staves when in and on the barrel or keg, particularly when rolling the same.

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Patent No. 6032571A: Automated Home Beer Brewing Machine And Method

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Today in 2000, US Patent 6032571 A was issued, an invention of Brad Brous, Curt N. Torgerson, Terry Dubson, and Craig A. Wright, for their “Automated Home Beer Brewing Machine And Method.” Here’s the Abstract:

An automated home beer brewing machine and method makes beer in a single vessel under automatic control. The machine and method allows making of wort for beer without requiring apparatus to be sanitized, without boiling the wort, without the use of a traditional water-filled fermentation lock, and without using a wort chiller or ice-packing of a brewing pot. The inventive single-vessel automated brewing operation allows the user to load ingredients, conduct a grain-steeping if desired, and then automatically carries out the rest of the brewing process in a single vessel, until summoning the user days later to sugar-prime and bottle the beer. Thus, the user is required to provide much less time and labor than conventional home beer brewing, and the invention also frees the home-hobby brewer of much of the current art traditionally attached to home brewing.

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Patent No. 620820A: Automatic Keg-Soaking Apparatus

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Today in 1899, US Patent 620820 A was issued, an invention of Charles Zies, for his “Automatic Keg-Soaking Apparatus.” There’s no Abstract, but it’s described as follows:

It is the object of my invention to provide an improvement in that class of troughs or tanks for soaking and rinsing beer-kegs and other casks which are provided with automatic apparatus for causing such kegs or casks to roll and travel through the tank and to deliver them therefrom, say, to a scrubbing machine. I have devised improved means or mechanism for submerging the kegs or casks in the body of water contained in the tank and also for causing the same to roll and travel from one end of the tank to the other, where an improved elevating and delivery mechanism is arranged for automatic cooperation with the means for submerging as aforesaid. I further provide an improved guard for regulating the admission of kegs or casks to the tank, the same being automatically operated in connection with the other mechanism above referred to.

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Patent No. 3647473A: Malting Grain

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Today in 1972, US Patent 3647473 A was issued, an invention of Peter Michael Howlett, and Keith Christopher Stowell, for their “Malting Grain.” Here’s the Abstract:

A process and apparatus for dehusking cereal grain by a dry mechanical method at a temperature not above about 105 DEG F., and wherein the moisture content of the grain is above about 8 percent by weight in order to damage the grain so that substantial rootlet growth is prevented without substantially damaging the aleurone layer. The dehusked grain is subsequently malted and there are advantages compared with conventional malting of husked grain.

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Patent No. 7186428B1: Method Of Oxygenating Yeast Slurry Using Hydrophobic Polymer Membranes

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Today in 2007, US Patent 7186428 B1 was issued, an invention of Nick J. Huige, Murthy Tata, Jeffrey F. Fehring, Michael C. Barney, David S. Ryder, and Alfonso Navarror, assigned to Miller Brewing Company, for their “Method of Oxygenating Yeast Slurry Using Hydrophobic Polymer Membranes.” Here’s the Abstract:

Disclosed is a an economical method of efficiently oxygenating yeast slurry without bubble formation. The method employs a membrane oxygenator comprising at least one hydrophobic, microporous membrane having a gas side and a liquid side. The yeast slurry flows over the liquid side of the membrane; oxygen is delivered to the gas side of the membrane and passes through the pores to the yeast slurry.

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Patent No. 535267A: Electrolytic Conduit For Beer Or Other Liquids

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Today in 1895, US Patent 535267 A was issued, an invention of Louis Wagner and John Marr, for their “Electrolytic Conduit for Beer or Other Liquids.” There’s no Abstract, but the description states that their “invention relates to that class of apparatus in or by which an electric current, preferably of an alternating character, may be applied to or through liquids for the purpose, among other things, of destroying the life of organisms which would otherwise cause the deterioration or souring of beer, or effect similar or other objectionable results in other liquids.”
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Patent No. 399200A: Apparatus For The Pasteurization Of Beer

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Today in 1889, US Patent 399200 A was issued, an invention of Charles V. Koehler, for his “Apparatus For the Pasteurization of Beer.” There’s no Abstract, but the description states that the “invented a new and useful Improvement in Apparatus for the Pasteurization of Beer, of which the following is a specification.”

My invention relates to improvements in the mode of introducing steam into the steaming-vats, in which the bottles tilled with beer from the brewery are placed and covered with cold water, and then subjected to heat by introducing steam into the vat containing the bottled beer and water and heating the contents to a sufficient degree to destroy the yeast molecules in the beer contained in the bottles and arrest fermentation, thus bringing about that condition of the beer called pasteurization; and the object of my invention is, first, to provide a continuous distribution of the heat throughout the water from the top downward, thus saving breakage; second, to afford facilities for obtaining an equalization of the heat of the water and bottled contents of the vat; third, to reduce the amount of the surface of steam-pipe heretofore used and dispense with the holes or perforations therein; fourth, to insure the direct contact of every part-0t the water in the vat to the steam-supply.

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Patent No. 3079925A: Machine For Plucking Hops Or Like Plants

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Today in 1963, US Patent 3079925 A was issued, an invention of Albert Edward Brookes, for his “Machine for Plucking Hops or Like Plants.” There’s no Abstract, but the description claims that the “The object of this invention is to provide a convenient machine more particularly for plucking hop flowers from their bines, but also usable for analogous purposes, such, for example, as the plucking of beans from their bines, or for separating seeds from herbs and the like.” The description continues:

A machine according to the invention comprises in combination a plurality of endless conveyor chains each incorporating a plurality of spaced and outwardly extending conveyor fingers, means supporting complementary runs of the plurality of conveyor chains for traverse through substantially straight parallel paths, a plurality of fixed parallel channels within which the outer ends of the conveyor fingers are adapted to engage during movement along said substantially straight paths, and a plurality of endless plucking chains each having a substantially straight run extending parallel to the straight runs of the conveyor chains, said plucking chains having outwardly extending plucking fingers adapted to pass between the conveyor fingers, and being adapted to be driven at a speed such that the plucking fingers on the straight run will move in the same direction as, but at a greater speed than the conveyor fingers.

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