Shaft furnace for thermolytic distillation of hydrocarbon fuel

Claim 1

In a shaft furnace for thermolytic distillation of solid hydrocarbon fuel comprising: a vertically disposed, cylindrical casing; at least two vertically disposed gratings provided in the upper part of said casing such that the sides of said gratings are attached to said casing; a heat carrier distributing chamber formed by a side wall of the casing and one of said gratings; a semi-coking chamber formed by said gratings; a vapour-gas mixture chamber formed by the other of said gratings and a side wall of the casing; a gasification chamber located in the lower part of said casing under the heat carrier distributing, semi-coking and vapour-gas mixture chambers and communicating with said chambers; means for admitting heating gas into said heat carrier distributing chamber; means for discharging the vapour-gas mixture from said vapour-gas mixture chamber; means for feeding solid fuel into the upper part of said semi-coking chamber; and means for discharging solid semi-coked waste from the lower part of the gasification chamber; the improvement comprising: wherein the lowermost edge of at least one of said gratings is provided with opposing cutouts adjacent the sides of the casing, whereby the resulting dependent, central section in conjuction with the cutouts of said at least one of said gratings constitutes means for more evenly distributing the solid fuel in the gasification chamber and for more uniformly distilling the solid fuel.