Rotating boiler or vat used in bleaching or scouring cotton fabric
High Pressure Blow-through Kier
Akier,keir[1] orkeeve (or similar spellings) is a large circularboiler or vat used inbleaching or scouringcotton fabric. They were also used for processingpaper pulp.
In use they were continuously rotated by anengine, steam being supplied through a rotating joint in theaxle. They were usually spherical, sometimes cylindrical, and some were recycled from old boiler shells.[2]
Kier, the cylindrical-shaped vessel, straight, with egg-shaped ends made of boiler may have the capacity to process one to three tons of material at a time.[3]
Kier boiling and ''Boiling off'' is the scouring process that involves boiling the materials with thecaustic solution in the Kier, which is an enclosed vessel, so that the fabric can boil under pressure.[4][5][6] Open kiers were also used with temperatures below 100°C (at atmospheric pressure).[7]: 102
^McEwen, Alan (2009).Historic Steam Boiler Explosions. Sledgehammer Engineering Press.ISBN978-0-9532725-2-5.
^Knecht, Edmund (1911)."Bleaching" . InChisholm, Hugh (ed.).Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 04 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 49–55, see page 50, fifth para.Bleaching of Cotton....The first operation, viz. that of boiling in alkali, is carried out in a "kier," a large, egg-ended, upright cylindrical vessel, constructed of boiler-plate and capable of treating from one to three tons of yarn at a time
