Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1889-09-18

/ ~ dlnZ0 ana put nln IN charge OF the
construction of the sugar house, under
plans provided by himself and his BROTH
| or.
THE BUILDINGS.
The main building is 4Sx14S feet, 26
feet nigh with tower 24x3O and ~ feet
high. 1t is built throughout of Texas
long-leaf pine, the frames, from founda-
ton to top, being 12x12 inches. BrlcB
is used for the foundation walls and
solid stone for pillar foundations. The
walls are drop-siding and the roof Is
corrugated iron. 1t has every element
of strength, being firmly built, strongly
held by innumerable iron rods, bolts
and supports. Its evident substantially
ity is commented on by everyone and
to-day there is nothing that will COM
pare with it in the sugar industry In
Kansas. The machinery floor is heavy
concrete and cement.
The engine room, aseparate building,
is 50x90 feet, 20 feet to the caves, built
of stout frames and sided and covered
with corrugated iron. 1t is practically
| fire. proof.
HOW OCCUPIED.
The first floor of the main building is
occupied by the cutters, shredders, en-
gines, pumps, dynamo, montejus, GEN.
trifugals and sugar packing depart
ment.
The second floor is occupied by the
cleaners, CHARTERS and diffusion bat
terry. On this floor is the hot room con-
tanning the sugar wagons.
On the third fooris the Yaryan evap-
orator, the vacuum or strike pan and
the sugar storage room.
| On the fourth floor, in the tower, are
the condensers of the evaporation and
strike pan.
The fifth and sixth floors hold the
water tanks from which the mill gets
the water-pressure. These are supplied
from the cistern heretofore mentioned.
The top tank is " feet from the ground
and affords pressure Of 35 pounds to
the square inch when the water reaches
its destination ON its downward course.
Through this tank passes in twenty
four hours about 100000 gallons of
water.
AODUS OPERANDI.
Starting with a load Of cane at the
scales by the side Of the Office, the IN
DEx will follow it until it is on the car
and carried out on the main line over
the switch built around the lake to the
works.
The wagon, loaded with perhaps a ton
and half of cane, without the heads,
which haye been cut off at the farm, for
convenience, backs up to the cane shed,
or platform, SOx200 feet, built at the
height of the cane frame, and with
room for holding 200 tons. A rope at
tached to spool on a shaft leading in
to the building, is fastened to rope,
fastened around the load; the spool is
started, and in just thirty seconds the
load is dragged to the side of the car
rier.
The carrier is an endless chain, three
feet wide, each link being on wheel
that runs on a smooth track. The cane
is dropped on this lengthwise. by four
men, as fast as they can pick it up, and
it is carried to the cutter. This carrier
is 100 feet long, half of it being up at
all times. 1t will carry all the cane
| that can be loaded on it..
The cutter is an improvement on the
H. A. Hughes pattern; it has 2 knives,
8 feet in length, three quarters of an
inch thick, At inches wide, of the finest
steel and it makes 200 revolutions per
minute. 1t can cut 500 tons of cane in
twenty-four hours and during several
runs already made it cut 20 tons per
hour, equal to $50 tons in day and
night. 1t has two sets of knives, and
others may be supplied at a small ex-
pense. There appears to be no limit to
the thickness of the pile of cane it will
cut: it goes through pile eight inches
deep and SO inches wide as easily as it
cuts single stalk. The builders say it
will cut two-by-fours into kindling
wood without hurting the knives.
When cut into pieces an inch long,
blades on, the cane drops into a pit
from which it is lifted by chain and
rake elevator to the cleaners. This ele-
vator rake is 6x1S inches, with one-half
inch iron fingers, 6 inches long set
in iron heads, run in angle iron chan
nels.
The cleaners or fans, 8 in number, fan
the leaves and all dust ard dirt out of
the chips. carrying the light particles by
blast fan and suction out through a
pneumatic tube, 200 feet from the bull
ding into silo, place che reader will
be taken to later.
/ From the cleaner the chips are drop
ped on the Hughes shredders. cylinders
made something like the rotary board
planners. These cut the strips into
shreds, as fine as may be desired. This
is done that the water may better force
the juice out, the chips being now very
small. about like fine tan-bark.
From the shredders the chips are
again elevated and landed on belt
conveyor which runs in trough over
and to the side of the diffusion cells.
Along this trough are gates, and by
opening one across the trough, the belt
passes under the gate and drops out the
chips into the cell to be filled.
DIFFUSION.
| The diffusion cells are the heart and
vltals of sorghum sugar PLAINTIFF di-
| tiwra l. TTya-
cutter and shredders are the mastica-
tors, the elevators and carrying trough
the alimentary canal, but the diffusion
cells are the digestive organs. Every
| intAlliOAnt reader of this dau knnuS