The Pacific commercial advertiser., 1903-11-24
MEET AND
DISCUSS SUGAR INDUSTRY
: and the committee had no report ready.
HANDLING OF CANE.

HANOLl.N1 A'H S<A4NE.
C. c. Kennedy gave the most inter
esring paper of the meeting on the
Handling and Transportation of
Cane" The committee had received
replies from thirty-one plantations on
cost of transporting and handling
cane. The average cost, Mr. Kennedy
said, was not accurate as some of the
managers had overlooked such items as
cost of repairs, time of overseers. etc.
While there had been great desire
for cane-loading machinery but little
had been accomplished. Such machin-
cry is in use in Louisiana, and the
committee had been told that there is
saving of five cents a ton over the
methods in use here. In Louisiana the
, cane grows straight, while here it is
! crooked. Still, said the committee,
there seemed to be no reason why an
attempt should not be made to pet
cane-loading machinery here. Five
| cents saved on each ton would mean
| S150,O00 saved to the planters of Ha-
waii. In Waiakea and Waialua plan
! tations cane leaders have been used.
| At Waiakea all the cane is put in cars
! by leaders, and there is saving of
fifty men per day, while ten laborers
are saved by the unloaders. The cost,
put on sleds was nine cents per ton,
and for handling 11.12 cents. At Wal
alua a different loader has been in use.
| Mr.. Kennedy thought that the planta-
tions here are slow in making changes,
when labor is plenty, but once let labor
be scarce, as it is getting to be, it will
be necessary to get labor saving ma
chinery At Waiakea the wire rope
iry tn6 hu r
Horner is in use. Some people say that
fiuming is cheapest, but Mr.. Kennedy
said he didn't believe this to be true.
Mr.. Kennedy suggested also that there
must be some inventive genius in the
islands, who could remedy conditions,
and that some attention should be
paid to this feature, instead of using
/ everything for laboratory work. 1t
cost $3.50 per ton of sugar to get cane
to the mill after being cut, but nothing
is done to reduce the expense, while all
1 goes to scientific work after getting the
sugar into the mill. Mr.. Kennedy sug-
gested that money be spent by the As
sociation to stimulate the work of in
yention in this line. Such men as Hor-
ner, Grozier and Wilson had been given
no encouragement. Mr.. Kennedy said
that more work is necessary outside
the boiling house, than inside, and
thought that the managers should meet
the inventors at least half way. In
conclusion some figures were given as
i to cost of transporting the cane. On
Kauai where portable railway is used
in five plantations, the cost averages
= 41.6 cents per ton of cane, On Oahu
four places using portable railway, the
cost is Al cents. On Maui three plan
tations using railway and fiume
spend but 31.7 cents per ton Of cane.
At Kohala by wagon and fiume~ the
cost is "a cents, in Hamakua fiuming
and gravitaf{on cost 45.5 cents and at
Hilo the cost is AZ cents.
GENERAL DISCUSSION.
Mr.. Thurston suggested that Mr..
Kennedy had touched one of the most
important points in the questions be-
fore the planters, and that something
should be done to improve the methods
of loading cane out of the fields and
transportation to the mills. He said
that experiments had been made with
the Gregg cane loader which did not
show a saving over the old method.
RENToN'S> OPINION.
Mr.. G. F. Renton said that in his
opinion loading cane by machinery was
only question of time. The cost of
loading on the flimsy machine already
tried had been several cents higher
than by hand. Eva plantation had
been debating trial of the Wilson
| cane loader. A proposition had also
been made by Gregg for the sale of the
three machines, but he would have to
take chances on their success, and pre-
ferred first to try the Wilson machine.
Wilson had figured that he could load
cane cheaper than by hand.
| y MSToCKER's VIEWS.
F. B. McStocker, manager of Olaa,
said Kennedy had touched the prime
point in the sugar industry. Olaa had
| found the cost of transporting by
portable track to be seventy-five per
cent higher than by f1ume. He thought
some method of assembling the cane
was the first essential.
| MANAGER Low TALKS.
| Manager Low, of Honolulu planta-
ton, doubted the accuracy of the sta
tistics given. The Oahu plantations
all had the same system of bookkeep-
ing and he doubted whether cane could
Ue ldHuleu any cheaper imam is done
here, except by fiuming. Mr.. Low said
he saw no reason why the association
shouldn't spend money to help such an
invention, as everyone wanted to get
along with less labor. He had seen
all machines working, and didn't see
where labor had been minimized, un-
less by special superintendent. He
said it was not only a question of cut
ting the price of handling cane below
that of labor, but of doing away with
| labor. He favored the association
spending money to get a machine
| which would do the work
WILL MAKE TESTS.
In this connection Mr. Low stated
that representative of the Osborne
| corn cutter had been in the city en-
route to Australia and on his return.
expected to spend four months in the
cane fields her., in &n attempt to
| adapt the corn cutter to cane fields.
The objection Mr.. Low found in wide
burrows, this man had thought was
an advantage.