Weekly journal-miner., 1908-12-23
CLIFTON SHELTER IS
 IMPROVED BY NEW MACHINE

CLIFTON, Dee. 1D.-Durinp ais TO. cent visit to Clifton, John C. Gill. chairman of the board of directors of the Arizona Copper Company, intro. duced new briquctting machine. which upon test proved Co be one of the most decided succcsses of the day. The machine is simple in construction. of practically everlasting durabilitv and has many advantages over the old briquetting plant both in it's output and cost of operation. In making the rest n ten'ton per hour machine was installed, wnicb was operated by n ten. horsepower engine, and enough bri. | quettes manufactured to make n five. hour trial run through the furnace. The Rause patent binder, a compost. tion of silica of soda, was used, which produces briquctte almost as hard as rock, and can be used for making coke dust, Hue dust and concentrate bri l quettes. With the use of the Rause binder the briqucttes produced are per feetIy hard and can be handled with. out loss by breakage or crumbling. which is the trouble with the old bri. | quettes. The size of the concentrate briquettcs manufactured were three pounds in weight, 34 inches deep. tapering from 2 l.2 inches at the top to . inches at the bottom, and the grea'es' advantage of the binding pro. cess is the fact that the briquettcs do not erumblc and return to dust. but smelt down the same as high grade ore without choking the furnace as in the case when concentrates are fed in in loose form.
 In the test run the usual tonnage was used for charge with the result that it was difficult to feed the fur. mace fast enough and in the fve.hour run it was clearly demonstrated that the furnace was running at the rate of about 60 tons per twenty four hours, with the exception of the first hours run, which is double the present ca. pacity of the furnace. Another ad. vantage is the saving of coke and prac. tically no fiuc dust is created.
 About two years ago it was planned by the shannon Copper Company to free itself from dependence upon the Arizona Copper Company for railroad facilities for the transportation of ore from its mines ,o its mill and smelter.
 The Arizona Copper Company owned the Coronado railroad, narrow guagc line of about nine miles, which con nected its mines and those of the Ohannon Copper Company with the smeltcrs at Clifton, and for some years the shannon Copper company has been paying the Arizona company about tl5O,00O per annum in freight charges.
 This road k so constructed that the floods which occurred annually for sev- eral years seriously crippled the road and interfered with production and tne shannon Copper Company endeavored to get the Arizona Copper Company to rebuild its line so as to avoid floods in the future, but this the latter refused 10 do and the shannon Copper Compa- ny organized n corporation to build a railroad of its own between its mines and smelter and had survey made for a new line. V
 The Arizona Copper interests asked { the shannon people to withhold action until the matter could be laid before their board of directors. As no, defn- i,e action has been taken, however, by the Arizona Copper people, and hnan- cial conditions have improved, the Snan- non people have decided to wait no longer and instructions have gone for ward to Clifton to immediately prepare for the building of this line by the shannon Copper company.
 Such line will eos, about $400,000 to build, but the saving in freight transportation of the ore, it is esti. mated, will amount 10 ss0,000 per an | mum, so that the road IS expected to pay for itself in five years. Bonds will probably be issued to pay for con struction, and the shannon Copper Company will hold the stock, giving it control.
 SUPERVISORS MEET.