MR MOORHOUSE’S SUPERPHOSPHATE WORKS.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2695, 27 November 1882, Page 3

MR MOORHOUSE’S SUPERPHOSPHATE WORKS.

On Friday afternoon at the invitation of Mr T. C. Moorhouse, a number of gentlemen interested in agricultural pursuits, &c., paid a visit to the works at Belfast, where the manufacture of superphosphate manure is carried on. The works themselves are extensive, and fitted with the latest appliances for the production of a. manure which has achieved a very high reputation throughout the colony as a. fertiliser. A siding communicating with the Northern Railway enables the bones to be brought right into the factory, and on. the occasion of the visit there was a verylarge quantity of all kinds, including whale hones from Kaikoura, waiting to undergo the process of manufacture. The hones having reached the works are received into an upper loft. Here is the steam digester, capable of containing ten tons, and they are subjected to the action, of steam at a pressure of -401 b. The fat extracted from them is conducted by means of a pipe to a tank used for its storage, and the gelatinous matter is also extracted and conveyed by means of a second pipe to a tank outside, being afterwards mixed with the hones, which have already passed through the digester. The next process is that of disintegration. The bones having been mixed with the gelatine are placed in the disintegrator, which is centrifugal in motion, capable of making 1700 evolutions per minute, and of turning out twenty tons of dust per diem. This disintegrator is capable of being set to crush to the various sizes required from half-an-inch to the finest dust. After passing through the disintegrator the dust is conveyed through a wooden box, in which, works an endless series of metal cups working on chain gear to the upperstorey. Passing along a wooden box running from end to end of the storey, which is fitted with ports for discharge on to the screens where required; the dust goes through another process. At the far end of this storey is the amalgamator, capable of turning out one ton every ten minutes. Above the amalgamator, and connected therewith by a pipe is the tank containing the sulphuric acid, the process of manufacture of which is described lateron. This amalgamator has a shaft -tinsquare, fitted with blades, something resembling the screw of a steamer. The shaft, revolving at a high rate of speed, thoroughly amalgamates the hone dust with the acid. A square aperture in the floor allows the manure thus amalgamated to drop through into a concrete room below where it is bagged and weighed. The furnaces for burning the sulphur are three in number, and are situate on the lower floor. The sulphur is placed in the furnaces together with a pot. or square kina of crucible containing nitre and suljjhuric acid. This discharges nitric fumes, which oxydise the sulphurous acid from the burning sulphur into sulphuric acid. The three furnaces of the flues meet in a pipe eighteen inches in diameter running above the furnaces and communicating with a large leaden chamber or tank on the floor above. Alongside the pip* from tbe furnace convoying the acid is the steam pipe, which communicates also with, the lead chamber, allowing sufficient vapor to enter with the acid to form it into a , liquid state. The lead chamber spoken of is 100 ft long by 20ft broad and 12ft deep. It is, as stated, of lead, the joints being of solid lead. At various parts along the side of the leaden chamber arc glasses enabling tbe person in charge to judge by the color of the fumes the quantity of nitre required. A V-shaped gutter at the side of the chamber communicates with a small tube, through which a drop of acid trickles, enabling it to bo tested for density. At the far end is a discharge pipe twelve inches in diameter, through which the gases generated in the lead cliamber pass out into the chimney stick. The acid when thus manufactured is pumped up into a pipe leading to the tank above the amal gamator, to which reference has already been made. The motive power of the works is supplied by a ton-horse power steam-engine and a Cornish boiler 25ft by 6ft, having Galloway tubes. These were manufactured at the Canterbury foundry. In addition to the portions of the establishment already described, there is a, storage floor of concrete one hundred feet loug,° and generally the works are fitted, with every appliance for the carrying on of the business, reflecting very great credit on the enterprise of the proprietor.