A NEW INDUSTRY.

King Country Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 393, 6 September 1911, Page 5

A NEW INDUSTRY.

BRICKMAKING IN TE KUITI. The establishment of a first-class brickmaking business in Te Kuiti is something that has been badly needed, and with the brick area now in operation in the borough, the demand for a good article has rapidly increased. Messrs Jones and Hudson have ac uired a site covering three-quart-rs of an acre of land just over the railway line at the corner of Ward and Carroll streets. Experiments were first made with the clay, and after burning a few samples the bricks produced were found to be of excellent quality and red in colour. A complete plant was then put in, including a steam engine for driving the machinery and pumping water from a well on the property, and the brick maker and table used in producing the bricks. The process resembles that which would be used in a glorified sausage machine. The moist day and earth descends a shoot and mixed with water is caught in the gigantic cogs of the machine and pressed forward through a lubricated box, which turns out the clay in brick shape, but in long lengths. The clay passes over rollers to a table where an ingenious machine measure cuts the clay to the exact width of bricks. These are then removed on a barrow and stacked in the sunshine to partially dry. There is room for a quarter of a million bricks on the drying ground, and when the two kilns of a capacity of 25,000 each are in working order the monthly output will be one hundred thousand bricks. The selling price will be a reasonable one. There is ample material in the hill the firm are at tacking to last for four years, and by that time Te Kuiti should be a handsome brick-built town. We congratulate the new firm on their enterprise and wish them every success.