Woolsorting Before Scouring.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 170, 18 September 1886, Page 1

Woolsorting Before Scouring.

.Ti^ l., following observations' on the above subject by Mr Charles Stokes, of New South' •Wales, 1 appear in a recent number of the Town ctnd { Country Journal: — . ; ! •il? nifti^nK how, interested your readers are in'-anything^rel&ting'to the great woolgrowing.industry, I venture to make a few remarks on jth'e manner in which wool is generally scoured on the back ■ stations,' hoping it may'draw the attention of squatters and others to this important branch in the management of Australia's chief export. It is a well known, fact to all growers and manufacturers that every fleece has at 1< a-t three distinct sorts. For instance, in a, firat-class' combing fleece we have the bulk, say two-thirds, first combing, and the balance, one part second, and the" rest thuds; of course the brands, particularly tay or pitch, should, be taken out and scoured separately. Wool -sorted before scouring iv this manner reali°es, as is well known, its extreme full value, and is fai more satisfactory to the buj er, as he thei. has it ready without farther trouble or ex pense for manufacturing, and will naturalh pay more for it. But greatly to my sur p l.se, I find matters are very different, foi instead of being sorted, as before stated, I find the whole fleece is simply put in the t>coiiring vat, and consequently taken out and washed : and, in ca-^es where the fleece has been broken in the shed and tied up with •string, which string, in many instances, is merely broken and scoured up with the wool Anyone who is at all acquainted with the delicate nature of weaving machinery knows hoW dest: uctive to it is a piece of string. Wool got up in this wav, especially when tar brands and string are left in, costs a great amount of time and money to sort after it ii scoured, as the scouiing so thoroughly blends the various sorts together that it it often impossible to separate them, and so the lot is only bought at rates ruling foi the lower kinds of scoured wool, no matter how good each sort may be individually. Juat now, when "wool is at such a low tf§>ure, it behoves all growers to have theii clip made the most of, and- to get the highest price possible, and I feel assured that once a fair trial was given, and the wool properly sorted before scouring, the result would prove so beneficial that the •- present style would become a thing of the past. Again, the wool frequently looks very well to the eye, considering its mixed state, but when handled quickly loses favour, for instead of having a nice kindly silky feel, it seems'very; harsh and dry. This, as all practical wool buyers know, is mainly accounted for, in fine wools especially, by first the scour being used far too hot, and secondly by most of the nature of the wool being perished by leaving it too long exposed to a fierce sun when drying, thus losing from say 8 to 10 per cent, in weight, which should have been retained, the result being less in price and returns. As for the locks and pieces, suppose from a shed there are twenty bales of the former from these there is generally sufficient badly stained wool to fill three bales which should be sorted out, and thereby add some 25 per cent, in price .to the remaining seventeen ; and though the three stained bales would' not realise very much, still the average for the twenty would be considerably higher. Having had many years' practical experience in this matter, I am sure it is merely a question of 'time, and we shall not see any wool in this colony scoured without having previously had a careful sorting.