[EXCLOSURE] BEET SUGAR MAKING IN EXGLAND. TIMES, January 24th

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1980, 17 March 1885, Page 3

[EXCLOSURE] BEET SUGAR MAKING IN EXGLAND. TIMES, January 24th

\i\ the end ut V.\i* month, oi a few day latu, the l,n enliani .Sugar Factory will be in full woik. 'Hie delay which lias pn eluded Messrs. Bolton and l'artnurs (Limited) from taking any deh\ei\ of beet since the tune of hanc&Ung on the fauns in October (which must have lcsultt.il in a ccitaiii loss of sacchaiinu in the loots) haabeen due to the difficulty of fitting the building with the new machinery in the tune for the opening of the manufacturing season ; and at the present moment is is only one piece of apparatus which is waited for — the whole machinery jikl plant being supplied by one of the greatest Continental firms, and constructed specially for the novel pioceb'i now to be intiodueed. Apart from the exigencies of agriculture in discouraged corn-mowing which may attract /farmers to the chances of a new crop, and apart also from the disposition of the railways to accord easy rates of carnage to the factory, there are two special reasons for expecting, even in the face of an unparalleled glut of sugai production, a better fortune for the enterprise than fell to the experience of Mr James Duncan at the Lavenham factory in 1869 to 1873 —one being the progress which has been made in anpiovement of the beet itself, and the other the new and economical process of extracting and purifying the tugar. As we pointed out in March last year, the Sugar Association of the Zollverein have developed upon their experimental farm better varieties of beet and improved methods of cultivation, together pi oducing roots richer in sugar and of a higher degree of purity from aalta which interfere with the process of sugar crystallisation ; and by selection and breeding of the plant such an advance lias been made also in France, notably by M. Vilmorin, of Paris, that growers can vow secure a heavier weight of roots per acre compatibly with the moit syrupy quality in the juice. At the factory there will appear great changes readily observable to persons who were familiar with the operations of a dozen years ago. The loads of carrotshaped roots (mviui their jrreen crowns cut off \-j the growdrt) will be weighed, but uot Ltibjected to any trimming by h*pub jUolcse, iadead, • for))}*] «nd f«9gy

toot bu dealt with now and then, For, .is theic will be no iapid i.nxp gifting up the loots into u fin* pulp, theie is no need fin caiefully parting oil the small lootlets and liblfS w Inch lisrd to go .may in the drain water— to the clogging and fouling of the biook which (lows close beside the factor}. And this waterway will not be corrupted and made pcstifeious with bl.uk char water winch used to pour from the charcoal filter?, as theie will be no such filters. The water supply will be sufficient, seeing that much less will be requited for condensing purposes than upon the old plan ; and good w iter, in addition to that of the natuial sticam has bun piovided by a couple of new wells The beets, cleansed from adheiing soil by the Mechanical stineis and bi u-hes involving in long \ats or washcis, will be ikvated to the cutter -a machine ics- ( mblmg the loot cutter used by a shep heid— w huh slices the roots into fing.-r-pieccs ; and these will be sent down a spout 01 tiough which d"liveis a piopcr clinige in tuin int.) c.ich of a '■cue-* of circular vessels, placed in a ling form of aiiangemcnt for being convenicnth charged by the spout ;ih it swings lonnd from the'oentic lik^ a ctane jib By what is called the " diflu-ion'' piocesh, water of difTeicnt teii'pciiituii •> at •ilYeicnt stipes Hows conliiiuon'-h through nil the * easels in turn, commencing as Hear water with each spent charge of beet, and gradually enriching ifrvi'lf with the juice fiom paitly exhausted charges in succession till it parses, as a tieh solution of sugar, salt, and iinpmitits, from the last vessel in which the maceration of fresh beet is begun. Each of the vessels is emptied in turn of the spent beet, which 13 carried to the pressing operation, where nny sweet syrnp remaining is made to exude— the pressed beet, however, still holding enough nutritive material to he all excellent fattening food for anininK This will be loaded upon c-uts fetching it away at tho ptice of Cm per ton ; that i«, half the price formerh paid foi the pulp as it came from the lint; pie-ses after the rasp. The solution from the beet will be boiled with limn which is teimtd "defecation," and the Inn • then piecipitated by blowinp carbonic acid ens through the liquid By the old piocess theie would tollow a second defecation, and then the tedious and expensive char coal filtci ing. But it has been oWned that the mineral earth strontia, as well a* baryta, has the property of being able to seize and enter into combination with sugar in solution Hence the liquor is boTled with strontia under presMiie; a yellowish-white sue.rate falls as a deposit to the bottom of the vessel ; the water, still holding the salts and impurities though it has parted with the sugar, is run out through the precipitate of sucrate on a screen upon the bottom of the vessel, and this material is then tieated with carbonic acid in wat«r, which breaks it up, separates and re covers the strontia, and leaves the pure sugar in solution to be concentrated by vacuum pan and crystallised in the iiounl manner. The greatest gain of tho new process, however, is that, whereas by the old crystallization process the manufacturer lost some 'JO per cent of the saccharine matter of the beer juice, which from contamination of salts could not be ays tallued and went away in the beet molasses— a product of low value— the strontia perfectly clears all the sugar from these impuiities in the way of ciystalli/ation, and extracts up to 9.") or moie per cent, of the sugar contained in the beet juice. The improvement has been vi ry widely and lapidly adopted ; and Mussis Bolton, who have mines of strontia and other uuneials at I'o.wlei. in Oxfordshire, and at Mciuup and Malngo Vale, in Somcisetshiie, w hue they inanufuetuie the natuial sulphate of strontia into the caibonatc and hydiate, send large quantities of this material to Get'many, Austiia, Fiance, and some to Russia and Holland, foi use in what is named "the ficlteibkr process " Baryta had been employed in France, but is objection tide on account of its poisonous pi opei ties, winch aie absent in stiontia; and at the hiiggestion of Captain kir Fi.incis Bolton, M Hippoljte he. play, in Fiance, patented an improved mode of uMiig stiontia, by which one opcialion accomplishes the same result that the " Scheibler " process effects in three. This method of Leplay is the one adopted at Lavenham. The process invented by Dr. Seheibler, of Berlin, is applied on the Contineut to ti eating the mohsses ; but the pioccss to be used at Lavcuhaui will almost do iway with molasses altogether, and the patent includes a cheap method for 1 eg* iterating the strontia after me, which has been a very costly item in tuating molasses. One advantage of the new manufactuie is that it is no longer a matter of piime importance that the percentage of salts in tho roots should be small. Common -alt, for instance, is an objectionable constituent in the analysis of sugar-beet, because its presence in laige quantities betrays an inferior cjuantity of sugar ; but potash m the juice is not objected to, and, indeed, as that article is woith about 24s per cv t, the sale of the ash resulting will form a considei able item of profit Mc-sis Bolton and Partners trust to meet the abnormally low price of sugar by the \ nine of their ptocess in both enhancing the \icld of sugar obtained fiom the loots, and in the various ways enumeratid cheapening the cost of pio dnction. There is also this gencial con snleiation, tint they possess impoitant offsets against the operation of the German bounties, in the fact that they will be able to supply sugar factories m England with btiontia at a lower price than that for which the chemical can be obtlined in Germany ; while it is certain that our home factories will be able to market their sugar at a much chcapct late than the German sugar can be trans potted to the same centres, Austunn and German sugar paying some 30s to .')ss pei ton freight, charges and landing expenses before it reaches our lehuers, and their produce again paying railway ficight to the interior. Coining how to the experience ot English growets of sugar-beet in ISS4, we have hefoic us the carefully con suleied and admirable report of Piofessur A. H. Chut eh, M.A , F.C S., late ot the Royal Agticultuial College, Cirencester. The extiaordinary dryness of the spung and summer told very unfavourably upon the germination or regular growth of the plant, and it was not expected that more than half a normal yield of roots would be secured on an average. However, upon b'4o acres under the crop upon 60 fai ms, the total produce turned out to be about G.SSO tons, or over 10 tons per acic. In aome instances the yield was as hijjh as 20 tons, in many cases it exceeded l.'i tona, and 111 a, few the produce was so poor as to give less than five totib per acre. On a large proportion of the farms the ay eragc was about 12 tous per aero, and the average quantity of sugar iv tho toots reached about 13 pei efiit., conespondiug to a pioduction of one ton and a half of crystalluable sugai per acre. Professor Church citts the example of the Ke\. R. K. Lomjden, who, at Brent Leigh, Lavenham, obtained 1 1 tons per acto of shapely small loots in drills Hi inches apart upon clean well fanned land, a crop which so managed in an oulinary season would hay c given at least 20 to 25 tons per acie. Mr G. H. Nunii, on 11 acres near Bury St Edmunds, grew 18 tons per acre. Mr Garett Taylor, on 10 acres near Norwich, grew 1 1 tons per acre ; the roots bung IS inches apart in the rows averaged, as they should do, less than JUb apiece, and were consequently very licit in saccharine, giving 14 1-3 per cent, of sugar. Had the spaces been only nine inches between plant and plant theie would have been double the number of plants aud a maikcd increase of augur per acre. Great stress is laid upon the importance of cleanness from weeds, especially couch-grass, of thick sowing, early thinning, careful singling, eai thing up exposed parts of roots, cutting off any " boltpd " or runaway stems, selecting the pmpor time for pulling the crop, and drawing without wouuding the root*. Aud Profwsor Church rccom.

mentis iiMiuu ing with nitiate of soda, as well as with supei phosphate of lime, though taim\ aid dung ou»ht to be ap plied to the ciop pimding tlio sugaibect \\ luio this, hiuhuuu used duectl}', especially in tlie spiing, the loots aic uneven in M/e, cu<u->e in quality, and much fanned It appeals that tiial crops have been giow n duung the past year in Suney, Beikshiie, Oxfoidshire, Middlesex, Noithamptonshire, Lincolnshire, Staffoidshirc, Worcesterslmo, Warwiekshnc, Suffolk, Norfolk, (.'ambiidgeshiie, and Fosses, ako in Wc\foid in lielaml. The v ear's uops by no mean-> ofler a snies ol exceptionally well-giown and i irh ioot-> ; yet in only four eases does the peicent age of sugar fall below 11, in sown instances it is between 11 and 12, in eight cases hetween 1:2 and ].}, in tight eases between 13 and 14, in seven tas«s between 14 and k~>, and in tlnee ease* between 1.1 and 10 4 per cent. It is encouraging to hear that the htghtst peicentngcs of sugar nic not gencially associated with the smallest yields pel acie. Piofesaor Chinch attributes most of the instances of only model ato mic cess to the faimeis ti eating sugai-bett as a fallow eiop, and to their mglecring the iiibttuutioiib given for management; and he adds an imp'>itint note on the value of the bt_et (not the pulp from the lactory, but the root itself) as cattle food. He says : — " Several of th>: fannei-, vshi> h ivugmwn the^e loots ha\e been glad to use a p.nt at least of the ci opb for feeding their '-luck : the ie,-ultrt have been in«bt s..itisf.ict(irv CheniH jI .m.ily»is o\pl«iin*i the Mipcinmtv of nilgai -beet over other voot-> fur feeding purp(iso<. While manifolds conunonlv cont.un !K) pa* cent of water, and swedes and white turnips often more, mis,mi lmetn will generally be found to average abmit 81 j)"i cent. Thus a crop of <uc,'at lnvt, ncn though it-, grnci weight may n<.t he much inoicthinoneh.dfth.it of other kind- nf .root*, will contain quite as much m>lkl nututivo nutter. Moiomn, it will pi.»sent the fmther advantage «.f containing le-s i.f tho-e -a.me mattcis which, without being of use in animal nutation, tend, bv thfir ienin\al fioni the *oil, to its exhaustion." It is necssiry to state that Messrs Bobon and I'artm rs have rcijuested then clients, thf growtrs by contract, to defer tilting any action towaids {.owing foi tin eiiMiing season until the closu of Febiimj, when the experience gained by actual woiking in the factoiy will en able them to make important decisions for the future. An impression pic vails that because of the unlookedfor fall in the sugar nuiket the enterpiibing company will not be able to pay a good price for roots But in any case they will certainly perform their contracts for the ptesent ciop; the term*, we understand, having been '20b per ton for roots delivered at the time of taking up, and 22s p3r ton when, as in tin present case, the loots have been clamped. The pioposal now under conbideiatiou is to li\ the selling value of the ciops ot ISS3 and lutuie yeais accoidiug to the quantity of &.ignr yielded per aeie ; and it is probable that stiict adherence to the scale will biing out some ciops woith, if reckoned by weight of loots, up to 2(Xs, and others down to pcihaps lite per ton. Mcsms Boltou and the influential members of their company contemplate the eventual extension of the sugai-beut industiy in many suitable districts of Kngland if the commercial results of the Livenham trial pi ov e encoui aging ; and it is veiy well known that lot depth and fertility of soil the Lavenham dihtiict has no especial advantage. Indeed, as shown by the comparative yielding of common mangolds, some tracts of laud aie capable of producing undci similar management onethird or even one half mote weight of roots per aeie thau tun be grown on most pai t of the area which has been under sugar- beet in ISM.