THE BELL CODEMAN RAFRI GERATION PROCESS.

Clutha Leader, Volume VI, Issue 335, 12 March 1880, Page 3

THE BELL CODEMAN RAFRI GERATION PROCESS.

: The following Jetter appears in the Australasian: — , ; 'Sir,— -In my last letter T mentioned that the Sydney .Abbatoir-Commis-sioners had:' strongly recommended the New South Wales Government to construct a chilling- house oa Glebe Island. ThaUreoommeudation lias been adopted, .the BellrColman process of refrigeration approved", ami an order sent Home for two of their most powerful engines,, to Be shipped as-early as possible. lam also* advised thVit the. Corporation there have had brought under their consideration the 'erection of a refrigerating market, for the reception and preservation, till sold, of butchers' meat, &g. These efforts,- in addition to the existing facilities afforded by Mort-'s establishment, will place the neighbouring Colony far ahead of Victoria in tbe first start of the meat sbipoing trade ; and that a start. will be made speedily, and on as considerable a scale as circumstances permit, cannot now be doubted. I suppose the expense of conveying carcases f.o.b. hereto London will run about lsd per. Ib. That is, making liberal allowance for the Colonial cost, they wrH be placed on the London market for little over half the price they—according to Strathleven precedent — will realise there. .Th«re need be no more question of "sending round the hat" to get up stock for shipment ; the pressure will be all the other way, by stockholders to secure refrigerating freight room, to reach so remunerative a market by so safe and sure a system. 'In "those circumstances the Victorian pastqralinterfist will, no doubt, be ready enough to co-operate with their town correspondents and the patentees in opening "up the trade from Melbourne. Indeed, from the number of letters and inquiries I have already received from different parts of the interior, it would seem that tbe bush districts are morealive to the prospects of the trade, and more anxious to take immediate action in the matter than your townspeople. Messrs W. Sloane and Co. have taken up the Victorian agency, and are advertising the business. They will furnish details of sizes, powers, and cost, &c, of machinery, for land depots. Here, therefore, 1 will only generally state that they are made from small power blowing 1 , say 150 cubic feet of air per minute, at 40 degrees below zero, and capable of chilling a space of about 7000 or 8000 capacity, up to very large power, saying blowing 2000 cubic feet per minute of same intensely cold air, and capable of chilling depots of 70,000 to 80,000 cubic feet capacity, and at prices varying from L4OO up to L3OOO. The air discharged from the engine at above intense degree of cold is distributed over the whole spac * operated upon, lam advised, as an illustration, that in Waterford, where the process is largely used for bacon-curing, the •' chilling-room " reduces sides of bacon in 12 hours to 40 deg. Fahr — i.e., "sets" the bacon. On the other hand, where the carcases are to be frozen hard they are hung under a main opening so as to receive the full force and intensity of the cold blast. The Stratbleven quarters of beef were thus frozen solid in 48 hours ; the mutton, of course, in very much less time. T t is easy enough afterwards, when packed away, to keep the carcases frozen. The refrigerators are -fitted with steam cylinders to drive them. The only Colonial extra required is a boiler to raisa the steam. This is sot a considerable item. The chilling depots must be specially Constructed, or if an ordinary room or loft Js used, it must be fitted with nonconducting walls. I see one of the most recently constructed refrigerator rooms in the United States thus described :— 6oft. long by 20ft. wide, by 12ft. high, raised 4ft. from the earth, wooden building, sheathed outside and inside with $ inch tongued and grooved boards, white painted, fitted between with Bin. of sawdust, floor ashphalted. and lined throughout with galvanised iron. Should sawdust in quantify not be available, I believe a double lining qf felt attached to the sheathing, and an airspace left between is as £ood. This seems simple enough, and not pxtravagantly expensive. A Bell-Coleman refrigerator, powerful enough to operate, even* in .the hot weather, on such a sized room as above, would be landed in the Colony under LIOOO ; and such a room should hang about 300 carcases of beef, or, of course, a proportionately larger quantity of mutton. The engines in OUT list are either larger or smaller than would- suffice for exactly the above space, but they can be made to order of any power. A larger size is raost in demand either for ocean or land purposes,, viz., that blowing 600 cubic fret of cold air per minute. It would chill a room of about double the above capacity. The carriage of country killed and chilled "meat to town by rail would be no difficulty. The evidence of Dr Williams* as- tb- the Philadelphia meat market is as follows : — " The best meat is farniters 1 meat, country killed and sent 240 milesr; It is'very much in request. MeaMjroiight 1500 miles is better than town killed, but not so. good as faruieis'. NlQi special carriage is required for : the conveyance of Jneat- 100 or 150, miles ,. bu^l is'fbrHong' -distance's^'- . . . ; ; The temperature is kept . at 30 deg,i, .. The oars^i;e >^p f t r §x^ens.i,v.e ir ' „/ T . „ . The relfigef4titi^ / wagg6iis ;: are' ! Bift. by 3Of«a£fepofc? MB double, with nori^

conducting substance^ between, fitted with an ice-box over which the iiii* passes. The meat is delivered, looking as if killed the night before, alter coming .1000 or 1200 miles." ,- -.- - , And as to our own experience in the Colonies,, Mr -Farquhar, the Mort Company s manager, says that "refrigerating cars are not necessary for even louy: distances here. If the meat were killed* and ' set ' nt up-cou-ntry stations when killed, and put into a non-conducting (double-sided) ear, it could be carried in the summer from Wagga or Dubbo to Sydney without any ice. Carcases are conveyed in that way from Bo wen Falls in the hot summer months, and when the truck arrives in Sydney there are only a few degrees difference in the temperature." If meat merely "set" — that is, reduced to nbout 40 deg.— can be Curried in ordinary cars so great distances, it is very plain that carcases actually frozen would bo abundantly safe in transit. But refrigerating rjars, if preferred, could be constructed and used at very little extra cost. To summarise, we require killing and chilling depots at stations on your railway lines convenient to growers, and carcase markets in towns (chilling" depots) to receive, accumulate, and distribute "set" meat to the trade for local consumption, and frozen meat to exporters for shipment. Like the New South Wales Government, your Government would do well to erect a chilling-house aY your abbatoir on a large scale, if only as a sanatory measure. Sooner or later they muse do this. So should your Corporation erect on a scale worthy of Melbourne a refrigerating market for the conservation and sale of butcher's meat and perishable edibles generally. But I expect and hope that, as a matter of ordinary mercantile business, many enterprising private persons and companies will appreciate tbe opening th<tt now offers for a new industry, and show those corporate bodies the way. Should their action anticipate the shipowners' (which is not likely), they will still obtain, independent of the export trade, sufficient and remunerative support in the local market, for who would not prefer meat country killed and hung till matured and palateable, as against the flyblown abominations, tough and almost hor from the shambles, that we are now all through the hot season compelled to US3. Trusting that the action of the Victorians will be as liberal and successful in making* their port the chief Colonial entrepot for the export carcase as it has lon^ been for the export wool trade, — I remain, &c, Dugd. Littlk. Agent for Bell and Ooleman. HobartTown, Feb. 10. 1880.