NEW ZEALAND POWELL WOOD PROCESS, LTD.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1088, 29 March 1911, Page 20

NEW ZEALAND POWELL WOOD PROCESS, LTD.

•This company is an offshoot of the English organisation which lias been in existence about nine years, and which during that period has been the means of installing eminently successful branches in India, Western Australia, America, New Zealand, and Germany. The means by which the lifo of timber could be prolonged has long provoked tho study and thought of tho most scientific minds, practical and theoretic cal, but with only partial success until the discovery in 1902 by William Powell, managing director of Crossfield, Ltd., the large sugar refiners. Exhaustive experiments were made by well-known scientists, and as a. result tho process was patented in 1904. In connection witli the New Zealand Company, a portion of the capital has been subscribed in tho Dominion, and it may bo stated with confidence that in the comparatively sliort period of about three years, the institution is a thorough success, and doing a sound and rapidly-increasing business. The head works of the company arc at Rangataua,-on the Main Trunk line, and almost midway between Wellington and Auckland. Tho plant at Rangataua has been erected on five acres of land, and connected N with tho Main Trunk lino of railway with a siding. Tho cost of installation, roughly, has been about £20,000. The motive power throughout the works is electricity, which is generated by a Bellis and Morcam 90-li.p. engine, directly coupled to a Ga-kilowatt generator-. The buildings occupy a space three chains long by one and a half chains wide, and comprise engine-house, treatment vats, drying rooms, and an electrical traverser, which handles 40 tons of timber at one time with the greatest ease. The treatment vats are each 36 foot long, 10 feet- wide, and 10 feet high. It is of some interest to explain that tho essential part of the process consists in boiling tlio timber to bo treated

in a saccharine solution, after which tho material is artificially dried. No mechanical force, either pressure or vacuum, is used throughout the proccs. There have been, and still are, other processes. Hitherto; numbers of them in existence have consisted in impregnating the timber with mineral salts, such as creosot-ing, barnettising, and kyanising. . . Some of these salts are highly poisonous, and their great weakness in other respects lies in the fact that they do not possess the necessary vegetable affinity with wood. In the Powell process, a vegetable »olution is applied to a vegetable tissue, and tho absorbent sympathy, as it were, between the liquid and the solid produces absolutely 110 injurious effects on tho timber treated. When the saccharine solution is applied to the timber it enters into the very heart and centre of tho wood, but not as a foreign material. From this it will be seen that tho treatment is of the simplest description, and iu this respcct it satisfies tho first conditions laid down for an ideal proccss. The opinion of Professor G. S. Bulger, F.L.S., Lecturer of Botany, Geology, and Forestry in the City or London College, on tho Powell process is tvorthy of special note to all interested. In his great book on timber, now regarded as a classic, he states:— "Powcllising consists in boiling wood in saccharine solution witfr out pressure, and so as to expel air and moisture, and coagulate the albumen (i.e., tho wliiteish parts carried in the walls of tho timber), and then drying it at a high temperature. The processed wood will take paint or varnish, and is completely immune to tho. attacks of . Haying no un- ;

THE PROCESS DESCRIBED. AN ENTERPRISING COMPANY.

pleasant odour, Powcllisod wood is adapted for furniture as well as for paving or railway sleepers, whilst a slight modification of tho treatment protects it from attacks of termits (i.e., borer and white ant)." When received for Powellising purposes, tho wood is preferably as green as possible. It is then placcd in the cold saccharine solution, and the temperature of tho wholo is then gradually

raised to toiling point, and maintained at that temperature for ' somo liours. The length of time depends on the size and nature of tho timber treated. Tho boiling point of saccharine solution is two or three degrees above that of water, and moisture, in wood, such as sap is thus converted into steam, which escapes with the air. When the ebullition of air and steam ceases, as shown by tho cessation of rising bubbles, the

boiling is stopped, and the solution is allowed to cool slowly, and in this process it is absorbed into the wood, penetrating into every portion of the treated material, and thus replacing the previously expelled sap and air. Tiio timber is removed when the solution is cold, and it is then placed in special drying chambers, where its moisture contents can be roduced to less

than one per cent. of. the dry weight, of tho wood substance proper. It has been found that tho saccharine solution forms an excellent vehicle for conveying other substances into tho wood, thus being able to replace tho sap on which the dry-rot fungus germinates and lives. It may bo mentioned that the replacement in question is an anti-septic, proof against the attacks of all fungoid growths. 'Jlie. Powell process was first introduced into this part of the world in Western Australia in 190(3. Tho company installed works in Western Australia in order to demonstrate the value of tho process on Australian timbers. The Western Australian Government spent large sums of money in thoroughly testing the claim put forward by tho company, with the result that the State has now erected Powell works for treatment of all timbers utilised for tho maintenance and construction of

railways; Last year in Western Australia no fewer than 350,000 railway sleepers wero processed. Not long after tlie Western Australian installation, an influential company was formed in New South Wales, and has practically revolutionised the timber trade in the great commercial centre, which practically extends into Queensland and Victoria. Amongst the most notable customers of the New

South Wales Company aro the Railway Department, the Harbour Trust, Government architects, and tho City Council. The latter has purchased no fewer fhan 5,000,000 wood paving-blocks. A largo number of these have been down for four years, and are giving every satisfaction to the mmucipal council. Tho New Zealand Company was formed in 1907, and although the process at

first mot. with a certain amount of scepticism $ the omphalic results obtained by the New Zealand Government, as well as by private individual tests, lias been so satisfactory as to lead to largely increased orders. The company recently acquired t magnificent birch forest near Raugataua of SOOO acres. Two sawmills h;ivo been erected— critics say two of tho finest mills in tho Waimarino forest. They arc connected by steel trams five miles in length, and alSo with the process works by a steel tram which at one section tunnels beneath the Main Trunk line. Tho construction of this tram was based for a quick delivery, and this objcct haß been achieved. Tho cost, of this undertaking was £30j000. l'owellised wood is being used in largo quantities for slc-epurs, bridge timbers, flooring, and lining, and furniture. Owing to its timbers being absolutely

impervious to the attacks of dry-rot and other destroying influences peculiar to timber, it is being largely inquired for in India, South Australia, and other countries where timber parasitic growths are so prevalent. Orders have even come from these places to New Zealand, but the company is unable at present to /take advantage of thfeso offers, owing to the extreme pressure of their Now Zealand business. New Zcalanders, remarks an expert, have not yet awakfUfd to the fact that red birch is one of their finest timbers." It has a long compact fibre, extreme strength, is suitable for any building or constructing'purpose, and when Powellised is in no danger of warping or splitting.. _ , The New Zealand Government Railway Department is installing a large Powellising plant near Kew, Invercargill, for treatment of railway sleepers, and timber required by the Government Department and railways in tho South Island, and under royalty to tho Now Zealand Powellising Company.

The Alfa Laval crcam separators are the subject of a special advertisement in this issue by Messrs. ,G. Clark ami Sons, Cambridge and Hamilton, who are the local agents for it,. Six hundred acres of laud, all in grass, and well subdivided aud watered, is advertised for salo by Mr. Stanley M, Dixon, land agent, Mangaueka. Mr. T. Lidstone, Main Street, Ohakuno, bookseller, stationer, and newsagent,, inserts n special announcement in this issue. Mi. Lidstono keeps a stock of the latest books, aud periodicals arrive weekly. ' • Messrs. G. M'Candlish and Hill, land agents, Waikato, have properties for salo, comprising both sheep and dairying country. Upon application the firm will forward their property list, and any information relating to the northern districts requited. In tho 1 Waikato, Messrs. J. B. Scott and Co., land agents, have a large number of excellent dairy farms for sale, 'i'lio firm inserts ft special announcement iu this issue giving particulars of several of theso farms, Messrs. Roche and Macgrcgor, stock and station agents, Hamilton, Waikato, advertise in this issue particulars of a number of up-to-dato dairy- farms. Theso farms range in sizo from 3100 acres to 150 acres. All kinds of medicines can lie had at all hours at Mr. C, Ridd, chemist and dental, surgeon, Olmkune, v A largo, slock of photograplric'plates and'chemicals, etc., are kept on hand.