A NEW PROCESS

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 119, 23 May 1933, Page 8

A NEW PROCESS

ROADS AND TRAM TRACKS B|G ECONOMIES CLAIMED 'Leading Government, local body, and other civil engineers yesterday afternoon listened to an address given in the Dominion Farmers' building by Major K. B. Hinder, consulting engineer to the Cement Manufacturers' Association (rf Australia, on a new process of road and tram track construction, a development of the cement grouting system. The process has been- adopted, said' Major Hinder, as standard tram track construction in New South Wales, as standard- highway; construction in Queensland, and is being used also in South Australia and Melbourne. The address was illustrated by, films showing the process in both, roading and tram track work. , Tho principle is that of grouting;the required depth of ; metal laid and rolled on ■ a prepared' bed to obtain a solid mass" of concrete. Inl practice in the past there have beien great difficulties in applying this apparently-simple .method, chiefly in arriving at consistent results, owing to the, practical- impossibility of maintaining exact proportions of water, cement, and sand and of preventing segregation of tho three materials. Speciakplant which has been developed has enabled these difficulties to.be overcome, and it was.of this plant and tho j varying systems .of working that Major • Hinder . spoke. An essential point of the machine is that the materials, precisely proportioned, are continuously mixed to the moment the thin grout pours on to the prepared stone, immediately sinking to tho bottom of the bed and rising as the pouring continues, leaving practically, ho air pockets. The process is carried on without interruption to traffic,, and tho.'film showed- the pouring continuing while trams ran over the track under treatment. Lengths of roadway were shown reopened to general traffic within 48 hours. Much of the matter was, of course, of technical .-ather than general concern,'but the claims made for the new system are o£ general interest: that the cost of such work as applied to tram tracks is only 12 J per cent, above that of the old method of macadam construction, and 50 per cent, below the cost of standard (pre-inix) concrete construction; in addition there is no interruption of traffic. Major Hinder and Mr. J. C. Blomfield, of Auckland, who is alsp interested in the process, left for the north last' evening.

The Holy Austin Kock, at Kinver, Staffordshire, has been occupied by a family named Shaw for 120 years. Eleven members of the family still live ia this sandstone cave.