A MILLION BOTTLES

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVIII, Issue 46, 6 February 1928, Page 7

A MILLION BOTTLES

SOLICITOR’S TRIUMPH. MERRY-GO-ROUND MACHINE. A new British engineering triumph has been registered at the Manchester works of the Metropolitan-Vickers Electrical Company, wnero a machine capable of making a million bottles a week has been constructed. The triumph is all the more remark able because the inventive genius behind the machine is not that of an engineer but of a London solicitor. Mr Redfern, of Mark Lane, Loution a solicitor by profession with no ex perience of machine construction, set uut some years ago to improve th design of bottle-making machinery to meet the needs of a firm of which tie was a director. He obtained the assistance of ar engineer and a designer to put his plans into practical form and succeeded in producing a machine which made better bottles and more cheaply than ever before. LANDMARK IN INDUSTRY. In the bottle-making world his machine became u landmark, and its peculiar way of tackling lhe problem forms the basis of the newest developments. The new machine weighs 40 tons. In appearance it resembles a merry-go-round about 17ft in diameter aud 15ft high, ft embodies 15 complete bottle-making units revolving around a central column. Working at its maximum output the machine can pi educe over 10.000 bottles an hour. It has required a particularly high standard of workmanship. Not only has the machine to carry its rotating weight of 40 tons with perfect rigirity to ousurs accurate moulding, but it has to withstand heat, dirt, carbonised oil and particles of glass in day and night operations. The plant has been built for the Mitsubishi Shoji Kaisha of Japan.