SUPERIOR BRICKS LIMITED

Hutt News, Volume XXII, Issue 2, 23 June 1948, Page 7

SUPERIOR BRICKS LIMITED

Progress in the establishment of the works of Superior Bricks, Limited, at Tawa Flat is well advanced. The whole area required for the Brick and Pipe Making Plants, tunnel kiln and drying sheds, switch lines and other facilities has been excavated and levelled in preparation for. the factory buildings. Streams in the property have been diverted and culverted and the formation of approach roads and internal site roading is proceeding rapidly. To assist in this roading the Company is in the process of installing a complete metal crushing plant at the quarry on the site, the plant to be in operation at an early date. Subsequent to the formation and metalling of the roads crushed metal in all grades will be on sale to the public. This is the nearest source of supply in .this rapidly developing area. Plans for the Tunnel Kiln have arrived construction of the kiln will be put in hand immediately. The ' Tunnel Kiln is an innovation to this country as applied to the brick making industry, although a similar type of kiln is installed for the making of roofing tiles. Unlike the' old type of Hoffman kiln, which had to be sealed during burning and opened up when the batch of bricks had fired, the tunnel kiln is continuous in operation. The dried bricks are stacked in a special way in lots of 2000 on heat resisting trucks, which travel slowly through the kiln in a continuous train, picking up heat en route in preparation for the intense heat of the burning chamber. Thereafter the bricks proceed through steadily cooled air to the discharge end of the kiln, where they are lifted, 500 at a time, by special automatic and mobile stackers and loaded to stock piles or on to wagons tor immediate delivery. The time taken for one truck of bricks to pass through the kiln is approximately 84 hours, which is about a quarter the time now taken by present methods in manually operated kilns, and at no time is it necessary for men to enter the hot kiln to stack bricks or remove them. For both the Brick and Pipe making plants, the clay and shale rock will be mechanically excavated by power shovel and loaded into powered dump trucks, which in turn will discharge directly into the loading hoppers of the mills. As the .working faces of the clay and rock deposits are elevated some 2 5 feet above the general level of the works all material will be gravity fed to the brick and pipe making machines. The natural advantages or this layout, coupled with the highly mechanised plant, will simplify production and speed up maximum output with a small labour force.

The works are situated in a rc-, mote valley to the East of Linden, and will not be visible from the main area of Tawa Flat. It is the intention of the Company to make these works a model industrial layout with good roading and landscaped areas. As portions of the area become worked out they will be levelled and formed into recreational spaces for the surrounding district. —Advt.