£1,000,000 FOR AN IDEA.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 10765, 13 May 1911, Page 6

£1,000,000 FOR AN IDEA.

REVOLUTION IN SALT INDUSTRY

Mr James Hodgkinson. of Safford, lias sold for £1,000,000 the American rights, of a new invention which, ho : asserts, will revolutionise the whole salt industry. A telegram reached him from an agent in the United States recently saying, "Sold American rights to strong 'American-Canadian syndicate. Terms, .5,000,000 dollars and 'royalty." •

The inventor is -a Salford merchant, head of the firm of James Hodgkinson (Salford), Limited, makers of mechanical stokers :and. economisors. The invention, besides making Mr Hodgkinson, a millionaire, will have the effect, it is said, of cheapening salt to users throughout the world.

Only a week previously Mr Hodgkinfion had disposed of the Canadian rights to the Canadian Pacific Railway Company for a substantial sum. His desire was that'theso transactions in the United States and Canada should bo kept secret until the tests now being conducted at the Northwich works of the Salt Union, Limited, had been completed. The option of purchase of the English rights rests with . the Salt Union.

"It is not an improvement in the process of-sall-uiaking ; it is "ii revolution." said Mr Hodgkin.son. He says that it will produce salt four or five times as easily as the present process, will save three tons for every four tons of coal at present consumed in salt-making, will make the various qualities of salt and every.size of crystal simultaneously on one plant by the use of a. single regulated lire, will produce by a process of pure crystallisation a salt equal to the present finest ground salts, and will secure an automatic discharge of the salt from the pans. -Mr Hodgkin.son is a septuagenarian, and resides in a modest villa in Kcelos Old-road, Pendleton, within a short distance of his works. An active lite, devoted mainly to the scientific side of the- problem of economy in the use of fuel, has made inroads on his physique. "I inn surprised that the news of the American purchase has been made public." he said. "I see it is stated I. have got .£2,000,(100 for the use of the invention in America and Canada. I wish to deny that. The Canadian rights wort' sold to the Canadian Pacific Kailway,' who have found brine along their line. The sum 1 cannot state. The telegram about the sale of the American rights does not give me anv further details than that the terms are (5,000,000 dollars and royalty. They are very quick to see a good thing in America." The manner in which Air Hodgkinson conceived the idea of his patent is interesting. Four years ago he was engaged in the course of his business on the plant at the Northwich Salt Works, and he then formed the opinion that there was room for vast improvement in the salt-making process. He went home and labored at the scheme for four years, until it has. at last borne fruit. "My idea was scouted at first," he said. " 'What do you know of the salt industry?' I was asked, but 1 kept pegging away, arid now I am as certain as it is possible to be of the success of my invention." 'Mr Hodgkinson's plant consists of three covered and four uncovered pans, all heated from one fire, instead of from seven, as at present. This fire is regulated by the Hodgkinson patent stoker to ensure automatically a uniform temperature. He can so regulate the intensity of the fire by draughtcontrol that he can produce all varieties of salt and all sizes of crystal simultaneously by the one fire.

As examples Mr Hodgkinson produced four boxes containing different kinds of salt produced in this way. In the first pan. heated at a uniform temperature of anything up to l.SOOdeg.. a table salt was produced by a process of pure crystallisation finer than any previously made. No grinding or further treatment- was necessary. From the first pan the waste gases nud steam are carried underneath the other pans by a draught system, and the heat is regulated and controlled by dampers under each pan. Precipitation is also hastened by the steam fans. The second and third pans produced a dairy salt slightly coarser than the table salt, and the remaining pans, which are covered, received the gases at a considerably reduced temperature, and produced the-coarser salts used in preserving fish. The whole system forms a sequential working of a ca=cade of heat, economising fuel and usin" the full value of the steam which had formerlv been allowed to escape.

As tlicro is "nil sraoko a chimney is unnecessary. Mr Flodsikinson mentioned thai in Kndand only ahout 1,(100,000 ions of .'alt were produced annually. The ('fleet of his patent would be felt with greater force in the United States, where 4.500.000 tons were produced a year. The. Chicago moat factories alone, lie said, utilised more than England Produced. There were undoubtedly large tracts of salt in Canada, too, and the invention would give its production an impetus. .. Moreover, lie claimed that .salt districts need no longer be marred by clouds of smoke, as this new plant gives off no smoke. "Even yet," he added finallv, "I do not think I have exhausted the whole resources of my scheme. I have discovered a principle not limited hv anything I have done, but there has been verv little invention in salt-making from the time of Methuselah till now." The inventor's only anxietv at present is that he is not well enough to undertake personally the tests of the invention to be made in the United States. The appliance has been installed at Xorthwich, and the finishing tests will take place in a few days. Apart from his present invention Mr Hod<>-kinsoii is known all over the work! as an inventor of mechanical stokers and economises and has received contracts from the British Admiralty He maintains also that he has solved the "black smoke problem:"