QUARTZ-CRUSHING MACHINERY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 3247, 3 July 1872, Page 3

QUARTZ-CRUSHING MACHINERY.

A largo quantity of crushing machinery is now being rmulo at the foundry of Messrs Kincaid, M'Q«e«n, aud Co., Great King street. 'Die chief is a ten-head quart/ crushing battery, for tho Cabriel's Gully Quartz Mining Co., Tuapeka. The battery consists of two cast-iron stamper boxes, containing five heads each, each head weighing sewt., 3qrs. The stamper boxes are on the front and back delivery principle; that is, the Btuft" crushed is discharged both from the front and back. The stampers are lifted with cams, .vliich are made on what is considered to bo an improved principle. They arc of iron, and are steeled on the face to insure their wearing longer. The discs on the stamp rods are of wrought iron, faced with steel, and can bo screwed up and down to regulate the fall of the stampers. The machine is fitted with a hopper sullicicutly large to hold 40 tons of quartz. The bottom of the hopper being placed on an incline causes a quantity of stuff to escape from it into the feed shoots. The latter, of which there is one to every five heads, rest on a fixed stand at one end, and on a strong: spring on the other. When the stuff under the htiunpers gets too low, the spring supporting the delivering end of the feed shoot- is shaken, causing some of the quartz in the shoots to be discharged into the stamper box, to which we have already referred. The ripple table is 13 feet long by 5 feet wide, aud has 40 superficial feet of quicksilvered copper-plate, six quicksilver ripples, and two quicksilver wells. A practical gentleman lately arrived from the Thames, considers this table an improvement; upon those in use tliwe. The ordinary ripple table has three ripples, some four or live feet; apart, while this, it may be observed, has six. At the end of the ripple table on. which the tailings are received,-there is a slope of about a foot, and on this slope there are three ripples at regular intervals from each other. They are each about two inches deep, and contain quicksilver. The pulverised quartz entering with the water into the first ripple, mixes with the quicksilver in it. J'he tailings escape from the ripple through a row of small holes, half an inch in diameter, iv the ripple board, pass through tho second ripple, then through the third, on to the more gradual incline of the remaining twelve feet of tho ripple table. } There are three ripples in this part of the j table, about two feet apart from each other, j aa in the ordinary table—but it is in those j through which the tailings first pass that mo«t of the gold is saved. At the cud, at which the tailings run off the table, there are two cavities called quicksilver wells, which we meant to catch any quicksilver that may be washed out of the ripples. The ripple table has between tho ripples a copper surface, coated with | quicksilver. It may be mentioned that at tho Cromwell Company's claim, an ordinary table, and one of the type here described, j were in operation at the same time some time i ago ; but as this table was found to be superior to the ordinary one in gold-saving qualities, thft ordinary one had to give place j to one of the new description. The blanket table on which the tailings are discharged from the ripple table, is six feet wide, and sixteen feet long, and has four compartments. Instead of a shaking table, as is used in some machines, a concentrator is used in this. The concentrator is circular, about two feet in diameter aud eighteen inches deep. The tailings enter afe the level of the bottom of the concentrator on one side. A number of rakes revolving in it round au upright spindle, churn the contents; the light tailings, being thrown upward, escape through an opening some inches above the I bottom, while the quicksilver and gold being too heavy to escape, are retained. The amalgam barrel, which is generally of wood, is made of iron, to last longer. AJI the timber to be used on the foundation is to be black pine from the Tapanui bush. The machinery is to be driven by a reaction turbine wheel three feet in diameter, which is to have two jets. The wheel is to work up to 30 horse-power, and is to be supplied with water conveyed in pipes down a slope having a fall of 150 feet perpendicular. The piping conducting the water to the wheel is to be of wreught iron, and guaranteed to bear a pressure of SQlbs to the square inch. Messrs Kititcaiu", M'Queen, and Co., have now other quartz batteries of five stampers each,, and somewhat similar in principle to the Gabriel's Gully machine, and-atep fitted with tlje improved ripple tables, in course of construction,, or which have been just con- J struefced. Ono of these batteries, is for Mr Tnomas' Logan, of the Cai^ck retsiK It is!

receiving a great deal of extra fhiish, and special pauia are being taken to make ifc complete in every respect. It is to be driven by steam power, and the boiler, a horizontal tubular one, made in the establishment, has a furnace specially designed to barn lignite. A battery ia now complete in the yard for Mr Dyer, of Tokomainro. A battery has been made, and has just been erected for the Per»everane« Co,, Shag Ilivur. A battery i« {jeing added to the Saddle Hill Co.'s machinery, and the present machinery of that Company brought fromMelhourneisbeingalterab This ought to be sufficient to show there is no necessity for importing mining machinery. It may also be mentioned that this (inn has supplied quartz-crushing machinery complete to the Canada Hush Company, to the Cromwell Aurora and Colclough reefs, and the Jversen reef, besides furnishing parts of machinery for the Nugget and Cornish Company, the Great Scandinavian Company, and fckiuthberg's.