"THE RIDDLE OF THE SANDS."

Sun (Christchurch), Volume III, Issue 764, 22 July 1916, Page 3

"THE RIDDLE OF THE SANDS."

For 50 years the problem of how to turn Taranaki iron sand into pig iron on a payable and commercial basis has defied all iron experts. Smelting these iron sands has been done, but the cost has been quite prohibitive. You cannot put iron sand into a blast furnace in its native state, it would either smother the fire or be blown out at the top of the furnace. All efforts to overcome the difficulty failed until the Heskett process was discovered. The Secret of the Riddle.

After 18 months of careful experi-

nient, the Messrs Heskett, father and son, and Frazer, late chief engineer for the Waihi Gold Mining Company, solved the difficulty. Its simplicity is absolutely absurd, but they have protected themselves by Letter.: Patent, and the whole secret is now made public. This is to mix the iron sand with coal dust in equal weights, and make it into coke, termed ferro coke —how easy when you know the way.

A company has now been registered at £f)0,006. The subscribing capital at £35,000, and the paid-up capital lo the inventors £25,000. The directors of the company are:—Messrs Samuel Edger Fraser, consulting engineer, Auckland; Duncan Rutherford, sheepfarmcr, Culverden; Waller Prosser Heskett, metallurgist,

New Plymouth; James Bain Laurenson, ironfounder, Christchurch; John Ambrose Heskelt, metallurgist, New Plymouth; George Frascr, engineer, Auckland. There is big money to the coming investors in this venture. The iron sands arc practically inexhaustible, and procurable at a nominal cost. The cost of manufacture is absurdly low, and the profits to be derived are extremely high. All the machinery required, as it is of a simple nature, can be manufactured in New Zealand and delivered up to date, and the duplication of the plant can be effected in a few months. The directors state they can produce pig iron for less than £3 per ton, whereas to-day pig iron is unprocurable in New Zealand at £lO per ton. This is the proposition I am now placing

before you, nothing chimerical, but a hard, plain business proposition that offers you the greatest opportunity to make money on safe and permanent lines, that you have ever had offered to you in your life, and if you do not come in now at the very beginning, while the shares can be procured on easy terms, you will never cease to regret if. The terms of subscription are extremely easy, 2/- per share on application, 2/- per share on allotment, and the balance at M- per month, extending in all for 18 months. I say you cannot afford to be out of this investment.

The Directors state that within four months the company will be turning out 75 tons of pig iron per

week, and will thus be in profit and a money making concern. A few months later they will be able to increase their plant to produce 200 tons of pig iron per week. Why this Taranaki Iron Industry Must Succeed. Because it is being controlled by practical men who know their job, and not by amateurs. Mr Heskett, senr., has been an iron and steel smelter all his life, and has installed steel plants in the chief cities of New Zealand for the New Zealand Government and private firms. He has also erected steel plants in Australia in many centres, and he claims that he has erected more steel plants in the Australasian colonies than any other man. Mr Heskett, junr., his son, is a metallurgical chemist, a specialist, and a scientific expert is

absolutely essential in modern iron smelting. Mr Fraser, the consulting engineer, was chief engineer for the Waihi Gold Mining Company for 11 years, a sufficient guarantee of hi: capabilities. Now the success of this iron proposition at Taranaki is in the hands of these capable men, all with big reputations, and the only hope of recompense they can derive is to make a success of this new Taranaki iron industry, and they have pledged themselves to do it. Prospectuses, forms • of application, and full particulars can be obtained from Joseph Smythe, sole selling agent for Canterbury, at the office of the Crown Iron Works. Manchester Street, Christchurch. .(!