Tea Bulking at the East and West India Dock Company’s Warehouses, in Crutched Friars.
It is not a little strange that the importance of effecting improvements in the present system of Tea bulking, which has exercised the minds of Tea growers and importers so much of late, should have hitherto been neglected or ignored by the proprietors of the various bonded warehouses in London wherein the Tea is bulked and stored. That Tea may be, and only too commonly is, bulked by an antiquated and unsatisfactory process is a fact which is well known to all who are interested in the matter. How this result is arrived at will be seen later on; at present we desire to show that at least at one warehouse the question has received the attention which it deserves, and to explain, so far as may be possible, the steps which have been taken in the matter.
It is, then, that old and powerful body, the East and West India Dock Company, who have taken up the matter. At the instance of Mr. Du Plat Taylor, the able and energetic secretary of the company, supported by the equally energetic warehouse superintendent, Mr. Robert Adams, the arrangements for bulking Tea at the warehouse of the Company have been very greatly improved. More than this; there has been invented and set up a special and very ingenious machine for the bulking of Tea in a manner which avoids all the failings of the old system. What this machine is, and what its peculiar merits are, will best, and perhaps only, be clearly understood by a brief description of the two systems as we lately saw them in operation at the warehouses of the company in Crutched Friars, which we may mention are nearer than any others to Mincing-lane, an advantage securing to planters and importers the certainty that their Teas will be sampled by the trade generally.
Under the old system, then, each chest of a break, after having been subjected to certain preliminary formalities, is opened, and the Tea turned out in a heap on the floor of the warehouse. When this is done the Tea is bulked by means of wooden spades, each spadeful being thrown to the top of the central heap, so that it falls over and on all sides. Here the Tea lies until it is placed back again in the chests after they are tared, there being a considerable interval at some of the London warehouses between the bulking and refilling. The refilling is thus accomplished. The Tea is first put into bags and weighed on a machine at the side of the bulk. The bag and chest are then taken off the weighing machine and the contents of the bag are emptied into the chest. The Tea, however, requires some pressure to force it into the chest, and this pressure is obtained by an expedient of a very primitive kind. When the chest is partly filled a man gets in and presses down the Tea by treading on it. So soon as the Tea is all in the chest the package is properly secured, and the operation is completed.
Now the serious faults of this plan are at once apparent. In the first place the Tea, being in heaps on the floor of the warehouse with a large surface exposed to the atmosphere, runs the risk of losing a great deal of its freshness and aroma, this risk being largely increased by the doors of the warehouse being kept open in order to discharge or to receive merchandise in all weathers. No atmospheric influences are calculated to benefit Tea. Then, again, the shovelling of the Tea by means of wooden spades, and the treading into the chests, can hardly do otherwise than injure the Tea—the filling in a minor degree and the treading to a more serious extent, the result being, of course, that the Tea is depreciated.
The East and West India Dock Company have made the best of this primitive method of Tea bulking. In the first place it is insisted on in their warehouses that previous to trampling the Tea into the chests, a cloth shall be placed over it to preserve it from the dirt of the man’s boots, and to some extent from injury—a precaution which, strange as it may seem, is not taken in every bonded warehouse. Then, again, Mr. Adams, the warehouse superintendent—who could hardly have the interests of planters and importers more at heart were he “in Tea” himself—uses his best endeavours to refill the boxes with as little delay as possible, and thus to prevent it from being injured by undue exposure to the atmosphere. He also keeps the floors of the warehouse as clean as practicable. But feeling that the best efforts, however well devised, and however strenuously carried out, must necessarily be attended with but partial success, the East and West India Dock Company have erected—as has already been mentioned—a Tea bulking machine, a device which is ingenious and meritorious, and which seems to be, so far as it has been tried, a great success.
This machine, designed by Mr. Tydeman, of the company’s engineering staff, and constructed under his supervision, consists, firstly, of a large hollow revolving drum weighing nearly two and a-half tons, and of sufficient capacity to thoroughly bulk about 50 chests of Tea. The drum is made to hold about 100 chests of Tea, which leaves ample space for the bulking of the above quantity. Inside this drum are frames fitted at intervals with iron rods, and extending at varying angles from the axle of the drum to its extremity. Externally the drum has two openings for the reception of the Tea, and two smaller ones for its discharge. In a line with the axle of the drum, some height from the floor, is a platform to which the chests are conveyed by a double lift which simultaneously ascends with a full chest and brings down an empty one. Adjuncts to the machine are a weighing machine, a presser, and four beaters—of the two latter the nature and object will be immediately apparent. The process of bulking as effected by this machine is briefly as follows: The drum being revolved till its receiving openings are level with the platform, a chest of Tea is raised, as before explained, and the contents examined on the door of the drum, which falls back into a horizontal position for that purpose, then by closing the tray or door the Tea is passed into the drum. The lift then brings up another full chest and takes down the emptied one, which is at once taken to a scale for taring purposes, and so the process is continued till the break is exhausted. This filling process can be carried on at both sides of a drum at once, as there are two openings and two lifts. The Tea being in, the drum is made to revolve, when the iron frames thoroughly mix the Tea in a very few revolutions—three would suffice.
The drum has now to be emptied, and this operation is effected in the following manner:—The revolution of the drum is stopped when the openings through which the Tea is released are brought over the weighing machines—there are two for greater expedition—on which are placed the chests ready to receive it. The delivery doors (worked by levers) being opened, the Tea is allowed to descend till the chest is about half full, when the presser and beaters are brought into play by hydraulic pressure. The presser is a piece of flat iron about an inch in thickness, removable at pleasure, and varies in size to fit either a chest or a box. The beaters are four pieces of the same metal, which support the chest so soon as it is on the weighing machine. When the chest is partly filled, the beaters are released, and, by the action of a wheel, are made to strike all four sides of the chest, and thus shake the Tea down. The presser is also brought down to press the Tea in. The action of both of these agents can be regulated to any required degree of force. Thus by degrees the chest is filled, and (the supporting beaters having been released and the presser raised) is weighed and ultimately removed. Such, in brief, is the action of the new Tea bulking machine. One or two points, however, remain to be mentioned. The power by which the machine is actuated is hydraulic. The presser will not injure the Tea. The beaters serve the triple purpose of holding the chest in position on the weighing machine, of supporting it should it be of weak construction, and of materially assisting the repacking of the Tea. The beating action does not in any way injure the chests. Our readers will also be pleased to know that certain very marked improvements even upon the above described are already in hand by this Dock Company—improvements which will greatly increase the value and usefulness of their machinery for bulking Teas.
To descant on the advantages over the old system of bulking which are possessed by the machine which has been described would be little better than a waste of time. Yet some few points may be briefly referred to. First, cleanliness is secured, for from first to last the Tea is never touched by hand or foot. Again, the Tea cannot be injured, nor can it lose its aroma, for it is never exposed to the atmosphere at all. Instead of being allowed to lie on the floor of the warehouse for any period, the entire process of bulking is completed without break or delay. The Directors of the East and West India Dock Company are not, of course, so sanguine as to imagine that the old system of bulking will be at once abandoned; indeed, they have, as has been mentioned, taken steps to improve that system; they do, however, think that it should be abandoned, and to that end have adopted the Tea Bulking Machinery as an alternative, and an immeasurably superior process. That they are justified in this view there can be no doubt in the minds of those who have witnessed both the systems in operation.
The said machinery is at the Crutched Friars Warehouse alone, and it is, of course, very desirable the machinery should be adopted in all Tea warehouses. This end will be quickly brought about if those who send their Tea home, and the importers here, insist on their Tea being sent to this one warehouse that has the machinery.
What an advantage to owners and managers of Tea estates is the fact that Tea bulked by machinery at Crutched Friars is not exposed to the changeable English atmosphere, or at least not for more than a few minutes, and consequently is not so likely to be classed as “flat.” How many planters are there who, after taking especial care in the manufacture of their crop, find to their chagrin that on arrival in London (and after exposure probably for some days), the shipment is described as “flat,” and worth so many pence per lb. less than if the atmospheric exposure had not occurred.
It appears to me that very little, added to the help this new machinery gives, would now do away with all the injury the producer and the Tea has hitherto borne in the Customs. So much has now been accomplished by this machinery, the Tea is well bulked, and receives no injury whatever thereby. But two further improvements are required:—
1. That the actual weight of Tea in each chest (discarding ounces) be recorded, and that thus the loss to the producer and the Customs, detailed above, be avoided.
2. That the lead at top of the Tea be carefully replaced and resoldered, so that every chest shall leave the Custom House in as good condition as it entered it.
Very little addition to the machinery detailed above would accomplish the first. The chest ready to receive the Tea, plus the lid and top lead (which should have been carefully removed), might be weighed on the platform at the side of the big drum (by simply making the said platform a weighing machine) and weighed again when filled, with the lid and lead laid on it. The difference of the two weights would, of course, be the weight of the Tea.
The second is a question of expense; it would not be great if done systematically. The chest should be carefully opened, and the top lead removed in a square piece nearly the size of the box. When replaced, a narrow strip of lead, soldered down on either side, would make the covering complete.
Justice will not be done to Indian Teas till this last is accomplished.
Who should bear the expense? The chests are received into the Customs for the benefit of the Revenue, and who can doubt, were the question tried in a Court of Law, that they are bound to return them in as good condition as they were received. They do not, and have never done so, and I only wonder the trade has stood it so long, and has not sued them. Were the course I advise followed out, there would remain no cause of complaint, and the trifling cost of soldering on the lid again should doubtless, therefore, be borne by the Customs.
But in reality the Customs would sustain no loss—in fact, the other way. I have shown clearly at page [278] that were the weight of Tea correctly recorded, the Customs would receive in duty upwards of £11,000 each year from Indian Tea more than it does now. To re-solder the lids on the boxes would cost nothing like that; and highly as Indian Tea is thought of now, how much higher still would it stand were it not injured to the frightful extent it is in passing through the Customs.