The spent liquors should flow off into ponds from which they may be drawn away to fertilize land.
A very convenient method of carrying beets from the silos to the washing machine is by means of a narrow canal of rapidly flowing water, flowing between the silos and entering the washing machines. Beets pitched into this stream are carried along by the current to the washers and at the same time undergo a preliminary washing. By laying out a system of channels throughout the beet yard the labor of handling is reduced to a minimum. These channels may be covered by boards on which the beets may be piled. These may be lifted and the beets thereon dumped into the stream.
A plant for the distillation of potatoes would be arranged very much after the plan of the grain distillery heretofore described except that it would have to be provided with apparatus for washing the potatoes and removing stones and adhering clods of earth. These washers, as put on the market, comprise a slotted rotating drum, which tumbles the potatoes about and loosens the dirt. When they escape from the drum they enter a washing trough where they are stirred about by revolving blades and acted upon by a swift current of water. The trough should be about two feet long to properly wash the potatoes. They are then lifted by an elevator to the mouth of the Henze pulpers (see Fig. [2]) or the vacuum cookers see Fig. [1]).
It is of advantage that the washing apparatus be so located that the potatoes as they are received may be shoveled into it immediately. The scale for weighing the potatoes as they are brought in should be so located that the manager may attend to the weighing without having to leave the distillery. This and other like details may seem of small moment but it is care in such details which conduces to the success of a plant. As before stated in describing a beet distillery, advantage should be taken of the lay of the land in laying out the plant so that the spent pulp may be easily disposed of, the spent wash carried away, and the finished product conveniently handled.
Fig. 59.—Molasses Distillery. Capacity 2,500 gallons per day.
In Fig. [59], is shown a plant for distilling molasses, designed by the Vulcan Copper Works, before referred to, and erected for the Rio Tamposo Sugar Co., of Tamposo, S. L. P., Mexico.
The molasses as before explained at page [164] being too concentrated, is first pumped into the steam mixing tank on the ground floor of the distilling building. Here it is diluted and heated, mixed with sulphuric acid and pumped into the long ranges of cooling pipes, located along the fermenting room and built on the principle shown in Fig. [4]. Here it is further diluted and yeast is added. From the fermenting tubs the molasses beer is pumped into the beer heater and thence into such a still as is shown in Fig. [32].