REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON PUBLICATION 253 



The next step taken in an effort to empty these tanks was a pump which 

 was a cross between a rotary and a centrifugal. A suction pipe of large 

 diameter was placed between the two rows of tanks with an opening for 

 every four tanks and a valve of the same diameter as the suction pipe was 

 fastened on to the bottom of each tank and a piece of hose was connected 

 between the valve and suction pipe. The pump was then started and the free 

 juice and pomace were pumped out of the tank into the press. A smaller 

 sized centrifugal pump returned the free juice to the same tank to keep the 

 pomace well stirred up until the whole tank was emptied. With this system 

 a tank holding 100 tons of grapes could be emptied in one hour's time. 



This system also had many disadvantages. It was costly to operate, 

 taking a lot of power and the volume was much too great for the presses, so 

 that the pomace had to be again handled in the presses before it was finally 

 disposed of. 



The next method was to introduce a screw conveyor through a manhole 

 in the side of the tank. This was run by the chain conveyor which carried 

 the pomace to the presses when these conveyors were adjusted to the proper 

 speed. Only one shoveling was necessary and very little of this was required, 

 as the conveyor being placed very close to the bottom of the tank, nearly all 

 of the pomace gravitated into it and only the last of the pomace at the bottom 

 of the tank required handling. 



To return again to the first operation, namely, crushing, some of our 

 wineries are now arranged so that the railroad cars can run alongside the 

 conveyers, which are provided with self-feeders which deliver the right 

 amount of grapes to the crusher and no more. The must pump delivers this 

 through a piping system to the fermenting tanks, and after fermentation the 

 conveyors take the pomace from the inside of the tanks and deliver it to the 

 presses. After it is pressed, it is discharged on to another conveyor, which 

 carries it away to the refuse pile, so that after the grapes are once picked 

 from the vine they go through all these processes without ever being 

 touched again. 



The time allowed will not permit me to touch upon the other branches 

 such as filtering, pasteurizing, racking, and pumping the wines, each of which 

 has gone through as many styles of refinement as those before mentioned. 

 But let me thank you for the kind attention, and beg for a little better under- 

 standing of the engineer, for without him none of these changes could have 

 taken place. 



