DECORTICATION 



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which covers the fibres is comparatively easily removed. 

 Mechanical fibre extractors, or decorticating machines, 

 usually consist of a scraper wheel and fixed blocks, between 

 which the previously crushed leaves pass. Water streams 

 constantly upon the blocks from an overhead reservoir and 

 washes away the woody pulp as it is removed by the scrapers. 

 Planters have always found it most difficult to hit upon the 

 right machine, either because such does not exist, or because 

 machines which suit one sort of leaf do not suit another. 



FIG. 14. 



What energetic fibre cultivators in the colonies want is a 

 machine small and light enough to be at least as portable as 

 the ordinary grain-threshing machine, an effective machine 

 which can be drawn by a mule. The machine must be run 

 with a comparatively small amount of power, as the power 

 plant must accompany the machine. These qualities are 

 generally essentials, as the fibre must be cleaned within a 

 short time after the plants are cut, it not being practicable to 

 have large central works to which the heavy leaf sheaths can 

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